How I got started in investing
July 10th, 1995 by Kenric1995, I graduated from college with an MS in Engineering. Unbeknowst to me, I was about to start the rat race. Living at home with my parents and having no student loans I was able to begin saving right away. My starting salary was $35,000 a year. At this time I began saving money and purchasing mutual funds and stocks. After saving over $10,000 I did what any young kid would do, I went out and bought a Lexus!
1997, I changed jobs and my salary had increased to $42,000 a year. I still continued to invest in high tech stocks like Intel, Microsoft and AOL. I took some stock market money, sold my Lexus and bought a used 2 seater sports car. The car was $40,000, throw in the wheels, tires, exhaust and suspension and the car came out to over $50,000. Insurance was $1,000/year. Boy, was I really in the rat race now! I read “The Millionaire Next Door”. I contemplated selling the car cause now I was feeling guilty. Looking back, I realized that I wasn’t ready at this time to sacrifice to get out of the rat race.
1999, News of my first layoff came. The good news is that my severance package was 6 months salary + 1/2 bonus. All came as a lump sum, totalling about $26,000 (before taxes). Got a job the next week as a contract employee for $37/hr. At this point I bought my first house for $230,000 using the severance money as downpayment. Got a regular job again for $58,000/yr.
2000, News of my second layoff came. The good news is I got 7 weeks severance this time. Why is that good news? Cause my next job was at a dot.com. Joined a start-up dot.com at $70,000/yr and 10,000 shares of stock options. Everything was looking good…
2001, Dot.com bust happened, out of a job on 2 hours notice. I got 4 weeks severance this time. By this time, I was weary of working for employers and then getting nothing. I’d become immune to the corporate ladder and was seeing that I work only for me. Corporations need to look out for themselves and will cut you in a second. It doesn’t matter that you put in 70 hours last week and skipped a vacation.
Posted in Personal Development, Real Estate | 2 Comments »
Stumble it!
i really belived a boat ypur story and i want to learn alot from this site, and now i start to bill my my own bisnis. and i always sure what i want and i bilifed my mind it will help me.
By mahfan adi hanafi on Apr 21, 2007
we read the book why you want to be rich ,how can we be rich?
By michael khan mba on Apr 12, 2008