How to Start to Investing: A Complete Guide for Beginners

Lets take a step back from this question for just a second, and start with another question. What naturally happens to money over time? In other words, what would happen to your money if you stuffed it under your mattress? Would it go up in value? No. In fact, your money would go down in value. Why is this exactly?

One word: inflation. Simply put, inflation is when the cost of goods and services goes up over time. For example, the cost of a gallon of milk in 1913 was 36 cents. 100 years later, in 2013, that same gallon of milk costed $3.53 - nearly ten times more.

So, if you were to put $1,000 under your mattress at a 2.5% inflation rate, the following year that same $1,000 would only be worth $975. In other words, since goods and services cost 2.5% more, your orignial $1,000 can now only buy $975 worth of goods and services.

Lets return to our original question. What naturally happens to money over time? Thanks to inflation, money naturally loses its value over time. This is a great reason to start investing. If every single year your dollars are worth less and less due to inflation, you want to invest in something that grows your dollars at a rate higher than the inflation rate.

If inflation hovered around 2.5%, but you were able to place your dollars in an account that also payed you 2.5%, you would be keeping pace with inflation. In other words, your dollars would retain their value. Now, is inflation the only reason you should invest? Of course not. There are tons of reasons to invest.

The obvious reason is to take your current dollars and multiply them into more dollars. You can invest for retirement, for your children's education, for general wealth building and more. The bottom line is this: you are not going to reach your financial goals simply by putting dollar bills under your mattress. You need to invest to get there.

You can make money from investing in two ways.

1) Appreciation

The first way you can make money from investing is through appreciation. If you bought a stock for $50 and it went up in value to $75, you could sell it and be left with a profit of $25. This profit that you made is referred to as a capital gain. We should note that you only have a capital gain when you sell for a profit. If you sell at a loss, or don't sell at all, you don't have a capital gain.

2) Cash flow

The second way you can make money from investing is through cash flow. Cash flow is where you make an investment, and then that investment provides you a stream of income. For example, you could buy a rental property, rent it to tenants and get a small "flow" of income. You could also start a business and get a "flow" of income.

Which one of these should you focus on as a beginner?

When you are first starting out, it will be much easier to focus on making money through appreciation. Buying or creating investments that create consistent cash flow, such as rental properties, can be quite challenging when you are first starting out.

On the other hand buying investments that focus on appreciation, such as stocks and funds, can be quite easy thanks to modern online brokers. In order to successfully make money through appreciation as you invest, you should understand two other concepts.

First, you need to take a look at the bigger picture and invest over the long haul. The stock market has historically averaged a 10% return over the long haul. We can see this cleary by viewing a snapshot of the S&P 500 which tracks the performance of the 500 most important companies in the US.

As you can see, the stock market has gone up overall during the past 30 years. However, there have been significant crashes during that time as well, including the 2008 financial crash, and the 2020 crash due to Covid. Say that you had started investing just before the financial crash of 2008.

It would be tempting to panic and sell all of your investments during the crash. However, if you would have just stayed calm, your investments would have recovered in about 6 or 7 years, and then continued to rise in value. That is why it is so important to see the big picture and invest for the long haul.

Second, you need to understand compound interest. Compound interest probably sounds like another complicated investing term, but its not. All it means is that your money earns interest on top of interest. This still probably sounds confusing so lets look at an example to clear things up.

Say that you invest $100 at the beginning of the year into the stock market. Lets assume that you can earn a return of 10%. This simply means that the value of the stock market would go up by 10% for the year. So, at the end of year one, you would have $110 since you invested $100 and earned 10% on that investment.

Instead of cashing out at the end of the year, you decide to leave your investment, now valued at $110, in the stock market. Lets assume that you could earn another 10% return. At the end of year 2, you would now have $121. This is because your $110 investment earned a 10% rate of return. Not only did your initial $100 from year one earn 10%, but the $10 also earned a 10% return on top of that.

Hence, compound interest is where your money earns interest on top of interest. The reason that we mention compound interest is that it is turning every day people into millionaires. Don't believe us? Lets look at another example.

If you were to invest just $200 each month into the stock market from the time you were 25 until you retired at 65, you would have over $1 million. The green line on the chart shows the total amount of your base contributions which equals $96,000.

The red line shows how that $96,000 grew over time thanks to comound interest. The key with compound interest is to invest consistently. You can invest small amounts each month and they can grow into large amounts over time.

