My New Year Resolution for 2020 is to help you achieve your financial goals by continuing to offer free financial investing tips that enrich your life and the lives of people living in the communities connected to you.
Tip #1: Apply my “SIP” Strategy (Save, Invest then Pay Bills) starting in January.
The “SIP” Strategy ensures you always invest in yourself first and helps you avoid overspending. The key to wealth building for most rich folks is automatically saving and investing small amounts (a “SIP”) of money before paying bills.
Most people pay their bills, buy the stuff they want, or save for the things they want and then decide if they can afford to save or invest for what they truly need. That’s just plain crazy thinking! No wonder so many Americans end up in debt, bankrupt, or unable to live and retire with dignity.
Apply the following steps to put the “SIP” Strategy to work for you and watch your wealth begin to rise in just a few weeks:
Step 1 – Open a Savings Account, Checking Account, and a Retirement or Brokerage Account.
Step 2 – Set up automatic payroll deduction at work to fund your savings, retirement (investments), and checking accounts with each paycheck and invest it as follows:
1st. Automatically Save 5% to 10% of your take-home with each paycheck.
2nd. Automatically Invest 10% to 20% of your pay into your company pension plan, 401k, 403b, or a separate brokerage account IRA. I suggest investing in an S&P 500 Index fund, mutual fund, or similar type of investment product with an average of 7% to 10% annual rate of return to start.
3rd. Automatically Pay Bills using the rest of your pay after it’s deposited into your checking account.
Tip #2 – Reduce or eliminate a few small zombie expenses and invest the extra money you free up.
If you’re strapped for cash this is one of the easiest ways to fund your savings and investments. As we go through life we accumulate a lot of stuff (recurring bills from subscriptions services, credit card interest, grab an Uber/Lyft, pay overdraft fees, pay late fees, eat out or buy new items daily out of sheer habit) like a zombie going through life never thinking twice about all the money going bye-bye.
Even I am guilty of paying for things out of habit like a zombie and wasting lots of money, money that should be making me much much wealthier.
I always start the year looking for recurring bills and habitual expenses to curtail or eliminate like the ones shown in the graphic on the left. Rid your life of a few of these or similar Wealth Robbers and invest the money you free up. Applying this simple tip will easily generate tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars in additional wealth in 5, 10, 20, 30 years if you invest the money in a mutual fund, the S&P 500 Index, or a similar product that yields an average of 5% to 10% in return annually.
Tip #3 – The more you learn the more you’ll earn & the more wealth you’ll likely accumulate.
Many of us go through life never wanting to invest a little time to learn about personal finance or other important topics we need to understand. As a result, we dream about the life we want (the life we “deserve”) but have fear of changing what we do because of our lack of knowledge, current job, age, income, race, gender, skills, family situation, or heritage. Don’t let fear continue to hold you hostage. Millions of people just like you are getting wealthier.
I can tell you from personal experience the difference between those who achieve great wealth and those who don’t is that successful folks remove their fears by learning from and mimicking others who have achieved similar dreams. They decide to take simple actions that are at first a little uncomfortable or unpopular with their friends, coworkers, or family members.
If you have fear about investing or need a little knowledge (know-how) about ways to get started I urge you to pick up a copy of Make It Rain to learn the practical advice I share in about a 90-minute read and continue coming back to my blog each week to pick up new practical tips for free.
I hope you decide to make a small investment of your time reading a copy of Make It Rain and continue checking out my blog to get the advice you need to create a more secure and prosperous life for you and your family in 2020.
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