Investing, Credit Cards & Erasing Bank Balances
Recently I have spent a significant amount of time understanding my financial habits and am constantly trying to improve upon them. Not so long ago, keeping your salary hush-hush and putting your money in the highest returning fixed deposits were the norm. Lately, however, the introduction of applications that offer investing without the need of a human broker and a plethora of information to help amateurs get into the world of stocks and crypto has encouraged (from what I've seen), a lot more people to delve into the world of investment. Even my mother, who otherwise is constantly teased by my sister and me for being from the age of dinosaurs, has started to dabble in equity investing.
The growing craze behind FIRE (Financial Independence, Retire Early), is pushing a lot more young investors onto the market, and aggressive investors too. I have often come across the invest first, spend later strategy to ensure that you're investing regularly, however, recent developments have allowed me to slightly modify this strategy. I have observed, I prefer to put most of my money in some sort of equity investment within a few days of being credited my salary, and survive the rest of the month sparingly off of a credit card. As I see it, whenever my money is invested I tend to forget it as a part of the money I have and think of it as money spent. The constant reminder to pay my credit card bill throughout the rest of the month also ensures I'm not too lavish about my spending after, as it means I can't invest as much in the following month.
Seeing your money grow is always positive reinforcement, and sure, there's a lot of research to be done before wiping out your bank balance, but I have found my method of invest first, evade spending (perhaps it's a popular strategy with a lot of people) quite effective in making sure I'm prudent on financial matters. The reliability provided by free credit cards that require no more than a mobile application, and the impressive experience of investing from the comfort of my mobile have made me constantly follow my invest first, evade spending strategy. Again, on a personal basis, I have been extremely lucky so far, and in most cases, I have seen the small, short-term advantages of investing, and if anybody were to ask me if it's a good idea to start investing, I'd recommend them to erase their bank balance too (clearly I'm not a financial advisor), if you can handle the risk that tags along with it.
It is estimated that less than 5% of India invests, (this was less than 2% if we go back a few more years), and only recently have we seen the wheels starting turning a bit more quickly. Being fortunate enough to have been around my dad (who introduced me to investing), and a handful of friends who fiddle around in the world of investment, I often feel obligated to encourage others to do the same. I'm often surprised by friends and people who tell me they haven't gotten on this ship of investing yet since a lot of the media I follow online is now almost always related to investing. If you are reading this, and you too haven't gotten around to experiencing the possible yields of investing, I highly recommend you pick up a book or two or join an online course to begin your journey of sinking your bank account balance. Edit: Today, a lot of really good content comes by free, and is usually just a quick search away, so you can always look at that too!