Everywhere we go we hear about how important it is to save up money for retirement, and it seems like it’s so far away that, that retirement thing, and you are not really motivated, am I right? Well, you need to tap into that, asap.
I have two different stock saving accounts one for retirement and one for when I want to have a year in my life where I do whatever I want. Needless to say, I save most for the retirement account. But besides retirement, I needed to have something more motivation for myself to look forward too. So I set up a long-term goal plan for myself, I am pretty hung up on goal setting, so much that I have actually created a goal planner and a goal-getter Facebook group, for ambitious females who want to uplift each other and reach their goals, whatever it is saving money for stock, starting a business or traveling the world (Just some of my personal goal there)
Well, let’s get back to how I started saving up money for stocks. When I got pregnant with my son I felt like I needed to save up more money and I started to read a lot of books about stocks.
It often feels like that if you don’t save a lot it’s not worth it. That is not true. Even a little amount can do a big difference in the long run, so I decided to find 100 dollars every month in my budget that I could buy stocks for.
First, I thought that the amount was too much since I was already saving up for all the crazy expensive baby equipment and that I could not afford 100 dollars extra per month for savings. But it’s all about mindset, convince yourself that it is possible, take a look at what you are actually spending your money on and start reading about what you should spend them on. If you don’t have time to read, get audiobooks. If you can’t afford them, borrow them at the library.
I read a really good book, where the author Louise Fredbo advises the reader to actually write down what you spend money on. Every time you use your credit card, write it down, what you spend and how much.
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So back then when I started to look into where my money went, it actually wasn’t that hard to find some extra cash.
- 40 dollars on a gym membership I almost never used. Now I use my yoga mat and a pair of dumbells and put on a youtube video. If I really need to burn some calories, I go for a run outside. It’s free! Crazy, huh?
- 30 dollars. I found out that I used to spend around 30 dollars per month in 7eleven, sometimes even more. What I bought in 7eleven was, pastries (for when I was too busy (see lazy) to make breakfast before I went to work) Coca Cola and Coffee. These are all things that are not necessary. Because it wasn’t something I spent money on every day, I did not see it as a bad thing or even as a serious expense.
- 25 dollars on short bus rides: I have a bike, but anyway I often took short bus rides on the weekends or if I was visiting one of my friends in the evening. So I started to use my bike again.
- 12 dollars on Netflix: I had several free streaming services that were part of my phone subscription, so we canceled Netflix.
Can you see, this is actually a bit more than the 100 dollars I was targeting for? So yes, it is all about mindset, if you look at your finances I am pretty sure that you will be able to find 100 dollars or a lot more. In my goal-setting book, I have expense tracker pages. And I use them myself, I found out that it was such a good habit, and it still helps me keep on track.
Another really good advice in the book by Louise Fredbo is to set up automation. Make sure your account automatically transfers the money to your investment account, no matter if it’s your own bank you are using or you are using one of the many investment companies there are. I use an Investment company called Nordnet, so every month there is an automatic transfer of the money I want to invest. And some of my money I invest in stocks I pick out myself and some of the money goes into an automatically investment fund, where the money is invested for me. I like to mix it up a little.
Are you still not convinced? Let’s do some math, shall we? For the past many years the stock market had an average return on about 7% There are no guarantees here, but if we look at the average it would be around 7% return. So If you invest 100 dollars every month, you could have a saving of around17000-18000 dollars in 10 years. Money you could invest further, or use on traveling or maybe something completely different.
So I am curious to hear, are you already investing? Where are you investing? Are you still thinking about it? What is holding you back? Comment below or find me on Instagram so vi can keep this money talk going.
Are you interested in reading more about money and investments, then these books are my favorites.
Books about money and investments:
- Invested: How I learned to master my mind
- Tony Robbins: Money, Master The Game
- Robert Kiyosaki: Rich Dad, Poor Dad
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