How I started Investing

BIGGEST question I get: How did you start investing? 

I'm sharing that journey after a little nudge from a few DM's from a few awesome peeps. 

I talk about financial planners, the global market crash and my biggest mistakes...so that you don't make the same ones!

To learn more about how to start investing so you can also start building a portfolio from the ground up, head to https://go.mswealthy.com

xo
Simone

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If you want to keep earn more and make more money you're in the right place. I spent over 10 years learning from the most brilliant minds in money, wealth, and investing to take myself from 20 K in debt to a seven figure investment portfolio. Join in. As I share the secrets towards growth, money investing and ultimately freedom. My name is Simone Mercer, Huggins, and welcome to ms. Wealthy's kiss my money.

Hey, what's up everyone. I'm pretty pumped to talk to you today because this episode has come about because a couple of people have actually asked me to tell my story about how I started investing. And it's something that, you know, I am probably not the best storyteller in the world if you are into personality types. So kind of understanding, you know, psychology and how we're all wired. And if you fought follow the Myers Briggs personality, then I am I in TJ, meaning I am very logical, rational thinking. And so storytelling and the kind of tapping into the emotional side of my journey and all that sort of stuff doesn't come naturally. Um, but so many people ask me and I know that I have a lot to teach you and a lot to tell about even how my story came about and how I started investing.

And a couple of people have also DMD me, um, to kind of say that that's what they want to hear. So I am as a person learning to tap more into the storytelling side and teaching you through the process. And even though it's kind of uncomfortable for me. And even though I get caught up and tripped up and think that, Oh my God, why would you want to know about my story? But it's how human beings learn and how we connect and how we kind of grow. And that conversation is so powerful because I know that when I hear other people's stories, particularly from my mentors and people who I really admire, people who have the things that I want and that I am also consciously creating and bringing into my sphere in my world, I learned so much from their stories of how they came to be, because it is, there's a lot of strength in understanding and seeing that because as the saying goes, seeing is believing.

And so when you see other like your mentors or expanders or people that you really look up to, we subconsciously literally start to believe it becomes something that's like, okay, well, they did it. So can I, and I mean, that is probably the biggest lesson and the biggest thing that I want to teach you and tell you today, because I guess when my story kind of starts from when my background from when I was very little, just very briefly so that, you know, I wasn't handed this on a silver platter. I wasn't handed I investment portfolio. Um, to me, I don't come from a family who have ever even invested in the stock market. And I grew up like many people I know who are entrepreneurs now, or forging their own path or creating massive things in our life. Uh, I grew up from a very poor family, like we struggled to get by.

And in fact at the time, so I'm the eldest of five old women. So I'm the eldest of five daughters. I know crazy. Uh, so I was the first born, but when I was conceived, my parents weren't even really together like that kind of, you know, being dating, whatever what together. And then my mom found out she was pregnant. My dad bless him. Did they gorgeous an honorable thing and proposed her mom to, you know, do the, whatever you call it, quote unquote the right thing. Um, but it wasn't there for mom. And, you know, I don't think it was the right thing for them. So they ended up never really getting married and they weren't together. Uh, but they did. They have been both in my life since the beginning, but they were never together. So I kind of grew up essentially predominantly raised by my mom, but going to my bed.

And my dad very often, uh, you know, on weekends and during the week. And that became kind of more and less in different parts of my life. And my dad went on to have three more daughters. And my mom later on went to have went on to have another daughter. So I'm the eldest of five. So between the two, um, you know, we have many women in our life, which is amazing and I can be that mentor and that guide for my sisters too. But growing up, they didn't have much, they didn't come from much. I remember from a very young age, my dad would have holes in his shirts and holes in his shoes and his toes would like be poking out and, uh, driving to school. Like our mom's car broke down. Literally we had a combi, a combi van and it broke down on the way to school.

And, you know, the, just so many stories, just not just knowing that we didn't come from much, but he didn't have much, um, you know, living in kind of tiny apartments, little apartments, you know, going to afterschool care because mum was working and dad was working. And, um, that was just kind of how it, how it was. Right. And so growing up, I definitely like most of us develop these money stories because we are all raised in a certain way and our parents bless them regardless of how well they raised us. We all have some degree of parental issues, right. And so I developed money stories about, you know, it's hard to make money and money. Doesn't grow on trees and you have to work for it and you have to like really protect it. And, you know, you will never really be rich because we didn't come from much.

And so that scarcity mentality was there from the very beginning for me. And so that was also part of the reason of why investing was never really something growing up or even coming into my adulthood or early twenties that I never, I didn't even think about it. That wasn't, it wasn't a conversation. It wasn't in my spirit fear a sphere of thinking. It just, it was like, uh, that's not possible. And it was almost like, I didn't know what I didn't know. Right. I didn't even know that investing was one of the biggest tools and biggest ways to develop wealth and build wealth. So that was kind of a bit of a background on where I've come from. And still to this day, my parents, both of them don't invest in the stock market. Uh, they do have some in their retirement accounts because most of our term accounts approved dominantly invested in stock market.

