{"id":48086,"date":"2021-09-05T10:49:00","date_gmt":"2021-09-05T14:49:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?p=48086"},"modified":"2021-09-14T15:35:44","modified_gmt":"2021-09-14T19:35:44","slug":"getting-started-with-investing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/getting-started-with-investing\/","title":{"rendered":"Getting Started With Investing? Ask Yourself This"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Do you want to get into investing but aren&#8217;t sure where to start? Do you need professional financial help to get started? <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Investing doesn\u2019t have to be complex. People selling investments profit by making them complicated\u2014they convince you that you need professional help to get started with investing. Yet the actively managed funds they sell are costly and underperform index funds. According to financial blogger J.L. Collins, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/introduction-to-investing\/\">getting started with investing<\/a> only requires answering three questions and applying three wealth-building tools (stocks, bonds, and cash).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We&#8217;ll consider Collins&#8217;s three questions for beginner investors and the wealth-building tools below. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<!--more-->\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Three Questions for Beginner Investors<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Getting started with investing requires that you answer these three closely related questions: <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>1) What investment stage are you in?<\/strong> Are you in the wealth accumulation (income-producing) stage, the wealth preservation (post-working) stage, or a combination of the two (for instance, you\u2019re between jobs)?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>2) What level of risk are you comfortable with?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>3) What\u2019s your investment horizon?<\/strong> In other words, for how many years do you plan to accumulate wealth? If you\u2019re just starting your working life, your investment timeframe will be much longer than if you\u2019re close to retirement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>These questions are interrelated in that your risk tolerance will correspond with your investment horizon\u2014you\u2019ll take more risk early and less later as you near retirement. Also, your level of risk and investment horizon will drive your investment strategy. Your job and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/how-to-plan-for-the-future\/\">future plans<\/a> factor into all three questions. For example, if you\u2019re planning to retire early, you\u2019ll have a shorter investment timeframe, and you\u2019ll want to reduce your risk and preserve your wealth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When answering these questions, keep the following in mind:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>All investing carries at least some risk<\/strong>. You can\u2019t eliminate risk but you can choose the type of risk\u2014for example, choosing less-volatile bonds if you\u2019re uncomfortable with risk as you near retirement.<\/li><li><strong>Your investment stage isn\u2019t necessarily tied to your age<\/strong>. It can shift back and forth during your life, impacting your earnings: Sabbaticals, early retirement, taking a lower-paid position to follow a dream, or re-entering the workforce after retirement all affect whether you\u2019re in the wealth accumulation or preservation stage.<\/li><li><strong>Having <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/f-you-money\/\">F-You Money<\/a> is essential.<\/strong> Life and jobs are uncertain, but you\u2019ll have more room to make choices if you have F-You Money. If you don\u2019t have this financial cushion now, start building it\u2014it\u2019s never too late.<\/li><li><strong>You should be a long-term investor, even if you\u2019re older.<\/strong> Don\u2019t follow the typical <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/best-advice-for-investors\/\">investment advice<\/a> and shift too great a percentage of your money from stocks to bonds (often considered to be a safer investment) to protect your nest egg as you near retirement. At age 60, if you\u2019re in good health, you might have another 30 years to build wealth, which is a long-term horizon. Maybe you\u2019ll want to keep <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/building-wealth\/\">building wealth<\/a> in retirement to leave money for a younger spouse, grandchildren, or a charity.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Three Wealth-Building Tools<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>The next step after answering the three questions is building your investment portfolio. To do it, you need only three simple tools: a stocks index fund, a bonds index fund, and a money market or bank account.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>1)<\/strong> <strong>Stocks:<\/strong> Collins\u2019s preferred option is investing in VTSAX, Vanguard\u2019s Total Stock Market Index Fund. (He writes that he\u2019s not being paid to promote Vanguard.) Stocks give you the best returns over a long timeframe and because they grow in value, they serve as a hedge against inflation. VTSAX is your wealth-building tool.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>2)<\/strong> <strong>Bonds:<\/strong> At the point where you\u2019re nearing the wealth preservation stage, you\u2019ll want to shift some money into less risky bonds. Bonds pay interest and counter the ups and downs of your stocks fund. They also serve as a hedge against deflation (declining prices) because in these periods, bonds increase in value. Collins\u2019s choice is VBTLX, Vanguard Total Bond Market Index Fund. (The next chapter explores bonds.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>3)<\/strong> <strong>Cash: <\/strong>You need accessible cash for expenses and emergencies. It\u2019s also another deflation hedge. When prices drop, your cash buys more. But when prices rise, cash buys less. Don\u2019t keep more cash than you need because when interest rates are low, cash has little earning potential.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You could put your cash into a money market fund like VMMXX Vanguard Prime Money Market Fund. But while interest rates are low, you\u2019re probably better off putting it in a bank account. Money markets used to offer better interest rates than banks, but currently, bank rates are higher. You can always switch if money market interest rates start rising again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>These three tools\u2014a wealth-builder and inflation hedge, a deflation hedge, and cash for needs and emergencies\u2014comprise a simple, diversified, low-cost portfolio. Next, we\u2019ll further discuss index funds and bonds, then investment strategies and how to determine your asset allocations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Why You Should Choose Index Funds<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Collins recommends <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/why-invest-in-index-funds\/\">index fund investing<\/a> over choosing professionally managed funds because index funds get better results and have lower fees.<\/strong> The chances of anyone regularly selecting stocks that outperform the market in the short term are minuscule\u2014you can get better results by buying into an index that contains a lot of stocks (VTSAX covers over 3,700 companies) that grow steadily over time. Yet index funds remain somewhat controversial in the investment industry. Professionals have denigrated index fund investing ever since Bogle introduced the index fund in 1976.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>The primary reason for the backlash is that because index fund investing is so simple and low cost, it threatens financial industry profits.<\/strong> As previously mentioned, money managers, mutual fund companies, and financial advisors make big money by charging investors fees, which they justify by making investment too complicated for you to pursue on your own and by claiming they can outperform the market.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Many financial advisors argue that index funds may be fine for average people who don\u2019t want to work at investing, but that with a small effort and professional advice, you can get better returns (outperform the market). However, Vanguard founder Jack Bogle, who died in 2019, contended that in 61 years in investing, he never met anyone who could do this.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In fact, research indicates that only around 1% of fund managers outperform the market consistently, although they\u2019re occasionally lucky. In reality, most professional money managers <em>underperform<\/em> indexes. Over 15 to 30 years, the index will do better than 82-99% of managed funds.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Do you want to get into investing but aren&#8217;t sure where to start? Do you need professional financial help to get started? Investing doesn\u2019t have to be complex. People selling investments profit by making them complicated\u2014they convince you that you need professional help to get started with investing. Yet the actively managed funds they sell are costly and underperform index funds. According to financial blogger J.L. Collins, getting started with investing only requires answering three questions and applying three wealth-building tools (stocks, bonds, and cash). We&#8217;ll consider Collins&#8217;s three questions for beginner investors and the wealth-building tools below.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":40375,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,31],"tags":[483],"class_list":["post-48086","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lifestyle","category-money","tag-the-simple-path-to-wealth","","tg-column-two"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v24.3 (Yoast SEO v24.3) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Getting Started With Investing? 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