7 Rules I’ve Kept Over 5 Years of Managing My Money
I opened my first stock brokerage account in 2019 and have been at it ever since. The first few years, I nearly lost everything; now things just roll along normally. Here’s what I learned along the way.
1. Set only one automatic transfer per month. If you set several, you can’t manage them, and you’ll definitely forget one.
2. Remove your accounts from your app favorites. This had the biggest effect.
3. You should spend more time leaving it alone than studying it.
4. News often shows you the result rather than the cause. I often read it after everything had already been priced in.
5. Learn about taxes in advance. If years pass without knowing, a big chunk will be taken out later.
6. Don’t stake your life on a few percentage points of return. When the amount is large, even a small percentage matters. And vice versa.
7. Keep it vague with family too. If you do well, they ask favors; if you don’t, they worry.
My takeaway after five years is that personal finance isn’t a “skill for making money” but a “habit of not losing money.” It took me three years to realize that.
9 answers
I really relate to #2. After I removed the app from my favorites, I open it way less often each day lol
A habit of never losing — agreed.
Do you have a source? It’s just your personal experience, so it’s a bit much to assert it as a rule.
No. 7 is a bit bittersweet. In my case, it was the opposite: I didn’t know where my parents were investing, and I only found out later after a tax issue blew up. It seems telling family to keep things vague isn’t always the right call.