How do you feel about your financial future? When you look at your financial accounts, do you feel confident?
Chances are, you feel like you could be doing more to prepare for your future.
Whether you are saving for a home, planning for retirement, or just trying to keep up with bills, it would be nice to see some more cash in your accounts.
The only way to properly prepare for the future is to start investing. Sure, you could strive for that raise at work or pick up a side hustle, but nothing comes close to the power of investing.
Investing is how the rich get rich – and stay rich.
Don’t worry, you don’t need to be rich to start investing.
Every little bit counts. Seriously.
If you invested $50 a month in an investment that made 10% a year, you would have $10,599 in 10 years.
The earlier you start, the better.
Investing doesn’t need to be complicated. Here are 4 easy ways you can get started.
1. Open a Brokerage Account
In order to start investing, you need to open a brokerage account.
Think of a brokerage account as a bank account for stocks. You keep money in a bank account and stocks in a brokerage account.
The truth is most brokerage accounts have similar offerings, so you can get started with any credible brokerage.
My personal favorite is Webull since it is easy to use and they give you 2 free stocks just for opening an account.
2. Get Stock Picks
After you open your brokerage account, you need to decide which stocks you want to invest in.
This is where a lot of people get overwhelmed.
Rest assured, it’s easier than you think.
There are a few simple ways to start investing.
- Invest in a total market fund – This is a fund that includes all of the stocks in the market. Essentially, you are buying a small piece of all of the biggest publicly traded companies (and you can do it with just a few clicks). Historically, these funds have great returns.
- Invest in what you know – What companies do you like? Chances are, you are already a customer of many publicly traded companies. Why not become an owner? Do you like Netflix? Buy Netflix stock. Do you like Apple? Buy Apple stock. Stick with large, well-known companies that have a strong track record.
- Get stock picks from the pros – If you really want to keep things simple, you can get stock picks from an online stock advisor. My personal favorite is Motley Fool because they have a 20-year track record of exceptional returns. They tell you which stocks to buy and when. If you followed these picks for the past two decades, you would have turned $10,000 into over $300,000. The company charges for the stock advisor service, but it’s well worth it (and it only costs $1.90/week)
3. Invest on Autopilot
If you really really want to take a hands-off approach to investing, you can use a service called a “robo-advisor.”
A robo-advisor is a digital financial advisor that invests your money automatically.
You simply choose your risk tolerance and financial goals, and the robo-advisor invests your money on autopilot.
You can use a service like Betterment to invest a small amount of money automatically each month.
Take Action
Investing really is that simple. You just need to take action.
Open a brokerage account and start picking stocks or go with a robo-advisor and invest on autopilot.
Your future self will thank you.
