Buying Motorcycle for My Son

My son want to have a motorcycle so that he can use it during his study far away from home. After he had surveyed a lot of places, he found the cheapest motorcycle for Yamaha FZ 150. It is a second hand motorcycle. We don't want to waste money to buy a new one. Buying a vehicle is not an investment. Unless, it is meant for generating income, it is worth it to buy a new one.

Although my son work part time during his long holiday, his income is not sufficient to buy the motorcycle by cash. He wanted to buy it by the motorcycle shop's loan. After I shown the calculation, it is very expensive to buy the motorcycle by a loan. Hence, I loan the money to him to buy the motorcycle by cash!

I know my son cannot repay me by monthly since he has just beginning further study for his diploma for a semester. And, I don't want the loan money to lost its value upon my son's graduation. So, he have to calculate the money to be equivalent to gold value which is currently RM191 to 1 gram (Public Gold). The total cost to buy including the road tax and insurance was RM4,232. Hence, he owes me about 22.16 grams of gold.

I prefer the money value to be preserved in gold since this loan is going to be more than 5 years without any interest. Gold is good to hold the value. But, gold as a physical cannot generate wealth on its own.

The booking money was paid to the motorcycle shop, Fook Yong Motor Trading Sdn. Bhd. on 22 April 2017.  The second payment was made on 25 May 2017. The motorcycle was registered under my son's name on 26 May 2017. All the documents were completed by 28th May 2017. Upon completion, I paid the balance on  28 May 2017. Since, my son work until 10pm, I have to bring back the motorcycle on my own on 29th May 2017 as shown in the pictures.

It has been 15 years since I drove a 150cc motorcycle. It felt different. But, it is good enough for my son.

To start Property Investment is as hard as to start a PhD

I started my 1st property investment after I had worked for more than two years and before I started my master study. I didn't have much knowledge in property investment at the time. But I strictly followed my father's advice to buy a house as soon as possible after started to work. It will be a waste of money if I spent a lot of money on paying a car but I have not buy a house. Buying a house will also ensure I spent only on essential.

My first house was under affordable category

I bought my second house after a year I have finished my master study. Although I already have a house, I didn't live in the house because it is far away from my work. It was a no brainier decision to invest on a second house when it is only less than ten minutes to work. The hardest part was to find some capital and reorganized my financial.

My second house is one and a half storey

With two properties, I thought it was enough for me to live comfortably. But, life was not easy especially when you were only a few years growing your own family. In addition, the house I lived in cost almost double than the first house I bought. This means I spent more than the return I got. But, what was done is done. To compensate the expenditure, I did a lot of extra works such as design consultation, trading, charity work and teaching to industry.

This also remind me, my master qualification does not make me a master in property investment. Having two properties does not make me a master in property investment. Both of them were just an introduction in property investment. I always thought I need a lot of money to invest in more property. I need a better plan. In 2002, I realized in my surrounding area, investment in shop lot is better than houses. At the time, the moment you buy a house, you lost about 20% of the value if you want to sell the house in two or three years. But, shop lot prices keep increasing. I also need to learn more especially from those who already invest a lot more in property.

My first shop lot

Although I have done many engineering designs for industry where some of them are world class designs or projects, something was missing. The same feeling can be felt in my property investment. Sometimes, it was not due to lack of knowledge or skills which prevent us from excel in our fields. I felt there was the need to improve my thinking process or also known as philosophy. After some convincing from my peers, mentor and university's policy, I decided to further study for my PhD in 2008. I was reluctant to further study because I was afraid it will prevent me from my commercial activities. Now, I realized how wrong was I. Within a year of furthering study, I found a formula to buy a shop lot! Now, the real property investment began!!

Knowledge In PhD more valuable than Property Investment

It is common to find people who inherit property from their parents sold the property for the money. Without sufficient knowledge, people will always choose the money first rather than exploring how to generate income from the property. You may have RM200,000 by selling the property. But, RM200,000 may not last for even a year.

I already have two houses when I finally decided to further study for a PhD in Electrical Engineering. My specialization areas are electronics or to be more specific are Programmable Logic Controller (PLC), Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA), Compiler, and embedded system design.

Whenever you pursue for a knowledge, God will always reward you in many ways. Within a year of doing my PhD, I found a way to buy a shop office with only RM1,000 down payment.


I submitted my thesis on the 30th August 2016.

Towards the end of my thesis submission, I managed to buy a two storey house and another shop office. Beside polishing my skills and knowledge to PhD level, I managed to accumulate a lot of knowledge in property investment. Although I am just a lecturer without any rank, my property investment is quite a big accomplishment.

Submitting a PhD thesis is a very hard work. Many of my friends gave up without finishing their thesis even some of them already published some of their works. Preparing for the Viva is a lot harder than I anticipated. I still need to do a lot of works, search for the latest research publication, preparing the slides, practice and practice. However, the slide presentation preparation is less stressful than completing the thesis.

My Viva-voce presentation was done in the 2nd May 2017. It was started at about 9.10 am and lasted until about 1.15 pm.

Now, I am more comfortable when people call me Dr. Zulfakar!

Here is one of video clips that motivate me to complete my PhD:

Sometimes, I wonder how can I bought all those properties. Part of the answer is here.

Learning is a never ending process. Knowledge is also Wealth!