Living the dream: you can do extraordinary things with ordinary amounts of money.

You can do extraordinary things with ordinary amounts of money.

MAYBE IT'S A CALL FROM A SECOND COUSIN WHO'S quit his job at the post office to chase his dream at Le Cordon Bleu Ecole de Cuisine, in Paris. Or you read about some couple who worked as janitors all their lives and left $5 million to a local college. Maybe a guy at work announces he's sending his daughter to Harvard--with out a scholarship. Or reading The Millionaire Next Door makes you start to wonder about your neighbors.

The scenarios vary, but the same question springs to mind: How in the heck did they do it? How did these seemingly ordinary people accomplish such amazing teats?

They dared to dream a big dream, that's how. On the following pages you'll read about five who did it. They maintained their focus on a goal, refusing to allow distractions to divert their time, effort and money from accomplishing it. That may sound simple, but for many people, aligning values with spending and investing habits isn't simple at all.

Distinguishing lip service to a goal from how you actually spend your money is essential, says financial planner Constance Barber, a former psychologist in Needham, Mass. She recalls a woman who declared that she desperately wanted to own a house but was dropping $1,900 a month on clothes, vacations and hairdos. A cash-flow analysis was the slap of financial reality she needed to start saving $1,200 a month for a down payment. She is now shopping for a home in the $200,000 range.

The final ingredient is something more intangible--call it determination, maybe even grit. The stories here are peppered with people who have the ability to weather hard times, sometimes over long periods.

INTO THE WEST

Lisa Wax's staff meetings are offen held on a boat gliding on Prince William Sound. Sometimes they're held on a pristine mountainside, alter which everyone skis back to the "office"--the lodge and restaurant Wax owns 40 miles north of Valdez, Alaska. When she needs to be alone, Wax, 30, can paraglide in remote locations, with a laptop in her backpack, along with a Smith & Wesson .44 in case of bears. No distractions, save an occasional eagle flying by.

Her journey to this pinnacle began eight years ago, when the former social worker packed up her jeep in suburban Detroit to follow her curiosity north to Alaska. It took rugged living, prodigious saving, serious study--and a pinch of serendipity.

She literally stumbled on Tsaina Lodge about seven years ago. She was searching for a place to warm up after the large snow cave where she had lived for a month--and which she had dug out herself, including a kitchen area, benches and bookshelves--began to melt. She was working for a law firm, making about $36,000 at year interviewing natives in remote Alaskan villages. Her simple lifestyle--living in tents and caves, bathing in glacial rivers and lakes, hitchhiking on mail planes--allowed her to bank almost all of it.

Tsaina Lodge (which means "the valley of many brown bears" in Aleut) is a rustic roadhouse with shellacked spruce interiors and huge picture windows. It's tucked into the Chugach Mountains, now home to the World Extreme Skiing competition and a mecca for hard-core skiers who take helicopters to untamed slopes. In the summer--when it's light for up to 22 hours a day--it's surrounded by a sea of wildflowers.

The lodge wasn't so charming when Wax discovered it. But after a few visits, she started to dream of owning h. "I had a vision for the lodge," she says. But the idea seemed so outlandish that she kept it to herself.

Her entrepreneurial juices started to flow, however, when she learned that the Small Business Administration was about to foreclose on the owners' loan. Although she figured she had little chance against deep-pocket investors, Wax quietly studied the laws of foreclosure. She doggedly tracked the proceedings and made sure friends knew how to contact her if she was in the wilderness when news broke.

And, of course, she was--kayaking in northern Alaska. She arrived at a tiny village to find a message left for her at the general store: The lodge would be auctioned the following day in Anchorage, more than 500 miles away. Alter a rare hot shower, she hopped a small plane from the village to Kotzebue, where she got the last seat on a plane to Anchorage.

Wax was one of a handful of people in the courtroom when the federal judge opened the bids on the lodge and the surrounding seven acres. She offered about $160,000--and won. And what about those deep-pocket investors? Apparently, they didn't know about the auction. Wax paid about $100,000 in cash and borrowed $63,000, which has since been repaid.

How could she afford it? Besides her salary savings, Wax was ready to bank a terrific bonus. Because her job was so grueling, the law firm had promised to double her money if she finished the three-year project. That added an instant $108,000 to her nest egg.

It took Wax two years to fix up the lodge. She held down costs by helping experts as a laborer or doing projects herself--she learned rooting, put in a septic system, and peeled logs to build cabins and a bunkhouse.