Keep in mind that your money does not compound each year as positive returns don't happen every year in the stock market. That is why it is so important to take a look at the big picture and invest over the long term and not the short term.

Remember, the stock market historically goes up over a long enough time horizon. The stock market is what is providing an average return of 10% This simply means that the value of the market goes up by 10%. Compound interest takes this return or value and uses it to grow your money

To sum this section up, you can make money in investing through either appreciation or cash flow. If you are a beginner, you should focus on making money through appreciation as it will be easier. In order to make money through appreciation, you need to look at the big picture, invest for the long haul, and regularly invest so that your money can grow using compound interest.

Don't worry to much about what investments you need to choose and how much you need to contribute. We will discuss those items later on in Part 2 of this guide.

In short, yes, all investing carries an element of risk. However, it is highly unlikely that you will lose all of your money when you invest the smart way. The risk of investing is partially determined by what you invest in. If you were to place all of your money into a couple of crypto meme coins, there is a very good chance you will lose everything.

However, if you were to invest in the stocks of good publicly traded companies, there is a high likelihood that you won't lose money over the long haul. Think about it like this. Everday thousands of people go to work at publicly traded companies such as Nike, Apple, Coca-Cola and many more.

These companies directly provide value to millions of people every single day. If all of these companies simultaneosly fail, you are going to have bigger problems than worrying about losing your money from investing.

If all investing carries risk, you might be asking yourself if there is a way to completely eliminate this risk? The short answer is no. A much better question would be how do you manage the risk associated with investing?

The way that you manage the risk of investing is through diversification. Woah, another complex investing term. Diversification simply means that you should not put all of your eggs in one basket. Instead you should spread your investments across and within multiple asset classes.

On a practial level, it looks like this. Instead of just buying a few individual stocks such as Tesla or Microsoft, you could buy lots of different stocks. If Tesla or Microsoft fails to perform well, the other stocks that you own can make up for it. This would be an example of diversifying within the asset class of stocks.

To further drive this point home, lets revisit a snapshot of the S&P 500 above. The S&P 500 simply tracks the performance of the 500 most important companies in the US. As you can see the S&P 500 has steadly gone up over the past 30 years.

At certain times some companies in the S&P 500 perform well, where as others do not. The companies that are overperforming and underperforming can change year to year. However, since the S&P 500 is diversified between 500 companies, it tends to go up over the long haul.

Now of course this does not mean that holding a diversified portfolio completely eliminates risk. As you can see on the S&P 500, diversified portfolios are still subject to lose value and even crash. However, holding a diversified portfolio does help manage the risk of investing.

In the example above, we primarily talked about diversification within stocks. However, you can also diversify among other asset classes such as bonds and cash or cash equivalents. Don't get to caught up on how to create a diversified portfolio as we will look at that in Part 2 of this guide.

The great news of modern day investing is that it is affordable to get started. Many online brokers and trading platforms offer the ability to buy fractional shares of stocks. This simply means that you can buy just a piece of a stock and not the entire share.

You can often start with as little as $100, $5 and sometimes even $1. Now keep in mind that this is simply the amount that you need to get started. The amount that you should be investing is typically higher, but we will cover that in Part 2.

Now that you understand why you should invest, as well as some important investing principles, it is time for you to understand what you can invest in. This is meant to serve as a general outline on potential investments. We will give you some ideas on what you should invest in as a beginner in Part 2.

Cash or cash equivalents

Although cash is technically not an investment, some cash accounts can be used to help you quickly "invest" or save for short term goals. For this reason we included a few cash accounts as investments.

1) High Yield Savings Accounts

A high yield savings account is a type of savings account that pays a higher than average APY when compared to a traditional bank account. A traditional savings account earns around 0.42% APY, whereas some high yield savings account can earn over 4% APY - ten times more than a traditional savings account.

2) CDs

A CD, or certificate of deposit, is another types of savings account offered by banks. A CD earns interest on a lump sum for a set period of time. For example, you could place $1,000 in a 1 year CD that earns 5% interest. During your term (the length of your CD) you can't get access to your lump sum without paying a penalty. After your term is up, you get your lump sum plus any interest earned back.

Bonds

A bond is a loan you make to a company or the government. Think of a bond as an IOU. Governments and companies issue bonds in order to raise money. In return, you as the investor get repaid the face value of the bond (the amount you loaned to the government or company) on a specfic date, as well as periodic interest payments along the way (usually twice per year).

