"A dream doesn't become reality through magic; it takes sweat, determination, and hard work" ~ Colin Powell

Do not blindly follow the investment advice of your friends, colleagues, or relatives.

Things that worked for them may not work the same way for you.

Make a customized financial plan for yourself as per your risk profile, investment style, and requirement.

Refrain from buying a house at a very early stage in your career and committing yourself to huge EMI.

First, have some base of liquid financial assets by your side then start thinking of physical assets.

Personal Finance is not gender-specific.

Women should take control of their finances.

Guys, motivate women in your life to take part in household finances.

Empower them with financial literacy.

Women must learn to value and manage their financial needs.

This is very important as we are responsible for our health, wealth, and happiness.

Bachelors who are working from home, if spend only 10 to 15 percent of their money and might be earning that back through their investments or even more than that in the long term is as good as investing 100% of their salary.

Interested in Gold investment?

Try SGB, as these are:

1 - Secure and purest: Issued by RBI

2 - Gives you the same return as physical gold Underlying asset is Gold for these bonds

3 - Additional 2.5% interest income per year as compared to physical gold

4. No fear of theft.

The exact requirement of a retirement kitty is based on 

# Your current expenditure, 

# Your current earnings, 

# Years to retirement, 

# The life expectancy of you and your spouse, and 

# The return expectation from the investment etc.

Step-up SIP is a very useful method.

It allows you to invest in a smaller proportion when your income is low.

As your income grows your investment can also grow.

Always keep a high target for self-growth.

Your efforts are directly related to the target you set.

So if you keep mediocre targets you end up being an AVERAGE person.

Don't panic about small market corrections.

Don't blindly put all the savings in the wrong fund.

The first statement is to control your FEAR.

And the second one is to control your GREED.

Clean your mind and heart every week.

As we do house cleaning this cleaning is also important.

Don’t hold grudges against anyone as it is impacting you only as that person who insulted you forgot about it long back.

Don’t regret about past.

It is very hard to let go of past events in life.

But it is always better to MOVE ON in life to be happy and feel peaceful.

Financial Planning does not involve just investment.

It involves the basics of financial planning like

# How well you have to prepare for emergencies (like loss of life, hospitalization expenses, meeting with an accident, or sudden income loss/job loss),

# How to be a conscious spender,

# Which goals to be prioritized in your life and

# How to fund and achieve those goals with a well-planned strategy.

Is there a smarter way of avoiding agency costs for an insurance policy?

Yes, there is. You can buy pure-term policies online directly from the insurer and pay zero commission.

Just believe in yourself and work hard for a better tomorrow.

Tough times if any, shall also pass..

We should provide insights about personal finance to our younger siblings, children, friends, or cousins from time to time.

We can give examples of others who did mistakes in their 20s/30s and missed out on the compounding factor benefits and now struggling with finances.

People always have one question in mind. Will this amount is sufficient to retire?

The answer depends on the following basic questions:

# What kind of life do you want to live? (normal middle-class life or a luxurious one)

# How many people are financially dependent on you?

# How much return you can generate every year by investing the accumulated corpus?

# Do you own a house or have rented one?

# Which part of India do you live in and where do you plan to live after retirement? tier 1 city or tier 2?

There is no special or right time to start managing your finances for your retirement as well as other financial goals.

But if you are still finding a good time then there is no better time than Diwali which is at our doorstep.

Diwali is the biggest Festival in India. All 5 Diwali days are considered auspicious for shopping, booking houses, starting new businesses, and buying vehicles.

We all can also start taking our finances seriously this Diwali and mark it as a new start.

The sooner you start investing the better will be your wealth creation.

Diwali is a good time to start learning about basic concepts of financial planning such as

# Risk profiling,

# Asset allocation,

# Goal-based investment,

# Review and Rebalancing, etc.

All these terms are important to plan your investments in a proper way.

If you are naive and want to start your investments this Diwali then first

# Identify your financial goals

# Fix the investment horizons

# Decide the asset allocation for every goal

# Select suitable financial products

For short-term goals, one can use RDs, FDs, liquid funds, and money market funds along with Arbitrage funds.

For mid-term along with these products, one can add hybrid equity funds.

For long-term goals, you can have a blend of EPF/ PPF/ NPS along with Index Funds, Flexicap Funds, and small exposure in mid-cap.

One can have exposure to SGB, Gold ETF, or Gold Mutual funds for diversification in the Gold asset class.

Saving is a virtue. We should convert it into a habit.

Once any activity converted into the habit, your efforts to do it regularly reduces and you keep on going with it efficiently.

Savings converted into investment makes money work for us. 

The market might move up and down but never get too excited with highs and never get too depressed with lows.

Keep your emotions under control, especially FEAR and GREED, and do not break the investment in between.

Remember that wealth creation needs time and patience. 

TEACH your kids the VALUE of MONEY.

This is the most important lesson of life.

Make them Emotionally and Financially independent and Mentally strong to face the harsh reality of this world. 

Everyone has their own experiences in investing.

It's good to learn from others' experiences.

But self-learning through own mistakes, patience, and fear will give real learning.

So keep learning and relearning through your own experiments in investing.

Have patience.

Do not check your portfolio on a daily basis.

Your money will grow slowly and patience will play a key role in long-term wealth.

Can't save much??

Review your budget and check your progress every month.

Not only will this help you stick to your personal savings plan, but it also helps you identify and fix problems quickly.

There's no time like your twenties to start putting your money to work for you so that you can achieve your financial goals well in advance.

Do not waste your time overthinking and analyzing rather start with a simple Index Fund to get a flavor of the equity asset class.

In reality, we need simple things in life to progress but we end up preferring complications ...

Many people find it very difficult to sacrifice their current enjoyment for the future which is uncertain.

They want to live today and take the day as it comes.

This philosophy is very risky

Everyone should give proper importance to Investing for a brighter secure future.

Investing is all about making informed decisions and choices so that we achieve our financial goals. 

# If your goal is 10+ years away, then any day/week should be fine to invest in MFs.

# Always keep investing & topping up your investment as your income grows. Min 5% or the same as your yearly increment.

# If you have additional lumpsum and you see a dip in markets > 5% then you can deploy 20–25% of those funds.

# Invest only in Direct Plans of MFs which will save the third-party commission and will help in additional growth in your long-term wealth..