She also became expert at cajoling electricians and building inspectors to come to her location, which, though remote, is "road accessible." That is, it's on the scenic Richardson Highway, which the state plows. When you get 80 feet of snow a year, that's a big deal.

Now in her third season, Wax has turned down million-dollar offers to sell. The place is booked solid without any advertising (e-mail address: tsaina@alaska.net), and she's already hosted playwright Arthur Miller, world-class skiers and a few Russian officials. A group of Japanese visitors recently proposed botling the lodge's well water and exporting it to customers back home.

The lodge and cabins house about 30 guests, who pay $150 per night during the ski season (February to May) and $95 during the summer. The restaurant serves nouvelle cuisine--featuring local salmon, halibut and Alaskan king crab--and seats up to 120 people some nights. Powder magazine named the lodge "the most perfectly located skier bar on earth."

Wax says the lodge attracts a "super eclectic" crowd, ranging from Wall Street types and foreign executives to "people who spend their whole lives skiing and living in ice tents. It's a cultural melting pot in the middle of nowhere."

So far this year, she's already grossed three times as much as all of last year. The lodge is profitable, and Wax reinvests most of her earnings into the business. Last year she added a massage room by a creek, erected an office tot ski guides who work slopes, and sent the dishwasher-turned-chef to the Culinary Institute of America, in Hyde Park, N.Y., and in Thailand for cooking classes.

Twenty-five people work at the lodge in the busiest times, but Wax is still in control of everything. "I feel like I have octopus arms," she says. Still, she's up at four or five every morning to go hiking, paragliding or biking. "That's my plug-in for the rest of the day," she says. There's not a day I don't look around in amazement and feel lucky to be where I am."

TIME FOR THE KIDS

The low point came in 1987, when Alan Greenwood's business became a black hole that had drained not just the money from his bank account, but the possessions right out of his apartment. To raise $600 to pay the printer for his fledgling magazine, Music Trader, he sold his VCR and a 12-speed bicycle. That winter he and his wife, Cleo, then in their late twenties, earned extra cash by shoveling snow. And they live in Bismarck, N.D., where snow occasionally drifts over their red Chevrolet Nova--which was "mortgaged" to secure a loan to help support the business.

Alan and Cleo Greenwood are really hooked on classic guitars, but that's not why they risked and sacrificed so much. Building a successful business was only part of their vision. Their "ultimate dream," Cleo says, was to be able to quit their jobs and have time to be with the family they were planning to start. "We just didn't want somebody else raising our children for us," she says.

The economics during that long winter looked bleak. Cleo was making about $13,000 a year working for a real estate company anti Alan earned $17,000 as an accountant for the state. Magazine expenses were running about $600 a month, but magazine income--mainly from advertising--was running only about $200. Subscriptions were dribbling in at a rate or a dozen or so a month. Alan remembers he would race to the mailbox every day, only to find "cobwebs."

Looking back, Cleo says, they giggle at just how lean things became that first year: "We never ate out. No new clothes. You could wear those shoes a little longer; you could mend it if it was torn."

But the Greenwoods persevered. Success came in dribs and drabs. Advertising in other music magazines, visiting guitar trade shows and pushing magazines at music stores finally started to pay off. Subscriptions and ad revenues picked up.

When Cleo became pregnant in early 1990, the couple began saving furiously. Jack was born in September; Cleo took a six-month leave of absence (to be prudent) and quit in February 1991. Alan banked his paychecks for six months--both to see if the couple could live off income from the magazine and to have a nest egg in case the venture turned sour. He quit his job in the spring of 1992.

Each child seemed to mark a turning point in the business. The day after daughter Leah was born in April 1993, they finally moved the magazine out of their home and hired a designer and people to help with accounting and shipping. By the time daughter Eden came along in August 1995, the operation was solidly in the black. "As each child came, we became a little more focused. That would just make us work a little harder, stay up a little later to get it done," Cleo says.

What they got done, besides realizing their dream of being able to put their kids first, was the creation of a national trading post for classic guitars. Before Vintage Guitar, as the magazine is now known, the market for classic electric guitars, such as Fenders and Gibsons (which can cost over $15,000), was fragmented and sparse. Comparison shopping was difficult, and the chance of being ripped off was high. The magazine has brought order to a chaotic and perilous arena.

Lead guitarist for REO Speedwagon (and vintage-guitar collector) Dave Amato credits the Greenwoods with "basically creating this world." The magazine, Amato says, is "the bible."

