In this video I go over investing while serving in the military. I get into a brief background of my service in the US Marines and my progression from the Infantry into Marine Special Operations Command as a Marine Raider (MOS 0372).

I show how small my paychecks were when I was a E1 and E2 (2002). And I talk about how I got caught up with materialism and how careless I was with money, early in my military career.

I encourage young service members to start investing, even if they start small. I show the last trade I made on Robinhood showing my purchase of Altria (MO) stock in partial/fractional shares. Some people get intimidated by the high share prices of some stocks, but you can buy fractional shares of these stocks (Amazon, Google, etc) in small dollar amounts if you want. Most brokerages like Robinhood and M1 Finance, offer the ability to buy fractional shares of stocks.

I also get into some scenarios that illustrate what could have been possible, if I was smarter with my money while I was serving in the military. I run a hypothetical example of investing into Google stock and Amazon stock with my first reenlistment bonus, and how investing $5000 into each of those stocks in 2006, would be worth more than $600,000 as of today (July, 2021)!

I also do an overview of the Thrift Savings Plan and mention that in my opinion, I believe the TSP is the best investing option for most service members. I also go over to the Thrift Savings Plan website (TSP.org) to show the basic information regarding the different fund options, and some considerations to think about when choosing the fund that is right for you.

As I've done in previous videos, I do a couple compound interest scenarios in this video to illustrate how powerful it is to start investing early.

Chapters:

0:00- Intro
0:20- My military background
1:00- Starting early
1:35- Why I didn't invest when I was in the Marines
3:05- 10,000 investment potential
4:45- My last stock purchase
4:25- Compound interest scenarios
7:15- Thrift Savings Plan
9:28- My TSP preference
11:23- Allocation
11:47- What I would have done differently

#financialfreedom #personalfinance #passiveincome #militaryfinance

Thrift Savings Plan Link:
www.tsp.gov

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DISCLAIMER: Christian Holloway, including but not limited to any guests appearing in his videos, are not financial/investment advisors, brokers, or dealers. They are solely sharing their personal experience and opinions; therefore, all strategies, tips, suggestions, and recommendations shared are solely for entertainment purposes. For investment advice please seek the counsel of a financial/investment advisor(s); and conduct your own due diligence