Cut your spending if you want to grow rich.

Picture a millionaire – someone who’s rich in assets and free of debt. What kind of job do you think this person has?

Probably a lucrative one, right? After all, most rich people are surgeons, investment bankers, and high-flying lawyers – not your average middle-income earners.

Well, if that’s your picture of prosperity, it needs to change. Why? Because wealth isn’t just about how much you earn. Instead, it’s more about how much you spend and how much you save.

The key message here is: Cut your spending if you want to grow rich.

Being smart with your investments is the key to becoming wealthy. But before you can invest, you need to save. After all, if you burn through your salary every month, there’s never going to be anything left over to invest.

So, if you want to become wealthier than the average person, you can’t spend like the average person. You have to spend less. 

This is a trick that many rich people already follow. Don’t believe it? Then picture the car you think the average millionaire drives. Is it a Porsche? A Ferrari? A top-of-the-range Mercedes-Benz? If that’s your best guess, you’re miles off. The average American millionaire drives a Toyota.

And what about their houses? If they’re not blowing their money on cars, surely they’re splurging on their homes, right? Think again. 

According to Thomas Stanley, an American wealth researcher, most million-dollar homes aren’t owned by millionaires. Instead, those houses usually belong to non-millionaires with high standards and even higher mortgage payments. In fact, only 10 percent of millionaires own homes worth more than a million dollars.

Simply put, wealthy people are generally frugal people, and their lifestyles are often nothing like the lavish ones we associate with the rich. Because they spend little, they can afford to invest a lot. That’s the real trick to growing your wealth.