Turn Income Into Equity 💰 📈

Brock's newsletter | JULY 3, 2026

Turn Income into Equity.

Vanguard just dropped its annual report tracking retirement savings for nearly 5 million people. The headline number looks decent: the average American has $167,000 saved for retirement.

Except that's the average. The median, which is what a typical person actually has, is a paltry $44,000.

That’s a tough number to retire on. The standard rule of thumb says you can safely withdraw 4% of your balance per year. On $44,000, that's $170 a month. Add the average Social Security check of $1,900, and it looks like most of us are heading into our seventies broke.

It gets worse. That data only counts people who actually have a 401(k). 40% of Americans have no retirement savings anywhere – no 401(k), no IRA, nothing.

Crazy Rich Retirees.

On the other end, to retire in the top 1% of Americans, the richest of the bunch, you need around $2.3mil saved by 62.

To hit that goal, here's what you should have saved by age, according to Yahoo Finance:

25-34: $365,000
35-39: $730,000
40-44: $1,234,600
45-49: $1,397,000
50-54: $2,311,000

And yes, these savings figures are close to impossible for most.

But through real estate? Absolutely doable.

Income vs. Equity

Building real wealth means converting income into equity.

Most of us convert income into vacations, cars, and lifestyle. Or taxes, rent, and medical bills. Either way, all the money gets spent.

When you own real estate, though, that conversion into equity is automatic. You spend money on your shelter, which you have to do anyway.

Your mortgage gets paid down exponentially, the house appreciates exponentially, and all of it happens over years and decades – even the compounding is automatic.

You often hear paying a mortgage called “forced savings” but it's more like forced investing.

Income vs. Equity

Take those savings rates above.

Is it unreasonable for a 44-year-old in LA to have $1.2mil in home equity?

Sure, if they bought a house 12 years earlier for $2.2 mil, and it's now worth $3.2 mil, and they've paid down the mortgage by $200K.

This is normal and we see it all the time.

This is compared to actual savings and investing, which require constant decisions about allocating a portion of your income (15-20% as recommended), and never stopping.

Obviously, you should do both: buy a house and max out your 401k. But the numbers don't lie: most don't.

Once More, Sorry to be so Repetitive

You only have to buy a house once, and you should move heaven and earth to do so, because real estate wealth tends to happen by accident.

And when you buy, it's worth repeating: buy the nicest house you can afford. Don't chase the deal, chase the house. Because it's the same K-shaped story showing up everywhere.

Luxury Home Prices Are Rising 3 Times Faster Than Non-Luxury Prices.

"Luxury" is relative to your market, but the takeaway holds anywhere: the more expensive the home, the faster it becomes more desirable.

Bottom line: the traditional retirement path is broken for most of us, but real estate still works.

Five years of appreciation on a solid house will build more equity than decades of saving ever could.

-Brock

P.S. We just hit 70 homes sold, in escrow, and for sale this year. And we are prepping 11 more.