Money and Finance

The Journey of a Budding Investor; When Actions Speak Louder Than Words

As some readers may recall, I previously received an email from "Reader A" who wanted to begin investing. When I asked how did he find me, he replied and I quote word by word:

"Currently, i am 18. Just last Saturday, i went to a wedding of my relative. So i started thinking about my future and if i can actually cover my wedding needs financially. Just nice i came across your post, "How much do you need to save for a decent wedding in Singapore?" shared by my friend on Facebook, That is what led me to your blog and it is enriching."

I found it very interesting that there are many things in life that leads to you "Thinking about your future".

Things like marriage, or you see your cousin/friend/sibling give birth, start a family. Things like that.

I'm guessing that thoughts about our future happens to everyone, some time or the other.

I also wondered though, how many actually acted after having that thought?

Everyone has their individual way of coping with their thoughts. Some shrug it off, thinking that they'll cross their bridges when they come to them. Others, however think deeper and begin getting worried. However, being worried is not necessarily a bad thing. It just might be what you need to spur you on to begin your journey to financial freedom.

Many financial blogs I have read all have a common objective. To get rich; to obtain financial freedom/security and so on.

What about myself? Well, I wouldn't dare to say I'm halfway there. In fact, I've only just begun less than one month ago. And I always wished I had started earlier. But at least, I started.

I don't claim to be the most knowledgeable, far from it in fact. It's comments by senior investors on my blog that gives me the motivation to continue, because I view them as my role models. It's their posts that help me learn more, every single day.

Seeing them all achieve so much makes me wonder why did they begin in the first place and what motivated them to begin?

For me, it's because of my mother. Seeing her work so hard to provide for us made my heart ache. I wanted to achieve financial freedom to provide for her in the later years as well as have enough money to start a family and afford a comfortable house. Most importantly, I also wanted my money to work harder for me, to beat inflation.

What worries me is also the amount of foreigners coming into our country and competing with locals for jobs. I see posts on Facebook every day that some local has been kicked aside replaced by a foreigner and so on. Job security is increasingly unstable.

But I digress. The main post of this article was to congratulate this young reader who actually took the first step and was already mentally mature compared to his peers of his age who might be more concerned about schoolwork, girls and popularity/clubbing/smoking and things like that which I was when I was his age. Guilty as charged.

It was only nearing the end of my school years and the stage of enlisting next year which woke me up. Two years of my life would be gone and I wanted to make sure that two years was worth my time. I intend to use part of the NS allowance to continue my small monthly investments.

I hope to look back some day and not regret the path I have chosen.

Would my future self thank me? I can only hope so.

Signing off,

Teenage Investor

Posts you might be interested in:

1. The First Step Is Always The Hardest

2. How much do you need to save for a decent wedding?

3. Why Every Singaporean Should Have An Emergency Fund

- Investments, Money + Teenage Investor's Q & A
Hello, recently I received emails from new readers of my blog after my post was shared on Facebook. Honestly, I was quite shocked and a little gratified that readers found my blog post interesting and relatable enough to share on their Facebook page....

- Life Goes On In The World's Most Expensive Country
Hello everyone, it's been quite some time since my last post. Have been catching up with my studies, going for army check-ups and everything else that goes on in a life of a polytechnic student. I recently received an email from Hady, who found...

- My 10 Year Plan
I never expected myself to sit down one day and start thinking and setting expectations and goals for my 10 year plan. I guess, it's the sort of thing that happens to a person just as he is about to complete another chapter in his life. I don't...

- Is Having No Money Really A Reason Not To Plan For Your Future?
So, I received this comment today. I understand where "Anonymous" is coming from, but at the same time this comment is worrying because I feel that many other teenagers and young adults are feeling the same way. Firstly, having no money is never an excuse....

- 80% Of Young Singaporeans Have Little To No Savings At All ; Are You One Of Them?
According to this link (http://sbr.com.sg/financial-services/news/disaster-in-making-4-out-5-young-singaporeans-have-no-savings) 4 out of 5 Singaporeans have little to no savings at all! True? Source: Singapore Business Review Now, firstly I would not...

Money and Finance