This is Part 2 of Walter and Lily’s story about going from $0 to over $8 million in investments.
In this post they share:
- 3 questions they always ask about their investments
- 🚩 The red flag that had them pull millions out of a brokerage
- How they got free money to invest for their children
Want to (anonymously) share your investing experience and tips, whether you are new or experienced? Click here!
We lost 100% of our first investment
One of the most pivotal things that defined our investing career was losing ALL of our first investment.
We were in our early 20s, and we’d scrimped and saved to put that money aside.
It was $10K, but in today’s money it would be nearly $40,000.
We’d invested in a local real estate developer - who walked away with everyone’s money.
There’s so much truth to the saying, “Losing $10,000 feels like losing $100,000” - it hurts. Bad.
This is a good lesson to learn when you’re young, because you have lots of time to out-earn and out-invest the money you lost.
It’s even better if you can learn this lesson from someone else, and not have to experience it yourself!
Looking back, losing all that money on our first investment was a blessing.
It was one of the best things that ever happened to us.
This made us realize we’re more cautious investors than we first thought.
We needed to find ways to grow our money without taking huge risks.
So we started researching different investment strategies, but soon hit a wall…
We were laughed out of the bank
We went to the bank looking for help, but we were starting from nothing. They basically laughed in our faces.
Even getting information about investing was nearly impossible.
Nobody took us seriously.
Since we didn’t have any money, we were seen as not worthwhile talking to.
We scoured the library for every book we could find about investing and growing wealth, but it was slim pickings.
We were stuck, because how do you get money if you can’t even get the information to help you get there?!
If you’re reading this, you are truly in the golden age of investing. You have access to wealth-building information we never could’ve dreamed of.
We don’t gatekeep!
We’re here to help invest, even if you’ve never done so before.
We’ll show you how to get higher returns and keep more of your money than investing with an advisor.
(And it’s easy, low-stress, and takes just minutes a month!)
The first step is knowing what kind of funds to invest in. Click here to find out!
The 3 questions to ask about your investments
Whether you are self-investing or working with an advisor, there are always 3 questions we ask:
1. What is our overall portfolio at?
2. What is our rate of return? Look at what it is year-to-date, and the last 12 months.
3. What is our rate of return compared to the market overall?
You can get into the weeds with numbers all you want, but just knowing these 3 answers is enough of a guideline to know whether things are where they should be - or not.
You’ll always know where your investments stand with Passiv!
Our clear and simple reporting shows your rate of return and investment performance.
The red flag that had us pull millions out of a brokerage
Knowing the answer to those questions saved us from losing hundreds of thousands of dollars - or more.
At this point we’d been with that advisor for 20+ years.
In the beginning things were going well - but then we started consistently losing money, when the overall market was up.
This was a BIG red flag. We were really stressed wondering….
“How do I leave my investment advisor?”
We didn’t know how to get our money out of that investment brokerage, and this was a big strain.
At this point we were kind of friends with our advisor, since we’d worked together for more than 2 decades!
It was a huge relief to realize that our new investment platform could handle transferring your investments, so we didn’t have to have an awkward conversation with our advisor.
If you want to move your investments to another platform, you can do so without saying a word to your advisor!
When the transfer is handled by the institutions, you can easily transfer registered accounts like RRSPs and TFSAs without any tax implications.
Your transfer fees are typically covered too! Check out how easy it is to switch to Questrade.
Find a ‘financial mentor’ to look up to
Walter says,
“A few years ago I heard my son’s friends talking about money.
I chimed in with my two cents - and they asked if I could teach them about investing.
They were in their early 30s, so they had lots of opportunities for growth!
One of my son’s friends now has my photo in his apartment and asks himself, “What would Walter do?”
If you want to make better financial choices, ‘channel’ someone you look up to. Think of how they would handle a situation and you’ll have a good plan to follow.”
How we got ‘free money’ to invest for our kids
We invested every dollar we received from the Canada Child Benefit.
If you can get by without using your monthly benefit payments and invest it instead, it’s a great way to get a headstart on investing for your children’s future.
Your child benefit payments are tax-free, so that’s already a huge advantage.
Then you can invest it in a tax-sheltered Registered Education Savings Plan (RESP) for tax-free growth!
We didn’t know enough to use the RESP at the time, but we would’ve if we knew about it.
We’d love to share your investing experience!
Whether you’ve been investing for a month, a year, or a decade - people want to hear from you!
You’ve got tips, strategies, and advice that is helpful to others.
We will share them anonymously on our blog so others can learn from you.
Click here to share your experience!
* Names are changed for privacy.