Stocks

A stock is simply a share of ownership in a publicly traded company. Similar to bonds, companies issue stock to investors in order to raise capital for a variety of business functions. Stocks are typically the back bone to most investors portfolios.

‍Related - How to Invest in Stocks as a Beginner

Funds

1) Mutual funds

An investment fund simply pools the money of many investors and then uses that money to invest in a variety of assets such as stocks and bonds. Mutual funds are managed by investing professionals and allow you to gain exposure to all of the assets held within the fund.

2) ETFs

Similar to a mutual fund, an ETF, or exchange traded fund, pools the money of many investors to buy individual securities. The primary difference between an ETF and a mutual fund is that you can trade an ETF during the day like a stock, where as mutual fund trades can only be executed once per day.

3) Index Funds

An index fund is another collection of individual securities that aims to mirror the performance of a market index. For example, the S&P 500 index (which we have mentioned a few times), is an index that tracks the performance of the 500 most important companies in the US. The S&P 500 is not an investment itself. Instead, you could buy an S&P 500 index fund if you wanted to invest in the 500 most important companies in the US.

Related - Mutual Funds vs Index Funds: Which is Better?

Real Estate

Real estate can be an investment in a couple of ways. The first and obvious is that you buy a property, it goes up in value, and you sell it for a profit. The second way is to use real estate to create cash flow. You can rent out a property to tenants or try to do short term and vacation rentals through places like VRBO and Air BNB.

Alternative investments

1) Precious metals

Precious metals such as gold and silver are a few alternative investments that some investors like to have in their portfolio. The idea behind investing in precious metals is that they can act as a hedge against inflation. Precious metals tend to retain their value when dollars are losing value due to inflation.

2) Cryptocurrency

Cryptocurrency, or crypto, is a digital currency that can be used as an alternative form of payment or investment. Crypto has exploded in popularity during the past decade due the potential for high returns. Some investors will argue that crypto is a great investment due to the technology behind the digital currency. However, crypto is highly volatile and there are still many unkowns.

Related -Should You Invest in Crypto?

Now that you understand what you could invest in, you need to understand potential investing accounts. An investing account simply holds your investments. It is not an investment itself. There are a wide variety of investing accounts availble, but to keep things simple we are only going to look at retirement and brokerage accounts.
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This is simply meant to serve as a general guide on a few investing account options. Don't get to caught up on which one you should have and how to open it. We will give some more details and recommendations in Part 2.

Retirement accounts

1) 401(k)

The 401(k) is one of the most popular accounts that investors use to fund their retirement. The 401(k) is an employer sponsored plan. When you set up your 401(k) at work, contributions are automatically taken out before you pay taxes to the IRS. In other words, you are deferring paying tax until you withdraw from your 401(k) in retirement.

For example, if you were to contribute $250 each month to your 401(k), your employer would automatically take that money out of your paycheck each month before the IRS can tax the contribution and invest it into a list of available investment funds that you choose.

Most employers typically offer to match your contributions up to a certain percentage of your total compensation. For example, say your employer offered a 3% match. If you make $50,000, you could contribute 3% of your total compensation ($1,500), and your employer would match your contribution with another $1,500.

The total amount the IRS lets you contribute to a 401(k) per year is $22,500, or $30,000 if you are 50 years or older (limits are for 2023). Contributions to a 401(k) are also tax deductible. Lets return to the example above. If you were making $50,000 per year, and contributed $1,500 to your 401(k), your taxable income would be lowered to $48,500.

2) Traditional IRA

An IRA is an individual retirement account. As the name implies, these accounts are specifically designed to help you save for retirement. The Traditional IRA functions similarly to the 401(k) in that you defer your tax bill until retirement and then pay taxes when you take money out of the account.

Where as a 401(k) is only offered as an employer sponsored plan, almost anyone can open a Traditional IRA as long as they have earned income. Traditional IRA contributions may also be tax deductible depending upon a variety of factors including your income and if you have a 401(k).

The total amount that you can contribute to a Traditional IRA is limited by the IRS to $6,500 per year, or $7,500 if you are 50 and older. (The IRS limits the amount you can contribute due to the tax benefits of the account.)

3) Roth IRA

The Roth IRA is the exact opposite of the Traditional IRA. You pay tax now on the dollars that you contribute to the Roth IRA, but then when you take money out in retirement, you don't pay any tax.

