Wanting to retire early!! what things can i do to help me with this quest?
22 year old female very determined to retire at least by 40 or 42 or before that..what efforts should be made on my part to do so? should i make some small investments or go to a couple of edward jones and speak with them??
Public Comments
- join the military is a second choice. 20 years and the Us. Gov pays for you
- Save, save, save as much as possible every month. Put off luxuries and save and invest instead....invest in money market accounts first, then possibly a couple of cd's from a bank, then start an IRA, then invest in various types of stock and bond accounts through a good broker company....if you like Edward Jones, you can always ask for their suggestions. There are plenty of brokers out there who want your business.
- I commend you for your determination. DRS is right about saving, that's a must. I suggest you do your own research on investing and then if you want, get advice from a financial planner. I would never trust managing my money to someone else though. At your age you can afford to take some risk in your investments and that will probably be necessary to meet your retirement goal.
- NEVER, EVER USE A CREDIT CARD. Save, Save, Save. When investing, it's better to be consistent in your payments than in working to get a half-point improvement here or there. Never finance a car (pay cash, even if all you can afford is a clunker) No sence in paying for the same car twice. Open a Roth IRA, and put as much as you're allowed to (this year, $5,000/yr). Then the rest will go into a 401K or a regular brokerage account. Once it's in the account, never take it out. $1,000/month @ 0% * 20 years = $240,000 $1,000/month @ 7% * 20 years = $589,000 $1,000/month @ 0% * 30 years = $360,000 $1,000/month @ 7% * 30 years = $609,000 Once you have $2500 in your brokerage account, you can put the money into mutual funds. Just park it and forget it. 20 years will be more than enough time for the bulls and the bears to finish fighting, so that you won't be taking a big risk. With 20-30 years to work on it, "Buy Low, Sell High" changes to "Buy Now, Sell Later" Right now, the Dow Jones is 12,270. A lot of people lost money in the last couple weeks because it got up to 14,000. But, in January 1978, the Dow Jones was at 750. Which means that $750 invested 30 years ago is now worth $12,270, a gain of 9 3/4% a year.