Today, Vintage Guitar ($23.95 for a one-year subscription; 701-255-1197, or www.vintageguitar.com) is an oversize, 200-page monthly shopping guide and fount of information covering everything from turn-of-the-century guitar makers to how to ship your precious instrument. It has more than 20,000 subscribers. But the pages upon pages of ads that list classic-guitar prices have created a one-stop shopping and pricing guide for those who covet the history and sound of electric guitars built during the early days of rock `n' roll.

The company will gross about $1.75 million this year, up from $1.5 million in 1997, and show a profit of about $175,000. It has nine full-time and four part-time employees, and the Greenwoods own the building where the magazine is published. They pay themselves salaries that exceed what they were making before they quit their jobs.

The Nova has been replaced by a Ford Aerostar van and a GMC pickup. The couple bought a four-bedroom house that's two doors down from an elementary school--close enough to walk, and the kids don't have to cross the street. Alan owns 35 classic guitars, the rarest a 1952 Gibson Les Paul model. And they recently bought VIP passes to a three-day concert of classic-rock bands. As for anything else, Cleo says she'll have to think about it some more and call back. It's almost 2:45 P.M. and she has to go pick up the kids.

UNDER THE BIG TOP

Growing up in Baltimore in the '50s, Cedric Walker never thought of running away with the circus, nor did he ever envision following in the footsteps of P.T Barnum. But today the 45-year-old Walker heads up UniverSoul Circus, the only touring circus owned and operated by an African American, and the first black circus to come along in more than a century.

How did a kid who started out shining shoes at 15 cents a pair at a local Ford dealership become founder and president of a $20-million extravaganza?

The fact that he started working at age 6, using a shoeshine kit made by his granddad, gives you a hint. Next, he sold Christmas cards to earn enough to buy the best bike in the neighborhood. He sold Kool-Aid popsicles his mother taught him to make, and helped an uncle sell fruits and vegetables from a horse-drawn cart. So at an early age he learned that hard work could be turned into hard currency. He didn't work only for profit, either. His success at collecting for Unicef, the U.N. children's agency, earned him an invitation to appear on a telethon with the late Michael Landon.

"Those kinds of inspirations taught me I could put it all together and do it on my own," he says.

From the time he left Tuskegee Institute in 1972 until 1994, Walker eked out a modest living promoting showbiz groups, including his college chums Lionel Ritchie and the Commodores. "We made a way out of no way," he says, remembering a one-meal-a-day life on the road. Walker helped put together the first rap concert tour for Run D.M.C., worked for the Jackson Five and promoted the Kool Jazz Festival.

Between gigs he was always dreaming up his next project. That's what led him in 1993 to a hotel room in Oakland, Cal., where he holed up with longtime friend Calvin Dupree Jr. Walker was trying to come up with the one big project that would ensure a comfortable existence for his family. As they brainstormed, Walker observed that successful variety shows seemed inevitably to feature animal acts. Dupree responded with a laugh, "Well, hell, let's just do a circus." That offhand remark released the genie from the bottle.

Walker had had some experience with a circus, consulting with an advertising agency in Atlanta that had the Ringling Brothers account. But nothing prepared him for what was ahead--researching animal acts and aerialists and, even more exotic, doing the behind-the-scenes deals to pull together the cash.

His reputation as a hard-working straight shooter paid off, allowing him to tap into the contacts he'd made over the years. He put together a patchwork of financing to cover the $600,000 cost for the circus's debut in Atlanta. He got a $75,000 second mortgage on his home, sold sponsorships, offered investors a stake in the business and took on high-interest loans. "It was 50 grand here, 100 grand there and credit from everywhere," says Walker. He's still paying back some of those loans.

The circus opened in October 1994 at Atlanta's Fulton County Stadium to enthusiastic crowds--and promptly plunged $400,000 into the red. But that didn't quash his dream. Walker cut costs and persuaded additional sponsors to shoulder more of the load. Two years ago, tot example, Burger King, Ford, General Mills and Texaco became sponsors. Their support keeps ticket prices affordable--they range from $8 to $40, allowing low-income families to attend the circus. A Southwest Airlines commercial and an HBO special on the circus next year will provide additional cash infusions.

This year UniverSoul will travel to 19 cities coast to coast. The single-ring circus seats 2,100 people under its red, white and blue big top, all of them close enough to be part of the show. In a highly charged atmosphere--often whipped into a frenzy by yellow-zoot-suited co-founder and ringmaster Dupree--downs, aerial acts, unicyclists, elephants and lions perform to pulsating music and a rocking laser-light show created by Tom Marzullo, who has designed shows for KISS, Guns N' Roses and the artist formerly known as Prince.

