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You’ve probably been in one of these conversations, before. Someone who’s older, maybe a teacher or a family member, encourages you to start investing as soon as possible. It’s well-meaning advice.

On an academic level, you know that the younger you get started, the more you can allow the magic of compounding investment returns to work in your favor. You’re also committed to prioritizing your own financial health, and you feel inspired to work towards your own personal financial freedom.

Every new investor has to start somewhere, and there’s no better time than this year.

So, you’ve got the right idea, but you don’t have a playbook. No one taught you how to invest. You’ve heard of Roth IRAs and mutual funds, but how do you know that you’re doing the right thing?

Further, there are a lot of people with divergent opinions on the best way to invest. It’s hard to know where to go and who to listen to.

Much of learning to invest means learning to navigate the options and the conflicting advice and then distilling that down into a portfolio that makes the most sense for you and your goals.

Here are some suggestions for how to start investing in five easy steps.

1. Understanding the Options

While the universe of investment options sometimes feels limitless, it’s not. With knowledge of the core building blocks of investing, you’ll be better able to navigate the available options with ease.

Investors have a variety of options available to them, including: stocks, bonds, cash or money market funds, real estate, private equity, investment partnerships, and natural resources, like gold. These are assets, essentially, things that have economic value and can store wealth. Beginner investors may focus largely on stocks and maybe bonds.

Stocks

A stock represents a share of ownership in a company. Shareholders can make money in two ways: through the value of shares appreciating, and through dividend payouts. Although this is an oversimplification, the success of a stock will generally be correlated to the success of the underlying business. This is highly unpredictable, which leads to the volatile nature of stock prices overall.

Bonds

Bonds, on the other hand, are investments in the debt of a company or government. In this case, the bondholder is the lender, collecting a rate of interest on that debt. The terms of the contract are agreed upon at the outset. Therefore, they are typically less volatile as stocks, although they can lose value.

An investment portfolio generally includes a variety of assets, including both stocks and bonds, for diversification. The purpose of diversification is to minimize risk, especially over the long-term.

Exchange-Traded Funds (ETFs)

What about mutual funds and exchange-traded funds (ETFs)? Funds are pools of investments. It may be helpful to think of a fund as a basket that holds a bunch of investments, such as stocks, bonds, or real estate holdings. For example, an S&P 500 index mutual fund or ETF holds the 500 leading stocks in the US. Therefore, an investment in this fund is really an investment in the US stock market.

Funds are a popular and easy option for investors looking to get broad exposure to whichever market it is that you’d like to invest within. Depending on the fund, this could also be an affordable way to invest. It is a common misconception that you need to invest in individual stocks to be a good stock market investor.

2. Creating a Goals-Based Investment Plan

The decision on which asset class to be invested in, and in what proportions, is an important one. It is called asset allocation. Although it is tempting to dive right into trying to pick out the “best” stocks, it may be appropriate to first take a step back and ask whether stocks are appropriate given your goals.

The next logical question is this: How does one determine asset allocation? Start by determining what the goal or intended use of the money is. To determine your personal investment mix, conduct an examination of your financial goals, risk tolerance, and investment time horizon.

At its core, the asset allocation decision is one regarding your comfort level with the tradeoff between risk versus reward. In investing, risk and reward are intrinsically connected. In order to have the potential for more reward, you have to take more risk. Be leery of investment options that tout “all reward and no risk.” Unfortunately, such an investment may be too good to be true because risk is an inherent part of investing.

A couple of questions worth asking yourself are: What is my goal with this money? When do I need the money? Last, what kind of risk am I willing to take with this money? Then, take these answers and match them up with one or a handful of the available investment options.

It’s may be easier to wrap your noodle around when we consider two different examples of two investors:

Our first investor is saving up for a down payment on a home. They plan to use that money within one year. For them, the risk of losing any money in a potentially volatile investment outweighs the possibility of earning investment returns. Instead of investing, they decide to keep this money in cash, in a savings account.

Next, our second investor. They’re new to investing, with plans to begin investing in a retirement account. They want to focus on growth over the long-term. Because they have a long time horizon for their investments, they have the time to ride through any short-term volatility, so they are more comfortable with the risks of the stock market. They may build out a portfolio that is primarily invested in the stock market, and for diversification purposes, they may decide to include some exposure to bonds as well.

