Just to jump in the brewing flamewar...


So if I tell you a story about my cousin Timmy, and how he died from sticking his finger in a light socket, and that you shouldn't stick your fingers in light sockets, does my advice suddenly become invalid if you find out I never had a cousin Timmy?


What if it were a story about two ancestors of mine, Adam and Eve?

Cashflow game while is a average game, it is a excellent simulation and puzzle. BGG is a boardgame site and BGGers are used to playing great games and will not tolerate average games.

I like the Cashflow game because it teaches people about investing in less boring, casual way. I prefer reading and watching DVDs about investing. Books and DVDs are cost effective and time efficient ways of learning for me. However according to motivational speaker John Maxwell, most people stop reading books after they leave school, whether that is graduating high school or college, people stop reading. I like that Cashflow can introduce advanced investing concept without reading a book. I can convince people to play a game about finance, I have a much harder time convincing someone to read a book or watch a DVD about finance.

As for me, I have read about over 15 books on investments and have a small portfolio of stocks that is doing above average. I even dabbled into day trading foreign currencies. I can read charts and graphs, use technical indicators and understand the financial section of a newspaper and so forth. Thus, I am what Wall Street calls, a sophisticated investor.

I am no ways rich but I am on a learning journey of investments and Kiyosaki is one of many teachers that is helping me on the journey. However I do have two college friends that own income property because they were inspired by Kiyosaki. I gave my parents, a copy of Kiyosaki book three years ago, who had no investment knowledge, they are about to build their 2nd condo now.

Investment plans are like diets. Most of the them work, if you work the plan. Low carb, low fat, low whatever diets work if you follow it. If you follow a diet plan not as a fad but a life style you will lose weight and keep the weight off. Most financial plans, including Kiyosaki's plan will also work if you follow it. What Kiyosaki is teaching in his game is basic information, reduce spending on grown up toys like fancy cars and fancy clothes, and increase spending on things can make you money like income property and stocks.

I own about 60 games found on BGG and they are by far more fun than Cashflow game. However I have yet to find a game that simulates financial market acurately as Cashflow game. If you are looking for a fun game try the BGG top 100 games. If you want to learn about investing without reading a book, go play Cashflow. I even made a controversial he more despised geeklist about my bussiess games. The top three games would be:

1) Cashflow – the best investment simulation
2) Queen's Necklace – the best simulation of supply and demand pricing mechanism
3) Trader of Genoa – the best negotiations game

I have yet to find a simuation

you can check the rest out at:
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/geeklist.php3?action=view&listi...

BTW, the Cashflow game is a puzzle. It is solvable, you have to do something that is so contrary to what you been know about personal finance. If you figure it out it will change the way your think about money.

Yes it does. Only because I already know that this is a bad idea. If I knew nothing about light sockets, then what you were telling me in your story would be completely meaningless.



If you believe that story is true, then you are gullible enough to believe anything, including whatever the cashflow guy is selling.

The original post for this thread had Greg visiting a real estate wealth expo. That's the context for his post and the context for this game.

Unlike most games on the 'Geek, this game was not designed for the the simple entertainment of the purchaser. It was designed to teach personal wealth gaining principles and paradigms, some of which are perhaps not always apparent to the average working man or woman of today. This "game" is actually an educational tool masquerading in the medium of a board game. It should seem obvious, but if you were to treat this game like your average strategy board game by buying it, taking it home, learning it, and bringing it out on game night repeatedly to try and put your best strategies forward to try and win against your friends, you would be missing the point. Yes, it is high priced, but then you will never see this game for sale at your FNLGS, as it is not meant for that context.

And about the designer charging so much, well...it would be quite a violation of his own principles as personal wealth gaining guru if he were to not charge so much and make so much from those who are trying to learn his principles. A seller should always get us much as he can in a sale. Who can fault him for that? If anything, when it comes to this product, perhaps we should fault the buyer of this product who doesn't understand what they are getting in the exchange.

As avid board gamers and wardens for our beloved 'Geek, we should more accurately depict such "games" as this. So I am going to submit a correction to get the description of this game changed to clearly identify it as a wealth gaining educational tool sold by a personal wealth guru in real estate/wealth expo settings. Enough already.

Submitted a suggested first paragraph to be added to the existing accurate description for this game:

"Cashflow 101 is a didactic game designed by investor, businessman, and self-help author Robert Kiyosaki to serve as a tool for learning basic financial strategies. Cashflow 101 is the first of several games created by Kiyosaki to reinforce the information in his books."

I got a reply to my correction submission from the admins:



Was I editorializing? I don't think so. "Didactic" means "meant for teaching", and this game is meant for teaching. Also, what is my "comments box"?

You can add comments about a game down near where you add it to your collection and enter dates played.

I don't think your comments were editorializing, and would indeed be useful to explain the existence of this scam..er...game.

Robert Kiyosaki makes the fart go "HONDA."

I bought one of his books for $20 and it seems OK. $200 for a boardgame that teaches the same principles is obviously ridiculous.

While I personally wouldn't pay $200 for this game, I also don't begrudge Kiyosaki the ability to set his own price for the game.