Performers include the Jackie Robinsons of the circus, the King Charles Unicycle Troupe, who broke the color barrier with Ringling Brothers in 1969. Aerialist Pa-mela Hernandez was Ringling's first black trapeze artist; and accordion-playing clown Denise Payne was the first black clown with the "Greatest Show on Earth." Another performer, Paris-born Monique, is billed as the only black female lion tamer on earth.

"Our goal is to showcase circus arts from an African-American perspective," says Walker. Dupree calls it "the black folks' Vegas."

In a recent performance in Newark, N.J., the spirited crowd broke into hysterical laughter when a member of the Willy family, a Colombian act, did Michael Jackson's moon walk on the high wire 35 feet above the ground.

Unlike performers in big touring circuses, UniverSoul artists mingle with the crowds at intermission, selling souvenirs and signing autographs for the kids. "We take the show to the community," says Walker.

That he does. The toadies and roustabouts who handle the equipment and put up the tent are local workers supervised by the circus's production staff. Walker figures the circus creates about $2.4 million a year in employment opportunities.

When not on the road, Walker and his wife, Cynthia, who is vice-president and director of merchandise and concessions, live comfortably with their son, Corii, 11, in a middle-class suburb of Atlanta.

This year, Walker expects the circus to gross about $12 million and to break even for the first time. But is this the "big one," the success it will take to finally satisfy the driven kid from Baltimore?

No way. He's already dreaming up his next project.

ANCHORS AWEIGH?

When Alan and Sharon Christiansen set a financial course, rest assured that the Missouri couple will arrive at their port of call on time and shipshape. Fixed firmly on the horizon is the couple's biggest goal of all: to retire at age 60 and spend the rest of their lives exploring the Caribbean in a 35-foot sail boat--an ambitious aim for a couple of civil servants in their mid fifties from a landlocked state.

But they're sure to succeed, says their financial planner, Sheryl Garrett, because the Christiansens have mastered the art of spending less than they make.

Alan remembers that as a child his parents made him save the cash and checks from birthday cards in a bank account. Also key to the Christiansens' success is the discipline to forgo immediate gratification for long-term goals. "We measure what it would cost us in terms of what other things we couldn't have in the future," says ,Man. Skipping the theater has been painful for them, and not getting cable TV was painful for their son, Erik. But Alan stresses that the family sees those as choices, not sacrifices.

With that attitude, the Christiansens began saving for household items, such as a refrigerator, rather than buying on credit. When they had enough for a down payment on a house, they bought a duplex and rented out one half. And when it came time for a new house, they kept the duplex to rent and bought just enough house for their needs. They banked the difference between their mortgage payment and that of a more expensive house, and doubled their principal payments, allowing them to pay off the house ten years early. Part of the savings was invested tot Erik's college education, which the couple paid for in full, in cash.

The Christiansens don't live like monks, but many of their habits are textbook frugal. They drive a 1989 Ford Aerostar (with 208,000 miles on it) and a 1990 Chrysler LeBaron convertible (with 55,000 miles), both of which they bought used and with cash. Their living-room sofa has been reupholstered twice.

Alan works for the Social Security Administration, earning $61,000 annually, and Sharon makes $35,000 as an income-maintenance programs trainer for the state.

Their hobbies reflect the discipline they bring to their finances. He plays classical music on a small grand piano (which he bought restored, of course), and she does counted cross-stitch, an exacting diversion in which a few missed stitches can ruin the piece of embroidery.

And, of course, there's sailing, where the couple really cuts loose. Longtime friend and sailing mentor Bob Morris says that on a recent weekend he caught the two out on the water in a 35-knot wind, when most other boats had slunk to shore. "I could see their grins from a quartermile away, waves crashing over the bow," says Morris.

For years the couple sailed a pocket cruiser, hauling the 22-foot craft (bought with cash for $5,500 in 1984) around to various lakes on a trailer. This spring they moved up to a 30-foot Catalina (model year 1988, bought for $42,500), which is moored at Stockton Lake, a 25,000-acre body of water in the rolling hills of southern Missouri, about two and a half hours south of the couple's home near Kansas City. They used a home-equity line of credit--with tax-deductible interest--to cover part of the purchase price.