Similar to the Traditional IRA, the IRS limits the amount you can contribute to $6,500 per year, or $7,500 per year if you are over 50. Since you won't pay any taxes in retirement, the IRS also dictates that your income must be below a certain level in order to qualify for a Roth IRA.

If you file your taxes as an individual, your income cannot exceed $138,000 in order to qualify for the full contribution to a Roth IRA. If you file your taxes under a married filing status, your income cannot exceed $218,000 in order to qualify for the full contribution to a Roth IRA.

Related - Is a Roth IRA Better Than a Traditional IRA?

Important note for these retirement accounts: The 401(k), Traditional IRA, and Roth IRA all have the same basic withdrawal rule that is worth noting. You can not access the money in these accounts until you reach the age of 59 1/2. If you try to take money out before then, you can incur penalties.

The only exception to this rule is that you can withdraw the base amount of your contributions that you made to a Roth IRA. The reason for this is that you already paid taxes on the dollars you contributed to the account. You can't withdraw any of the earnings from the account.

Brokerage account

A brokerage account is the most basic investing account that simply allows you to buy and sell a range of investments. Unlike the retirement accounts listed above, brokerage accounts don't provide any sort of special tax benefits. Due to this, there are no requirements on who can open a brokerage account and you can contribute as much as you would like to the account.

Related - 12 of the Best Investing Accounts

Congratulations! You made it through Part 1. You might be feeling excited, enlightened, and a little bit overwhelmed. This is completely ok. We covered a lot of topics and terms. To keep things simple, these are the big takeaways from Part 1.

1) Your dollars are naturally becoming less valuable due to inflation. This is why you need to start investing to not only preserve the value of your dollars, but more importantly grow them.

2) You can make money from investing through either appreciation, cash flow, or both. When you are just getting started it is much easier to focus on making money through appreciation. It is important to invest for the long haul and look at the big picture as the stock market historically goes up over time. Finally, consistent and small investments can grow into millions due to compound interest.

3) Investing does carry risk, but it can be managed through diversification and making smart investments.

4) You do not need a lot of money to start investing. In fact $100 or less is a good place to start. Keep in mind that the more you are able to invest, the greater chance you give yourself of building wealth. With that being said, it is ok to start small.

5) There are a wide variety of investments, but the most common are cash or cash equivalents, bonds, stocks, funds, real estate, and alternative investments such as precious metals and crypto.

6) There are a wide variety of investing accounts, but retirement accounts and brokerage accounts are a good starting place.

The first tactical step you need to take to start investing is to open an investing account. Remember, an investing account simply holds all of your investments. In Part 1, we covered retirement and brokerage accounts. We are now going to give you some recommendations on how to use those accounts effectively and in what order. After that, we will give you the steps you need to open the accounts.

Option 1: Invest in your companies 401(k) up to the match

The first account you could invest in would be your companies 401(k) plan if one is offered. We recommend only contributing enough to your 401(k) to get your employers match. So, if your employer offers a 3% match and you make $50,000, you could contribute $1,500 so that your employer will match that contribution. If your employer does not offer a match or 401(k) plan at all, go on to option 2.

Option 2: Max fund a Roth IRA after contributing enough to your 401(k) to get a match or if your employer does not offer a 401(k) plan

After you contribute enough to your 401(k) to get your employers match, it is better to stop making contributions to your 401(k) and instead make contributions into a Roth IRA. Why is this exactly? One word: taxes. Remember your contributions to your 401(k) are not taxed until retirement.

If taxes go up in the future, it does not make sense to defer paying taxes until later. Although there is no way to perfectly predict what will happen in the future, some experts believe it is inevitable that taxes will go up in the future. Instead it would make more sense to pay taxes today, and then enjoy paying zero taxes in retirement.

This is exactly where a Roth IRA comes in. You pay taxes today on the dollars you contribute, but then enjoy paying zero taxes in retirement. Keep in mind that your income has to be below certain levels in order to qualify for a Roth IRA. (We reviewed the requirements here in Part 1).

So, if you qualify for a Roth IRA, you can open this account and make the max contribution once you have contributed enough to your 401(k) to get the match. If your employer does not offer a 401(k), or does not offer a match on the 401(k), jump straight to the Roth IRA.

The max amount you can contribute to a Roth IRA is $6,500 per year or $7,500 per year if you are 50 and older. (Limits are for 2023.)

