Like any typical child, my mother received an allowance from her
father. But unlike a typical child, she received that allowance into her
60’s. He stopped writing her checks only when he died. My mother
received financial support from her father because as a teacher and
divorced mother of two, she could not make ends meet on her own. Her
teacher’s salary alone didn’t cover the kind of lifestyle she wanted to
live.
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My mother divorced my father when I was 4. Then my mother and
stepfather divorced when I was 10. There was no man in the house for a
few months, and soon thereafter came the string of boyfriends.
Of all my mother’s boyfriends, I remember Robert the most. My mother
seemed to feel proud and privileged to be his girlfriend. He was older
and wealthier than any other man she had dated.
Robert was a handsome, highly paid marketing executive with a major
Pennsylvania department store who drank dry martinis, wore Italian
sports coats, and drove a Datsun 280zx. He was separated from his wife,
who lived in Florida.
My brother and I assumed he would eventually get a divorce and move
in with us. After Robert bought me a tan, corduroy suit for my piano
recital (it was considered very stylish for the early '80s), I imagined
all the clothes he could afford to buy me as gifts.
When Robert learned he had cancer, he moved back to Florida with his
wife and children to die. My mother told me after his death that he had
“abandoned” her. I was only 14 and felt confused by the choice of words
she used to describe her pain. She could have said she was “sad” or
“lonely,” but instead she used the word “abandon.”
I looked the word up in the dictionary, and it meant that Robert had
“ceased to support” her. I decided that I would never put myself in such
a vulnerable, helpless situation and from that point on vowed to
support myself (with or without a man).
My grandparents on my father’s side were poor. I was 24 when my
paternal grandmother died, and she left me $1,600. Although I wanted to
spend that windfall on things that most young women like to spend money
on (like clothes and shoes), I knew I needed to begin investing for my
future. I was employed but had already been laid off twice and concluded
that I couldn’t count on a man or a job to provide financial stability.
I had to build a financial cushion myself.
In thinking about whether I would save or invest that $1,600, there
was only one clear choice: invest in the stock market. I recalled an
eye-opening chart presented by Wharton Professor Jeremy Siegel when I
was studying finance that demonstrated that over the long run (despite
its short term risk of going down) the stock market generated higher
returns than other asset classes, such as bonds or certificates of
deposit. Because I was in my mid-20s, I had quite a long time horizon
and knew that stocks were the place I wanted to invest my cash.
The decision I made to invest that $1,600 (not merely save
it) was the most important wealth-building decision I made in my life.
It is the reason I became a millionaire before I turned 40, a feat that
would not have been possible had I chosen to keep that money in the
bank.
That’s why I feel sad when I read articles about the large numbers of
millennials who are shunning the stock market and keeping their money
in cash. It’s a mathematical fact that you can’t grow your money by
keeping it in a mattress or in a bank account earning close to zero
percent. But according to a recent Wells Fargo study,
only half of millennial women agree that the stock market is the best
place to invest for retirement, and only 9 percent are saving at least
one-tenth of their income.
I’m doing my part to change that trend. If I can inspire just one
more percent of women to not only save more of their income — but to
invest it in the stock market — imagine the millions of dollars of
wealth that we as women can build on our own.
Was it easy to go from $1,600 to $1 million in just 15 years? Did I
get lucky on one stock pick that doubled in value every year? Of course
not. I had to regularly add money I earned at work to my brokerage and
retirement accounts. It wasn’t easy, but it also wasn’t as hard as you
might think.
In my book, “Every Woman Should Know Her Options: Invest Your Way to Financial Empowerment,”
I explain the decisions and trade-offs I made regarding spending,
adopting a frugal lifestyle, forgoing graduate school (because I didn’t
want to take on more student-loan debt), renting instead of buying, and
delaying marriage and family.
The major benefit of the book is that women get the opportunity to
learn from my two decades of investing experience in language and
through examples that resonate with women.
The path to financial empowerment can be a long and bumpy road, but
you can do it — with or without a husband or partner. There is no better
time to start investing than the present, no matter what your age. And
you don’t need lots of money to start. If you have an employer-sponsored
retirement plan, contribute to it. If you don’t, open a self-directed
IRA.
Don’t let your fear of making poor decisions with your money stop
you. When you invest, sometimes you make money and sometimes you lose
it. But if you start early, make contributions a regular habit, and stay
in it for the long term, you might just end up a millionaire.
#Source:
The Decision That Helped Make Me A Millionaire Before Age 40 | Laurie Itkin
Jul. 30, 2014
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