As you can probably tell, there’s no one “right” asset allocation for any one individual, nor is there a universal formula for determining asset allocation. Investors who are learning how to start investing may want to take some time thinking about what allocation makes the most sense for them.

3. Opening an Account

Here’s another common misconception about investing. A Roth IRA and a 401(k) are not investments. These are accounts, just as a brokerage account, that hold investments. Retirement accounts, such as a Roth IRA or 401k, simply have special tax treatment.

Which account you decide on depends on a few factors. First, what are you investing for?

If you are investing for the long-term, then a retirement account may be most appropriate. Retirement accounts can either be opened individually or through your employer. If your employer offers a plan, this could be a good place to start. (And yes, picking funds or a strategy within a 401(k) or 403(b) counts as investing.)

If you are self-employed or do not have a plan through work, you may want to open an individual retirement account. Some options include a traditional or Roth IRA, Solo or Individual 401(k), and SEP IRA.

Because these accounts come with some tax benefits, they also have their own special rules, like when you can withdraw money and limits on how much money can be contributed each year. To determine which type of account that makes the most sense for your personal situation, you may want to speak with a tax professional.

If you would prefer to invest with more flexibility, you may want to open a brokerage or other general-purpose investment account. Though those accounts do not have the tax benefits of a retirement account, they also don’t have restrictions on when the money can be accessed and no penalties for withdrawals before retirement age.

No matter which account type you choose, remember: this is just an account. After opening the account, it will be funded with cash, likely by hooking up an existing checking or savings account. Once the account is funded with cash, that money can be used to buy investments.

If you are opening your own investing account (as opposed to using your workplace retirement plan), you will have to choose a brokerage account or online investing platform. When choosing your account, it helps to pay attention to the fees charged by the platform. Investing costs can dig into your potential returns. SoFi knows that new investors don’t want to pay a bunch in fees just to get in the game. There are no commissions on the SoFi Invest® platform.

4. Deciding How Much to Invest

This may sound oversimplified, but start with whatever you’re comfortable with, knowing that this money will be subjected to some amount of risk. Generally, this should be money that you won’t need in the near-term. That said, one of the greatest features of investing in the modern era is that you can get started with any amount.

There are a few ways to look at this. The first is to consider where you’re at in your own financial journey. It is often recommended that people first work on saving up an emergency fund and paying off credit cards and high-interest debt. And if COVID-19 has taught us anything, it’s that having a firm financial foundation is incredibly important. If you have yet to build up a sufficient safety net or maintain expensive debt on your personal balance sheet, this could be a good place to focus.

It’s easy to get hung up on the “invest versus pay off debt” decision. Here’s a simple place to start: compare interest rates. On debt, it’s the interest rate that you’re paying. On investing, it’s on the interest that you could potentially earn. So for example, if you’re deciding between aggressively paying off a private student loan with a 12% rate of interest or investing at what you expect could be a 7% rate of return, perhaps this makes your decision for you.

That said, it’s not as if you have to be completely debt-free in order to start building wealth. Instead, take some personal inventory. If you feel like you’re missing out on achieving investment and compound returns, then perhaps you’ll want to make investing a priority. If you feel like you’re being weighed down by debt, then maybe you’ll want to give expedited debt pay-off your energy.

If you have arrived at a place of debt repayment that feels manageable, you may want to consider investing as a piece of your overall budget. (Ever hear someone say, “pay yourself first?” This is what they are referring to.) One popular budget, called the 50/30/20 budget, recommends allocating 20% of income towards saving and investing. If you’d like to reach a place of financial freedom sooner than this, then you may want to consider saving more, as a percentage of your overall income.

5. Selecting Investments

Now the fun part of learning how to invest; choosing the actual investments in a portfolio.

Hopefully, you’ve given some thought to which asset class you’d like to invest in. For example, stocks. Then, there are lots of different options to invest within the stock market: You could pick out individual stocks, or stock-based funds, whether mutual funds or ETFs.

With funds, it is possible to invest in categories of the stock market that are very broad, such as the entire global or US stock market, or that are narrower, such as technology stocks. Building simple portfolios of just two or three broad, diversified funds has been a popular method for investors. This is called “passive” or “set it and forget it” investing.

