Thursday, November 14, 1996
Just Get Started
by
MF DowMan
Procrastination is something on which I've become an expert. In college I perfected the art of writing term papers on the fly, often printing the final copy when I should have been sprinting to class (although I pride myself on having never missed a class deadline). And it's cool when you're 18 or 19 to put things off you know have to be done. But that coolness wears thin real quickly when it comes to real life issues, like, of course, investing.
Yet most young adults have the attitude that you have to have a lot of money to get started and so they wait and wait and wait until they're 40 or 50, and then suddenly realize nothing's put away for retirement. But it's so simple. Don't wait.
Let's say you're 25 years old, with 40 years to go before retirement, but you don't have much to invest. Just get started anyway. Open up an IRA, use Dividend Reinvestment Plans, whatever it takes to get you started. Now let me string up a carrot in front of you.
If you invest just $100 a year (not even a month), each year for the next 40 and get a return of 22% (the average for the Foolish Four over the last 25 years), you'll still retire a millionaire. Hard to believe, isn't it? But that $100 a year would grow into $1,293,653.53. Just think what it would be if you were able to put $1,000 a year away. (Okay, I'll tell you -- $15.8 million.)
It's really that simple. No excuses. Just get started!