In 2012, my family and I had a series of conversations around our finances. I was fortunate to supporting family. Sure, they have to work a several years in order to receive pension benefits, but it freed me to be more entrepreneurial; taking greater risk without threatening our financial future as a young family.
Turns out, I was a dreamer with enough persistence and focus to actually get a business off the ground. The gamble, for me, paid off. Of course, it only paid off after a whole lot of failure, but I eventually reached the point where my business could support my family; beating the odds with sheer grit.
When my company started to produce serious cash-flow, my parents and I sat down to discuss their options for retiring early (without a large portion of their pension). What's interesting, is that simple conversation turned into something much broader.
The question was raised: How do we want to live in retirement? I knew that I wanted to be financially independent (i.e. debt free with enough assets to generate a ROI that could support us for the rest of our lives). My family was onboard, and we decided to keep active in our careers, working towards multi-millionaire status.
1. Online Brokerage Platforms
We continued to work hard, which led to one more question. What should we do with the money we had earned so far? Yes, of course we would continue to save as much as we could manage. But, where would we invest our money, so that we could cash in on the magic of compounding interest?
Your probably familiar with the likes of Scottrade, Fidelity, E-Trade and TD Ameritrade. These giant platforms offer investors access to all of the tools that traditional brokers use, including instant trading and breaking industry news.
While an online brokerage platform was an enticing option, we were more interested in letting our money operate on auto-pilot. The last thing I wanted to do after coming home from a long day at work, was fire up the computer and stress about a stock portfolio.
2. Short-Term Options and Binary Trading Platforms
I knew we needed a diverse portfolio, so my solution was to invest 60% of our savings into Vanguard Index Funds and high-growth Mutual Funds with a track-record (at least 12 years) of long-term growth. This allowed me to set my distribution and then promptly forget about the headache of keeping up with individual stocks.
Although, the more I read about the markets, the more the different types of trades peaked my curiosity. Instead of buying and re-positioning stocks among sets of companies, I began to investigate ways to take advantage of short-term gains, without the investment of long research hours.
I had the opportunity to speak with Adam Green, the Founder and CEO of Signals 365. He advised that "...virtually every type of investment carries risk, so if you're going to invest in the stock market, you have to be prepared to lose everything. That's a real potential. But, there are a variety of signals that could help indicate which direction an industry, or specific company is headed. Investment instruments, like binary options, allow casual investors to quickly cash-in on these signals if they turn out to be accurate."
The challenge for me was finding reliable information. This is where the investment platforms came into play. Analyzing the trends and seeing how the market was reacting to news helped me to identify patterns. It became less about investing, and more about figuring out the pieces to a puzzle.
Find Ways to Make Investing Fun, Which Encourages Additional Savings
It was weird, because I knew I hated "watching the stock market". But, I loved reading about the movers and shakers in the industries, and how they were making moves that started waves in the market. To make managing my investments less of a chore, I tried to make my research time personal. Who was doing what, and how would that impact my portfolio?
If it was an especially significant event, I'd attempt to cash-in on the movement with binary options and other types of short-term positions. While the majority of my savings were safely managed by the index and mutual fund market, I was free to invest more aggressively with the remaining portion.
And, most importantly, I found the more I spent time investing, the more motivated I was to save. As Warren Buffet is fond of saying: "If you don't find a way to make money while you sleep, you will work until you die."
Investing my funds in a manner that I control, without the necessity for micromanagement, was my key to earning money while I slept. I hope you'll dip a toe in the water and realize how powerful investing is for your long-term financial independence. Good luck!