While their current craft might be able to handle the kind of coastal cruising they plan to do in retirement, it would be too cramped for comfort. Instead, they plan to trade up for a craft in the 35- to 38-foot range. Alan's research shows that, properly outfitted, a boat 12 to 14 years old should cost about $150,000. Some of that purchase price will come from the sale of their existing boat; the couple's retirement income from pensions and investments will finance the rest.

The nest egg the Christiansens have been incubating is now worth more than $150,000 and is geared tot growth, with the lion's share in growth-and-income mutual funds. The two will have pensions that will contribute $48,000 a year to their cash flow, and they figure they can wait until their mid sixties to collect social security in order to receive full benefits.

Prudent to the end, Alan and Sharon plan to try the seafaring life for six months to two years before the), decide whether to sell their house. "The dream may be more fun than the reality," says Alan. "It could happen. So we're not going to burn our bridges."

THE ACCIDENTAL PHILANTHROPIST

Albert Hoffman, 70, never earned more than $41,000 in a year, but he has already given away nearly $1 million. And he intends to keep on giving for the rest of his life. He didn't set out to be a philanthropist. He had planned to be a college professor, and earned a master's degree in civil engineering. But he stopped short, of the requisite PhD and instead designed bridges and dams throughout the country.

In 1963 he got tired of living out of a suitcase and returned to his native Chicago, where he signed on with Bethlehem Steel. It was then that he became a compulsive saver.

Paying his parents nominal rent to live in the family home, he saved most of his annual salary--which started at $11,000 and grew to $41,000 by the time he retired in 1983. He never got married.

A stockbroker friend recommended that Hoffman invest in utility companies and sign up for their dividend reinvestment plans. The timing was good. Dividend yields were high--delivering a steady stream of money to reinvest--and prices rose smartly in the 1980s and '90s. "All of a sudden, I'm a very wealthy man and I never gave it any thought," he says.

Hoffman retired when he was 55 and signed on as a math and religion teacher at Gordon Tech, a Catholic high school located near Wrigley Field. Events there transformed Hoffman from a super saver to a super giver.

"One day, the principal told me not to let three boys into my class because they hadn't paid their tuition," says Hoffman. "I felt so bad that I wanted to start scholarships for people who, through no fault of their own, can't pay tuition."

He gave his first major gift in 1991: a $50,000 endowment to help a few boys every year attend Gordon Tech. Since then it has become an annual habit: Each year he gives $50,000 to a Chicago high school.

Recipients are often shocked, Hoffman says. Tim King, president of Hales Franciscan High School, one of Hoffman's beneficiaries, is an example. "He approached me at a football game and said he wanted to start a scholarship fund," says King. "I'm thinking, Hmmm, is this guy a nut?"

Nope. Just generous. "The wildest part is there was no pretense," King adds. "A lot of people want you to jump through so many hoops before they give smaller amounts."

Hoffman picks the objects of his generosity for a variety of personal reasons. They are all Catholic schools. One of them, St. Scholastica Academy, is the alma mater of his sister, Mary Frances; three are run by Jesuits (his late brother, John, was a Jesuit priest); another is where kids he coached on a parish volleyball team go to school; and others offer the only college-prep programs in poor neighborhoods.

Most of Hoffman's gifts are appreciated stock--which gives him a double tax benefit. He can deduct the market value of the gift, and he avoids paying tax on the profit that has built up. Money he saves on taxes is more money that can go to future scholarships.

The schools agree not to distribute the principal but to use earnings for perpetual scholarships. Most of the endowments have been earning about $3,500 a year, helping to pay 25% to 50% of the tuition for four to six students at each school. To qualify for a scholarship, a student must maintain at least a B average. Families suffering from a sudden financial difficulty, such as a parent being laid off; get special consideration.

Each time he endows a scholarship, Hoffman gives a matching $50,000 gift to a Catholic mission or to the Jesuits. He also gives schools additional gifts, such as the $10,000 he once donated to pay for badly needed sports uniforms. He smiles when he remembers that the students--who cheered when that gift was announced--seemed much more excited about it than they were about the scholarship endowment.

With his Bethlehem Steel pension, social security and income from gift annuities, Hoffman doesn't worry about cash flow. His house is paid for, and he has few expenses. So he can spend his time playing bridge, giving talks on history at the Chicago Historical Society, attending church activities, cheering the Chicago Bulls and traveling on elderhostel trips (he's participated in about 100 educational programs throughout the world).

He still has another $600,000 to give away, and the bull market keeps making the pot bigger. "I have as much money now as when I started giving it away in 1991," he says.

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