More Money Podcast - Is Right Now a Good Time to Invest? - Money Minute with Jessica Moorhouse

Episode Date: May 1, 2020

Is right now a good time to invest? Yes! But also...so was a 6 months ago, a year ago, 10 years ago (you get the picture). Remember this famous Chinese proverb: “The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.” – Chinese Proverb The same goes for investing! Don't try to time the market, just get into the market and stay there. One of the best things I ever did was start investing when I thought it was the wrong time (in 2010 when the stock market started to recover). I thought I missed the boat and I was doing it all wrong. Cut to a decade later and no, I didn't do it wrong. I did it right by starting to invest as soon as I could afford to, and making regular contributions to my investments during all the ups and downs we saw in the past 10 years. So if you want to get started with investing, I highly recommend you start educating yourself more about it, gain some financial confidence, then go for it! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hello, hello, hello, and welcome back to another Money Minute episode with yours truly, Jessica Morehouse. For this episode, I want to talk about a question I've been getting often, often, often for the past month and a half or two months, whenever this is kicked off. What is it? It's like May? How did that happen? Okay. Anyways, so I am even looking back at some of the episodes I did like a little while ago, when kind of the stock market started going crazy. Even some of the videos I made recently about, oh, we're entering a bear market. Holy crap. What has happened since then? Like so much, it's very hard to follow. It's very confusing and it's very stressful. And so that's why I think I've been getting a lot of questions from people like, oh my gosh, did I miss it? Did I miss the

boat? Like, are things going back up? Are gosh, did I miss it? Did I miss the boat? Are things going back up? Are they going to go back down? Should I start investing now? What should I do? Listen, listen, when it comes to investing, first, you need to chill. Just number one, rule number one, chill. Number two, and you've probably heard this before, probably from guests on my podcast, right now, today is always the best time to start investing. And I'm not talking specifically about the situation we're in. I'm just saying, in general, today is always the best time to start investing. And I'm not talking specifically about the situation we're in. I'm just saying, in general, today is always the best time to start investing. Because if you're trying to wait it out to start investing at the bottom, good luck. You're not going to get there because it is impossible to predict.

Okay. So there's, for instance, I just want to kind of share one of my favorite kind of old adages, or it's a Chinese proverb actually, is the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now. Now there's been versions of this that are specific to investing, but basically right now is always the best time. And a better time would have been a few years back. It's something that I'm so grateful for that I started investing when I thought I missed the boat back in 2000. I think I started investing in 2010. I thought I missed the boat because we were starting to recover from the recession. I'm like, oh my God. Life continues. Life continues. It's 2020. I'm so glad I started investing then because I've

been able to build my wealth so much more than if I just like tucked it away in a savings account or was waiting for the next market crash or correction. So long story short, yes, right now is a great time to start investing. That being said, that does not mean, okay, go open up a discount brokerage account, start buying stocks. I know. Okay. What you need to do is, again, chill and figure out what you don't know about investing. You've got to honestly, what you need to do is, again, chill and figure out what you don't know about investing. You've got to honestly, before you start investing, you've got to understand what you're doing a little bit. It's not that hard. It's not that hard. There's so many great resources. I mean, listen to my podcast. So many great free resources to answer any questions that you don't have right now. But you really want to know what you're doing before you're spending your money.

Because as someone who also dabbles in individual stocks, you can lose money and it hurts. It really does hurt. So you really want to know what you're doing. You want to make a solid investment plan. And what that means is you really want to figure out what are your investment goals? Are you investing for retirement or something else? What's your time horizon? How many years do you have to invest in order to reach that goal? What's your risk tolerance? How many years do you have to invest in order to reach that goal? What's your risk tolerance? How much risk are you emotionally willing to take in order to grow your wealth that will help you determine your ideal asset allocation for your portfolio? And then

how do you want to invest? Do you want to work with a professional, an investment firm, a bank, or do you want to use a robo-advisor? Or do you want to learn how to do DIY investing and do it yourself, build your own portfolio, or invest in one of those asset allocation ETFs by some of the ETF providers out there that kind of make it a little bit easier for you? There's some options out there. So you need to kind of answer a few questions before diving in and dumping your hard-earned money into the stock market. Get groceries delivered across the GTA from Real Canadian Superstore with PC Express.

Shop online for super prices and super savings. Try it today and get up to $75 in PC Optimum Points. Visit superstore.ca to get started. So what's the lesson here? Right now is a great time to start investing. So it was a year ago. So it was two years ago. So if you're not investing, take the time to educate yourself in anything that you just don't quite know. Honestly, it will make you so much more confident

about making a decision and you'll feel much better about what you're actually doing and you can stay in course and then figure out, okay, what's the avenue I want to take in order to invest? Do I want to use a robo-advisor? Do I want to do something else? And then how much can I actually contribute on a regular basis? Look at your budget and see how much can I afford to put in there on a monthly basis or weekly basis or whatever the case is. And depending also, of course, on what your investment goal is, you should also determine how much do I need in total to reach that goal. So if it's something short term, maybe you want to invest in something somewhat conservative so you can grow your wealth, but you eventually want to use that money for a down payment on a home, you're going to have

to figure out, okay, well, how much do I need though? Like $100,000, $200,000? I'm talking Canada where you do need like six figures for a down payment. And then that will help you also answer some of those other questions. So I hope that's been helpful. But I'm sure you do have more questions about investing and I want to know what they are. So let me know. DM me on Instagram. Hit me up on Twitter.

Email me, Jessica at jessicamorehouse.com. Let me know what your questions are and I'd be happy to answer them or find a guest who can go in depth about some of these exciting things. So thanks so much for listening. Have an amazing weekend. Man, do we deserve. I have never wanted a vacation more in my life. Oh, my gosh. I'm exhausted.

I don't know about you. I'm exhausted. And I'm definitely, like, feeling a little antsy. I don't know about you. I'm exhausted. And I'm definitely like feeling a little antsy. I wish I had a yard. Oh, living in a, you know, townhouse is great because there's, you know, a couple different rooms we can escape to, but there's no yard. We just have like this little patio and it's driving me a little crazy. And it's also really cold here in Toronto. Like, what's that about? Why? It's like May now. What's going to, oh, it is, but whatever. I can't, I can't control it. You can't control these things. No one can control it. You can only control what you can control.

So just everything's going to be fine. Everything's going to be fine, guys. Uh, yeah, that's it for me. What am I doing? What am I doing right now? Um, thanks for listening. Um, appreciate it. I'm going to be back here next week. I've got an actually amazing episode for you on Wednesday with Preet Banerjee. We're going to be talking about all the different kind of financial relief programs in Canada. He breaks them down. He has some amazing videos about all of them. So I want to have him on the show. So I'm going to see you back here next Wednesday, and it's going to be fabulous. So have a fabulous weekend. end. This podcast is distributed by the Women in Media Podcast Network. Find out more at womeninmedia.network.