10 Bad Habits People Start Developing in Their 20s

Stopping them before they start

Source: @manancfc23 on Unsplash.

Whether you’re reading this when you’re in your 20s, about to be in your 20s, or your 20s have passed, you’re either

1. guilty of these things.
2. going to be guilty of these things.

A part of getting on track means accepting responsibility. The other part requires action.

Here are those things you’ll need to be wary of.

I’m going to live now, save later.

Believe it or not, the sooner you put money toward some index-tracking fund the more money you will make later. Saving money earlier is actually the key to investing, other than setting money aside consistently. The earlier, the better.

Vanguard, Fidelity, and even Charles Schwab all have S&P index trackers. If you had purchased them going into the recent collapse, you would have seen a 50% jump in your portfolio in the last month or two.

We know about the power of compounding. However, the true power in compounding is in accumulating a large proportion as early as possible. Putting the first $100,000 toward a 401(k) or a personal brokerage account is the first step. After that, growing the initial gets easier.