My main gripe with the game, and maybe this is addressed in Cashflow 202, is that there are no difficult decisions. The properties are all either blatantly good choices, or blatantly bad choices. There are few, if any, choices that are good in certain situations and bad in others, or choices that present varying levels of risk. After one or two playthroughs, you've pretty much exhausted the lessons the game has to teach you.

Well, I once worked for a mortgage company doing deals and accounting type stuff. They used cashflow as a marketing mechanism to get people into the idea of passive income.

Well, after 6 months of team training consisting of "embracing you goals" and "actualizing sessions" I quit. They tried swindling me out of commission and court action was threatened.

A month later I realized I had one of the cash flow games at my house. And considering I was very angry at this compnay i didnt return it.

So I paid the best price for cashflow.... nothing.

It is truely more a tool of evil than a real boardgame however.

jeesh - couldn't read past the first page - snarky snarky snarky - i was previously aware this game fills a special niche and might even be out of print - why would boardgamers try to pass judgement on an educational tool? must be touching some bone that dislikes anything costing more than any other game in their collection (that last sentence was bait by the way, no need to respond)

Personally, I think that the much bigger rip off is the 3-D Settlers game for $300+. At least you can learn something from Cashflow and there aren't $20 copies running around everywhere.

I think in some cases (including my own), the judgement is being placed on the value of the education itself, not of the tool.

So the garbage which is this board game isn't as overpriced as the garbage which are the seminars which you, your company, and others also spend money on. Gotcha.

Well I know of a much cheaper investment game that has a great story behind it. Check out Look Out Wall Street!. It was a game created by a mother and daughter team and retails for about $40. It is self produced and the artwork was done by the daughter. It may be a monopoly clone, but I think it has just as much depth as this $200 game.

Meh, that all you got? I'm chalking this one up to either "Uninformed Opinion" or "Troll". I haven't decided which yet. Leaning towards the latter, but I try to give new users the benefit of the doubt.

This game is for some, and not for others.

It will help some people, it will anger others. Some will use it to see the forest through the trees, others will see it as a scam, as a get rich quick scheme, as another reason to hate. Some people will use it to possibly make a better life for themselves, others will use it to justify their sense of self-worth and self-righteousness.

EventHorizon found it useful, Ateo finds it foolish. I found it useful.

There you go.

You were the one who said your company spent $300 for a useless seminar. And if you want to see the value in action of the other ones, check out iamfacingforeclosure.com. So I was just summarizing.

But as was said, people have different opinions. And different ideas of value. That I learned in Econ 101 (although to be fair it cost considerably more than your seminars).

True. But I was just trying to point out that different audiences have different price points. This game is reasonably priced for its audience and the environment it is in. If they were trying to sell it on Thoughthammer or at a FLGS, there would be legitimacy in the complaint that it costs too much. And I still say that it is much less a rip off than the 3-D Settlers set. Of course, who am I to complain? I bought this for $70 and CF 202 for $100. Do I play it much anymore? Not really, but playing 202 every once in a while is a good refreasher. I think that 101 is a bit too simplistic (of course it's amazing at how many people just don't get it).

Do I use what I've learned with the game? Not daily, but it has helped me figure out how to direct my investing. Was it worth it? I think that is still undecided. Do I regret the purchase? Not any more than I regret spending a similar amount of money on M'44 and expansions, and a whole lot less than I regret spending the money on Napoleon in Europe, Attack! + expansion, and A&A D-Day. At least I learned something from Cashflow (in all honesty, I did learn not to buy Eagle Games without playing them from buying those other games, but that's not all that useful in life, especially with Eagle no longer around).

I have to admit - I own a copy of this. I didn't pay for it though. I previous business partner of mine purchased it for me as $200 was nothing to him. I bought CF 202 a little later on.

CF 101 is VERY DRY. CF 202 is fun. I would play it more if more people knew 101. I can train it; I just don't like to.

I think there are some useful things in 101 for the layman. It's the first steps towards financial independance. It's not a magic bullet. It just chocolate covers financial skills into a digestable form.

Just my 2 Cents.

I don't know much about the game except that I'm looking to find it at a thrift store so I can flip it. I also have friends who talk about playing it with me but we haven't yet. I am interested in the cash flow issue. I've seen profitable business struggle because they don't understand this issue well enough.

Regarding games as educational tools, $212 for a good educational boardgame is a steal. I intend to charge much more than that.

Truly, $200 for useful financial education is not too much; but let's take a look at the 'lessons' Cashflow teaches.

1. Real estate investments have no risk (hahahahahahahahaha!).
2. Investing in several cheap rental properties (can you say slumlord?) costs you nothing beyond the initial investment and has no detrimental effects on your life. In fact, becoming an early slumlord and laundromat owner is the key to winning the game.
3. Time is money? Nonsense. You have all the time in the world.
4. Stocks are not only risky, but illiquid: you can only get your money out at special times.
5. Oh yeah, small businesses are much less risky than stocks too, never (rarely?) fail, never interfere with your job. Get as many of them as possible at first. You can sell them as easily as stocks.
6. It's all luck baby: Just wanting to be a slumlord or start a laundromat doesn't mean anything. No, you have to be lucky.

With education like this, you'd be better off going to one of the free "Investment Seminars" that ponzi schemes are always offering.

I actually do financial education and charge about $200 for 6 hours. My partner has this game and was enthusiastic about using it until I reminded him of our Hippocratic oath as teachers.