Uh, but outside of that, it's kind of still seen as, Oh, like, Oh my God, that's risky, which I'm going to debug that for you, if you think that it's not, uh, later on, but so that's kind of the background. And so when I got to, I would say like my 1920, I hit that age and I'd racked up a pretty hefty credit card debt. Um, nothing to show for it. Uh, literally just living beyond my means. Um, I was at uni getting my degree and just kind of wasn't didn't know how to manage money. Right. I wasn't taught in school. Most people aren't taught how to manage money in school and got to this point where I had a lot of debt. And I think even now it was the same back then, like banks would just hand out credit cards like candy. And they gave me $20,000.

When I think at the time I was on like $25,000 in my job or something, I decided to go part time because I dunno, just getting my degree was never really something that I didn't love being a full time uni student. And so I went part time and I got a full time job and I was a receptionist at an ad agency, racked up this debt. And then, you know, it was really embarrassed and sh like, I felt so much shame about it and hit it until the point that it got so bad. And I had nothing left on the credit card. I'd maxed it out. I had nothing left in, um, savings account and I had to come clean essentially to mum. And I thought she would like lose it and there'd be a yelling match or a screaming match. And there just, wasn't what I realized.

And I mean, I didn't realize this at the time, but maybe subconsciously I realized that, Oh my God, how did I not realize sooner to go to my mom and ask her to teach me how to manage money? Because she had managed to, you know, I was predominantly, I spent most of my time with mom. So she raised me on not a high salary and didn't have debt and managed to save enough to buy a deposit for a house like before I was 20. So she managed to do that. How did I not realize that she actually had some pretty good money management strategies? Right. So I was just fortunate really that even though she did have a scarcity mindset and I think still does to this day, but did have a scarcity mindset to some degree, she was great at managing money and not driving yourself into debt, which is something that I've managed to do myself.

So she sent me down and taught me how to manage my money properly, which was a godsend because it meant that I was able to then get out of debt slowly. It took me 18 months, which is pretty damn fast for someone with that much credit card debt. And at that age, I got a second job. So was it a doorbell at a, um, at a nightclub and just worked my butt off? You know, didn't go out as much as I was going out. This was supers. Like I literally walked around the supermarket with a calculator because I was super strict with what I was buying. There was no more unconscious spending. There was no like my habits change. My mindset changed. And the tools I had completely shifted my ability to get my self to a position of where I could save money. Right.

So I told you you're in a half, I saved up money once I hit that zero point. And like, it was such a relief when I hit that zero point, like I fry. And at the time, my $0 million balance on my lone, I had essentially cut on my credit card. Um, you merged them into a personal loan, took the advantage of like a 12 months interest free. I think that time a and paint down. So I merged everything together to like properly manage them. And in frame that $0 million balance. And I, because I'd had this ability to obviously manage money and get myself into really good play, I then started saving and, and I had had my sights set on traveling Europe and moving to London for a pretty long time, by this point. And so I got to a point where I saved up enough money and I was like, okay, I'm ready, ready to move, ready to travel.

And which I did so traveled through Europe for six weeks, ran out cash, moved to London and then started working again. And yeah, I said I was working in advertising. So I got an advertising job in London and it was amazing lived there for three years. And, you know, it just had a ball traveling through Europe. It did though, get to the point where I was kind of like, how do I, is this it is this kind of, do I just, did we just work? And then do it. We just, I don't know, retire when I'm 75, like, it's just kind of what happens. And I didn't love my job. I've never really loved working for other people. So, you know, that was, I guess, a bit of a red flag for me. And that was the point where I was like, what do I like, what now started saving some money we're taking weekend trips and stuff like that.

And it was all fun, but I was like, well, what, like what next was that the point where I started kind of really getting into personal development, I really set and to like learn and grow and discover more about, you know, what's what else is out there. And that was the point at which I read rich dad, poor dad. And that was the introduction essentially to me, understanding investing and like, Oh, Oh, I get it. Now, you don't just work. Like, we are kind of, uh, brainwashed into thinking that you work in nine to five or more like eight to six or eight or seven and you go home and then you do do that until you're 75 and you might have a nice day, 10 year or 15 year retirement, but it's like, aye, I guess subconsciously knew that that was not what I wanted.

And subconsciously was thinking that has to be another way. And that book was the introduction to me seeing that there was another way still reading it though. Like, I mean, if you read that, you've probably got to the end thinking. Yeah. But that's all cool. But like how I, I mean, I was still like, it was still a very new concept investing the stove early new concept. And so it was kind of like, I still don't know how to do it. Like how does this actually work? What happens? And so, uh, I still kind of didn't have the tools to properly get ahead. I wasn't surrounded by friends or mentors. I didn't have parents, anything like that that I actually knew about investing or what actively investing. And so no one I could actually talk about with, right. And that was probably one of looking back, one of my biggest downfalls of not surrounding myself and not creating a new network of people who take me to that next level who are in the store, same mindset around that.