Option 3: Jump back to your 401(k) after you have max funded your Roth IRA

If you are still able to invest more after you have made the maximum contribution allowed into a Roth IRA, you can continue investing in your 401(k). Although you won't get your employer's match on additional dollars you contribute to your 401(K), you can still get some benefits including lowering your taxable income for the year.

Option 4: Max fund a Traditional IRA if you don't qualify for a Roth IRA and your employer does not offer a 401(k)

If you find yourself in the rare scenario in which your employer does not offer a 401(k) and you don't qualify for a Roth IRA, you can open a Traditional IRA. The Traditional IRA is sort of like a 401(k) plan outside of work. You contribute to the plan with pre-tax dollars and then pay taxes in retirement.

Contributions can also potentially be tax deductible, which would lower your taxable income. The amount you can contribute to a Traditional IRA is the same for the Roth IRA. However, unlike a Roth IRA, your income does not need to be below a certain level to qualify.

Option 5: Add in a brokerage account for any additional investing

Finally, if you want to supplement any of the accounts above, you can open a brokerage account. A brokerage account does not have an immediate or long term tax benefits like the other accounts. However, a brokerage account is much more flexible. There are no limits on who can have one, how much you can contribute, and when you can access to the funds within the account.

What steps do you need to take to open one or more of these accounts?

Steps for the 401(k):

Since the 401(k) is an employeer sponsored plan, you need to speak with your company's HR department to see what you would need to do to enroll. Some companies automatically enroll new employees, where as others require you to go through a sign up process.

Most 401(k) plans offer a selection of mutual funds (usually 10 to 20) that you can choose to invest in. Some employers have a default investment set up, but you can typically change that if you want to.

Steps for the Traditional IRA, Roth IRA, and Brokerage Account:

Since these accounts are not held through work, you can set them up at an online broker.

Go to the website of your chosen online broker. (You can see some of our favorite online brokers here to get some ideas on which broker to use). Once you are there you should see an option to open an account. Click on this button.

Using the options above, you can decide which type of account you want to open (start with a Roth IRA if you qaulfiy). Then you simply fill out the paperwork online through your chosen broker. The process is pretty straightforward but expect to have to provide information such as your address, contact information, income, social security number, and government ID.

Once your account has been opened you need to deposit funds to buy your investments with. The easiest way to do this is to transfer money from your bank account. Most brokers allow you to punch in the routing and account number for your bank account in order to easily transfer funds into your investing account.

Once your account is open, you should see an option on your brokers website to transfer funds over. Simply follow the instructions. Keep in mind that some brokers do require a minimum initial deposit in order to open an account. However, most brokers allow you to deposit whatever you want or are able to.

Wait, I'm confused. Don't I already have investments in my investing account? The answer is no. Many new investors make the mistake of thinking they are investing once they open an account and deposit funds. But, there is one more step.

You have to take the funds you deposited in your account and then go and buy your investments. Imagine that your investing account was a grocery cart. You could go to the store, push the cart around, never put groceries within the cart and then go home. In this analogy, the groceries are the investments. You need to put the groceries in your cart.

In Part 1, we covered some of the most popular investment options. (You can click here if you need a quick refresh). With so many potential investments, you are probably wondering what you should invest in. We are going to give you the most beginner friendly option.

Use funds to build your portfolio

Arguably the easiest investment when you are first starting out are investment funds. Specificially mutual funds, ETFs, and index funds. Lets think through this a bit. Remember in Part 1 how we said that it is better to focus on making money in investing through appreciation instead of cash flow when you are first starting out?

Well, if you hold to this as you start to choose your investments, it immediatley elminates investments such as real estate (specifically rental properties and not traditional home ownership) that focus on cash flow. Now, you could invest in altnerative investments such as crypto and precious metals. However, these investments are either highly risky or not commonly used by new investors.

So, what investments does that leave? It leaves stocks, bonds, and cash or cash equivalents. Some investors like to choose invidual stocks and bonds to invest in. Although there is nothing wrong with this, it can be challenging to choose consistent winners and manage a portfolio of individual stocks when you are just getting started.

With that being said, it will be significantly easier to invest in stocks and bonds through an investment fund. As we mentioned before, there are mutual funds, ETFs, and index funds. Although all of these funds are baskets of individual securities, there are a few different reasons why you might choose one over the other.