It is also possible to build a diversified portfolio with narrower funds or even individual stocks, but this may require substantial research and curation.

When purchasing funds, investigate whether they are actively managed or indexed. An index fund, as it sounds, mimics some index that measures the performance of the market. For example, a “total US stock market index fund” may be built against the Russell 3000 index, which measures the performance of all stocks in the US. The point is to return whatever the returns of the broader US stock market. Because there is no active manager, the management fee embedded within index funds tends to be lower than the fees on actively managed funds.

Investors opting to buy individual stocks, may want to consider businesses that they believe will produce some sort of future stream of income, either by an increase in the share value or through the dividend payment. Consider reviewing the following: a stock’s price-to-earnings ratio, industry competition, strength of balance sheet, the company research and development, and product pipeline. These factors can help investors determine the value of an investment.

New investors may want to consider buying stocks or ETFs on a platform that offers zero-cost trading, like active investing with SoFi Invest. Fees can eat away at the potential performance of an investment and act as a barrier to entry. Luckily, there are lots of low-cost options for new investors just getting started.

The last option is to use an automated investing service that buys funds for you. This may be an especially compelling option for new investors who want some help building out their first portfolio in a thoughtful, diversified, and goals-driven way. SoFi Invest also offers an automated investing platform.

Be proud of yourself for starting the journey. Invest in a strategy that makes sense for you, starting with any dollar amount.

SoFi Invest®
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SOIN20107

We all want to improve our money-management habits, but sometimes the path on how to achieve this goal is a little unclear.

If someone is looking to take their financial health to the next level, they can follow these seven steps to gain control of their spending and money.

Tips for Evaluating Your Personal Finances

1. Determine Your Net Worth

A net worth gives an overarching view of someone’s personal finances. Sitting down and taking time to calculate their net worth each year can help consumers adjust their financial plans as needed. A net worth takes into account everything someone owns and everything that they owe.

To calculate a net worth, take out a pen and paper (or computer document) and make a list with two sides. On one side, they will list the assets that they own. On the other side, they will list liabilities or debts, which is what they owe. Then they’ll subtract their liabilities from their assets.

Assets can include money in savings, checking, investing, or retirement accounts; real estate like one’s home; cars; as well as stakes in businesses; or valuable personal goods like jewelry or art. Liabilities can include student loans, automobile debt, mortgages, or credit card balances.

If someone finds that their assets are greater than their liabilities, that means they have a “positive” net worth. On the flip side, if they owe more than they own, they have a “negative” net worth. If the net worth is negative, they shouldn’t feel bad. They just need to adjust their financial plans in a way that will help them work towards paying off debt and then working to build up more assets.

2. Plan a Budget

One way consumers can improve their financial health is by following a budget that takes their financial goals into account. A budget is a plan that someone can follow that will help determine how much money they spend each month.

Budgeting properly can lead to saving money each month to invest or put towards a large financial goal, like a down payment. A budget should illustrate how much someone makes and how they spend their money.

Budgets come in handy if someone needs help guiding how they spend their money. While some expenses are fixed — like rent — others can be tempting to overspend on — like entertainment, eating out or daily lattes — without a budget in place.

To create a budget, start by gathering all bills and pay stubs. Alternatively, there are now many mobile apps, such as SoFi Relay(R), which can keep track of your spending and income. Such apps can analyze your financial trends for you and will be easily accessible in your pocket always, but make sure to research the mobile app’s safety and security features since they’ll be holding your personal information.

Subtract any expenses from income to discover how much room if left in a budget. From there, it gets easier to determine what consistent expenses to cut and how much to spend on variable expenses (like clothing or travel). Don’t forget to budget for less visible expenses like saving for retirement, an emergency fund or paying down debt.

Recommended: Are you financially healthy? Take this 2 minute quiz.💊

3. Evaluate Housing Costs

After creating a budget, housing costs are likely top of mind since they tend to be one of our largest monthly expenses. Taking a hard look at how much your rent or mortgage payments are taking a bite out of your monthly budget can be helpful.

A general rule of thumb in personal finance is that you shouldn’t spend more than 30% of income on housing costs. This allows individuals to be able to afford other discretionary costs.

