4 Uncovered Truths I Discovered Why My Chinese Friends Are So Good in Business and Money

High rates of return for a small investment are not part of the equation

Most of the Chinese guys I know are wealthy.

It is not evident because they do not flaunt it.

They don’t damn care if they wear the same shirt all day or ride a low-cost scooter to commute every day.

As long as they get the job done and everything is A-Okay

When you scroll down the business news, most of the successful people are Chinese. In fact, out of the ten wealthiest people here in the Philippines, seven are Chinese.

When other people see them along the street, the first impression they have in mind is that these people with chink eyes are greedy.

And I disagree

We should not resort to stereotyping.

My wife and I have many friends who belong to the Chinese community.

Most of them are humble and — smart when you get to talk to them.

I have always been curious about their skill in handling and making money.

I even told my wife to seek tips from them. So that we can employ some of their practices in our daily living

You see what they are doing — but you wonder how they are getting the wisdom and implementing discipline as young as thirteen.

And there are no dark secrets behind it.

Most of them succeeded even if their venture is a traditional business.

You do not need to spend lots of time on the internet.

You will never hear silly rants or blame stories against their parents.

They own up to their finances and stop playing victims.

1. Ecosystem of prosperity

We met our Chinese academic advisor back in 2018.

Let us call her Noemi.

She is simple and dedicated to everything that she is doing.

Like us, she is also into homeschooling her kids.

My wife has an ear-ringing sound problem lately so, Noemi referred her 79-year-old doctor acupuncturist.

The clinic is near her pharmacy business.

One day, my wife — after her check-up paid a visit to Noemi. She also met the latter’s sister that also holds practice in the same place as an optometrist.

Their uncle owns the land that they are renting.

That uncle’s space was rented mostly to relatives and trusted friends — all of them belong to the same race.

That uncle also owned a sweet cake business which, is high on sales during the Lunar New Year festivity. And they as well bake good pastries that come in tasty varieties.

His clients who are known to the industry happen to be good friends as well with him.

And again, most of his clients were Chinese.

What I am trying to say here is Chinese families serve as a support system.

Family ties serve as an anchor to their prosperity through a fiscal ecosystem.

And this practice has been nurtured and carried on towards the next generation.

Even conservative Chinese families observe the tradition of tying the knot to fellow Chinese only. And within that marriage, they will build strong alliances and optimize those synergies as they continue to grow their wealth.

If you happen to come across their history, early overseas Chinese did not own land and needed to survive through business.

No unemployment benefits.

No free healthcare.

Overseas Chinese are literally on their own. There was no support from the foreign government.

In response to this challenge, what they did is to have established tribes that help support their fellow countrymen

And this is one of the primary reasons why the Chinese thrive in business.

The ability to make money is driven by — a strong economic community.

2. Ingratiation of money and business at an early age

My wife and I had a Chinese friend back in college.

She was funny and carefree. The first impression about her is that she seemed not to care about her studies.

But you know what?

She was impressively good with numbers — and her comprehension was fast.

One day, my wife had those itching moments to drop by the mall with a group of friends. Her Chinese friend begged off because she had duties to perform at that time in their family business.

When they paid a visit to their convenience store, they saw that friend doing things that other social status-sensitive people beg-off

She would take inventory of their goods, carry stuff from here to there, talk to customers and take charge of the cash register.

The mom was so down-to-earth. She didn’t mind riding a thrifty motorcycle — keeping their overhead low.

The friend’s brother also had a computer shop across. So that was the reason why that friend was good in numbers.

Her streetsmart skills were due to her work at an early age.

Wherein money-making was already ingrained in their system when they were kids.

At some extremes, the Chinese regard work as equivalent to life.

You do not need to take this route when you cannot differentiate between business and personal life.

But the point here is if you want to have a strong business ethic like the Chinese

Establish the foundation to be good at wealth-building by beginning with the roots by starting them early.

3. Live and breathe the teaching

When you cross-path with friends or join them for coffee, it is normal to have exchanges about each other’s personal stories. And if you run out of it, you shift on other people’s stories.

Back in college, I got to join their circle of a friend because they were block mates in several subjects. My Chinese seatmate shared a lot of stories about making money.

He mentioned his side hustle of selling rubber shoes for a neat margin.

On top of that, he said that he and his friend partnered on a water distilling business. At the back of my head, I was amazed that a young man, venturing into a lot of stuff even before graduating from college.

What I notice is Chinese people love to talk about business to whoever is in front of them. May it be a business partner, a classmate, friend, or neighbor — they bring the money-making topic to the table.

It may seem an excessive admiration for money geared towards their ambition.

But it is just part of their system that is merely living and breathing the teaching.

4. Art of negotiation

My wife and I are into the property management business.

And most of the tenants we have are Chinese from the mainland.

Before the pandemic, our rent payment terms require post-dated checks.

That is a non-negotiable feature — and they need to submit. Checks are the common medium of payment favored by guys in real estate like me.

Checks are not an absolute payment guarantee — but it has inherent controls around it that give us a bit of security.

For some reason, Chinese tenants prefer cash or online payments.

Our local bank rules seemed to be strict on them. Most Chinese find difficulty securing formal documents to establish a checking account to comply with our deal so, most of them tap their companies or locals to guarantee checks needed for the rent.

During the pandemic, rent rates were down as crazy — and it was hard to close the deal.

Since they knew it was a buyer’s market, they leveraged that they pay online for their convenience.

Learning from our previous unit viewing, we were close to having one Chinese client sign the contract — except that we did not submit their request to change the bedframe.

We told them that there is no other place to store the extra bed — and everything is on an as-is-where-is basis given that the rates were already low at that stage.

That client walked away.

They do not care about your business problems unless it outweighs their benefits. And they knew there were many units for rent — and they do not want to tire themselves.

So the next time we came across the next Chinese client, we submitted their request.

Say yes to no checks and change the beds.

There is some risk in there — but if you say no, most probably they would walk away.

Choose your risk.

Earn some money or do not earn at all?

If you want to thrive in business, learn the art of negotiation. Know when to walk away.

Final thoughts

Building wealth requires hard work.

It requires a lot of persistence while you wear a consistent attitude of hopefulness.

Learning from the Chinese, you have learned the importance of clans geared towards ambition with the thought of passing it on.

They live and breathe ideas of generating money — and then they execute afterward.

It also proves to show that negotiation and knowing when to walk away is a lifelong skill.

This skill is what every business or investor must learn along the way.

And this is the very reason why the rich keeps getting richer. Even if you are not rich, you can be one if you practice this set of values.

Whatever life gives you, make the best out of it.

Drop being a social status sensitive freak and stop playing the victim if you are experiencing adversities.

Learn from the Chinese who owned up their lives and took charge of their achievement.