An actively managed mutual fund could be a good option if you want a fund that could potentially beat the return of the market. Since actively managed mutual funds are managed by investing professionals, there is a small chance the fund manager could beat the standard return of the stock market.

An ETF could be a could option if you want to frequently trade it like a stock. An index fund could be a good option if you want a set it and forget it investment. Keep in mind that you don't have to stick to just one fund type. You can mix and match as you see fit.

Potential funds that you could invest in:

The Schwab S&P 500 Index Fund. The Fidelity ZERO Large Cap Index Fund. The Vanguard S&P 500 ETF (VOO). The SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (SPY). The State Street US Core Equity Fund. The Fidelity Mega Cap Stock Fund.

Important note: Keep in mind that these funds are simply examples of what you could invest in. The funds that are right for you could be different. The good news is that almost all online brokers offer free research tools to help you find good funds. We recommend looking for funds with at least a 10 year record that have low expense ratios. An expense ratio simply means what fees the fund charges.

Related - What Should You Invest In?

Once you have decided on the investments you want in your account, you need to invest consistently with regular contributions. Remember how we discussed the power of compound interest in Part 1? Well, the more consistent you are with your contributions, the more chance your give compound interest to grow your dollars over time.

On a practical level, we recommend investing on a monthly basis. Review your monthly budget to see how much you could afford to invest each month. Once you have a dollar amount in mind, we recommend setting up automatic deposits each month. You can set this up through the website of your chosen online broker.

Keep in mind that you can start small. If you review your budget and realize you can only invest $100, you might be discouraged. However, the point here is to build the habit of investing. Once you have the habit nailed, you can up the amount of your contributions later on.

As your financial circumstance allows you to invest more and more, a good rule of thumb is to aim to invest anywhere between 15% and 20% of your income each year. This is a good general guideline to follow as a beginner. However, the exact amount you need to invest might vary based upon your age, and your financial goals.

If you want to fast track all of the tactical steps we just went over, you do have an option to do that. In short, you could start investing by using a robo advisor. A robo advisor is a digital financial advisor that uses investing algorthims to manage and build an investing portfolio for you.

A robo advisor works like this. When you first sign up for a robo advisor you will be asked a series of questions related to your investing and financial goals. Based upon your answers to these questions, the robo advisor will build an investment portfolio for you using low cost investment funds.

The other piece of good news is that robo advisors offer all of the account types (except the 401k) we reviewed in Part 1. A robo advisor will eliminate the need for you to find and choose your own investment funds as it does that for you.

If a robo advisor sounds like a good option for you, you can check out our picks for the top robo advisors here. Once you have found the robo advisor that is best for you, you can go to their website and sign up for an account.

You can follow the same steps listed above on the account type you should open. (Click here if you need a refresher.) Once your robo advisor has approved your account, all you have to do is make a deposit. The robo advisor will take your deposit and invest it into the investment funds it chose for you so you don't have to do anything.

Related - What is a Robo Advisor and Should You Use One?

Seek out expert help

Our first tip is to seek out expert help. We hope that our guide gave you the knowledge and practical advice to get started. However, the writers here are not licensed financial advisors. We highly recommend seeking out the help of financial professionals.

This can include financial advisors, tax experts, insurance agents and more. Although investing is a key part of a comprehensive financial plan, there are other components as well. These experts can help you build a complete plan that is right for you.

With that being said, don't feel the pressure to instantly find every financial expert that you might need. The point of our investing guide was to get you into the game. As you continue to invest, you will most likely have further questions. This is when you can seek out financial experts.

The good news is that if you opt to use a robo advisor, some of them also offer financial advisors so you will already have one financial expert in your corner. Sofi Automated Investing offers financial advisors for free and Betterment offers financial advisors for an increased cost once your account balance reaches $100k.

Adjust your plan over time

Life changes over time, obviously. As your life changes, it might be a good idea to adjust your investing plan over time. Maybe you start having kids, get married, or get a new job. A good rule of thumb is to check on your financial plan and review it once per year to see if you need to make any changes.

This is where financial experts come in. They can help you pivot as needed and keep you accountable to stick to your plan. Now, you don't need to hyper obsess over this and be worried about constantly changing your plan. That will do more harm than good. Instead, periodically check in on things and see if you need to adjust your plan at all during major life changes.

If you are ready to get started, open your investing account at one of our top online brokers or top robo advisors. Good luck and happy investing!