If someone is spending more than that on housing, they may want to consider finding a more affordable option so they can make room in their budget to pay down student loan debt or to work towards other financial goals.

4. Determine Your Debt to Income Ratio

Speaking of debt, determining a debt to income ratio can give consumers a better idea of their financial health. A debt-to-income ratio takes monthly debt payments and divides them by gross monthly income.

Lenders often use a debt-to-income ratio to determine if a borrower will be able to make their monthly payments. If someone is planning on buying a home or taking out an auto loan, they’ll want to keep their debt-to-income ratio on the lower side. Working debt payments into a budget is a good way to stay on track towards lowering this ratio.

5. Refine Your Investment Strategy

Investing can be intimidating, which is why it’s important to gain a clear understanding of how it can help you work towards financial goals in a comfortable way. Investing inherently carries some risky because there’s a chance of losing some money rather than simply saving money in an FDIC-insured savings account.

However, those who stash cash away in savings accounts should remember that the value of their money is actually depreciating due to inflation, the tendency for the price of goods to rise over time.

Investments like securities and mutual funds aren’t federally insured and losing the principal amount invested is possible. It’s also possible to profit off investments, and diversifying investments can help mitigate risk. By spreading investments across multiple assets, if one investment loses money it can sting a bit less because a more successful investment may very well make up for that loss.

Recommended: Why Portfolio Diversification Matters

Diversification can’t guarantee success and if the market drops as a whole, all of a consumer’s investments can suffer as a result, but it can improve the chances of not losing a lot of money or all of it at once.

6. Determine Your Risk Tolerance

To determine which saving and investment products are a good fit, consumers need to understand what their risk tolerance is. For example, if someone is young and has 35 years of working left before they retire, they may feel more comfortable making a riskier investment, such as stocks, that can lead to bigger gains down the road.

Those who are 60 may feel differently and may want to go for a safer bet, such as in the bond market. Generally, if someone is pursuing a short term goal, it’s better not to choose a risky investment as the chances of profiting during a short period of time are not gauranteed.

Consumers can familiarize themselves with their investment options to help determine which they’ll be most comfortable with. There are plenty of investment products to choose from like:

•  Stocks
•  Mutual funds
•  Corporate and municipal bonds
•  Annuities
•  Exchange-traded funds (ETFs)
•  Money market funds
•  U.S. Treasury securities

Before making any type of investment, it’s also important to understand what kinds of fees are associated with holding the investment or buying or selling as part of the investment strategy (like when investing in the stock market).

Having a solid investing strategy can make it easier to save for retirement or college and to make hard earned money grow.

7. Set Financial Goals

Once someone has evaluated their personal finances, they’ll have the insight they need to set clear financial goals.

After considering what they want their money to help them achieve (pay for a wedding, vanquish credit card debt, retire early, etc.), they can create a financial plan for reaching those goals by listing their goals by which are most important to them.

They can then put together a timeline, like a monthly savings plan, that will help them meet those goals.

The Takeaway

From mortgages, tuition bills, utility costs to taxes, modern life throws at individuals all sorts of financial obligations that they need to juggle. This has made evaluating one’s personal finances to often be a tricky task.

Individuals can, however, wrestle control over their financial future by tracking spending habits, changing them if necessary, and making thoughtful, realistic budgets.

If overspending is getting in the way of reaching important financial goals, SoFi Relay can help make staying on track easier. Users can work one-on-one with a financial planner to set goals for their money and track their financial habits to make sure they’re on their way to achieving those goals. It also offers free credit monitoring in a way that won’t impact your credit score.

SoFi Relay offers users the ability to connect both SoFi accounts and external accounts using Plaid, Inc.’s service. When you use the service to connect an account, you authorize SoFi to obtain account information from any external accounts as set forth in SoFi’s Terms of Use. Based on your consent SoFi will also automatically provide some financial data received from the credit bureau for your visibility, without the need of you connecting additional accounts. SoFi assumes no responsibility for the timeliness, accuracy, deletion, non-delivery or failure to store any user data, loss of user data, communications, or personalization settings. You shall confirm the accuracy of Plaid data through sources independent of SoFi. The credit score is a VantageScore® based on TransUnion® (the “Processing Agent”) data.