So what happened was I was like, all right, I saved up a bit of money. Well, I guess what do I do? I go, I go to a financial planner, like is as you see it. And so that was what I did. I set up a couple of meetings and met with a couple of financial planners because I was at that point thinking, well, I don't know how to do it myself. Like, who am I this like 20 year old, you know, early 20 year old woman, like really, what do I know, what could I possibly do and do nothing about it. I don't have a background, all that sort of stuff. All of it. That self doubt that I'm not enough crap. I had it in spades, um, particularly around investing. And obviously I still had a lot of hookups and a lot of limiting beliefs around what I could do with my money and how far I could actually take it.

I still had definite scarcity mindset around money and limiting beliefs around thinking of what I could actually do. You know, being in debt left a bit of a legacy mentally, for sure. And so that was why I was like, well, I guess these pros are like the people that should do it. Right. So I remember walking to that meeting and kind of being sat down and like, they got out like a pen with like, you know, in a whiteboard and like spoke about all these different things and spoke about risk tolerance and like kind of spoke about different things. And they gave me some flashy examples of how they bought in at this price on this stock and then sold at this price. And I was like, okay, right. Still kind of a bit confused, not really following. And then I just remember kind of them explaining the different fees and it was like, there's a fee for this. And then we won't do it ourselves though. We'll send the money to someone else and there's a fee for that. And then we'll set up your retirement account, but we would use our guys. And so there'd be a free for switching and their fees a bit higher with these guys than what you're, where you currently are, but, you know, it's worth it cause I get better returns. And then

It was just, I was just

Plexed and I remember kind of just very, very quickly adding up the different fees that they were talking about. And I can't remember the exact amounts now, but it was just like shocked. Like I was just thinking like, you're charging me how much I'm paying. Like I would have to pay a couple of thousand dollars to even get started. And at this point I had a few thousand dollars. So I was thinking that doesn't make any sense, like what, and then there'd be ongoing fees basically for the rest of my life, like literally for the rest of my life. But because I knew nothing about how it all worked

And because I was very good

New to the game and still didn't know the questions to ask, I was kind of like, well,

I guess it's, it's almost like,

I like that concept of being brainwashed. Right. We go to school, we get a degree, we go to work, like we're told that we just have to go in and then we retire when we're later, like we're older. And then we're told these stories about how the stock market's risky. And then so you don't invest. I was still in this mindset of like, well, it's so normal. It's like the thing that you do, you go to a financial advisor or planner and they do it for you. Like they invest for you. And so I was almost like, our miss felt like it was, it was something I didn't get, it was something I didn't understand. Or maybe I just wasn't following the system enough. Or it was almost like stupid for me to be questioning the model. It wasn't really

Like silly that I would yeah.

Is asking questions outside of the norm, but still something wasn't sitting. Right. And now these days I'm so in touch with my intuition and like how things feel like I'm gonna, you know, what that feeling was like,

Something just doesn't feel right. Okay.

Was hands down, did not feel right. But at the time, I didn't know. And I wasn't probably tapped in to that feeling. I knew enough to not commit to anything in that moment. And so I walked out deciding I'd think about it still kind of confused because I was like, how am I giving, how am I giving you like half of the money that I'm even starting with? And then the rest of it's going to be eaten up in the fees. And just, I couldn't understand that. I still couldn't get a proper clear answer on their returns over like over the last period of years, it still wasn't clear. Everything was really vague. And so I'm so glad that I walked out, but I was so damn close from handing my money over and handing my power over. And literally that, that just being yet for the rest of eternity, the rest of the time.

Right. And anyway, so I walked out kind of left it. Uh, you know, I decided to think about it, life got in the way kept kind of working kind of forgot about it, put it off. And then the economy started turning and still living in London at the time. And I just remember my God, the new cycle of like, you know, literally every single thing of everything crashing of just like panic, being plastic, all over the newspapers and all over TV and the wall street journal just headline after headline, everything just shock as like the world markets crash and who will be next as like all these massive investment firms, but just like collapsing. And I remember seeing like literally people walking out with signs and like protesting in front of these money manager firms, like investment firms with like the word crook over it, like, you know, gee shady people because these money managers were losing the client's money in dodgy investments.

And they were the ones that were trusted and that were the ones that the clients would have paid money to, to entrust their money with. And that was the turning point for me because I started to realize that actually it's okay to question the status quo. It's okay to question this like story and idea that we're told and sold throughout our entire life. And I remembered a quote from Robert Kiyosaki, the author of rich dad, poor dad. And he said that financial plan is a salespeople. They're not teachers. And to get your education from someone, not getting a commission, meaning that you're not paying fees to, they're not profiting off of you. And that was when I realized that, okay, well, I'll start doing it myself then. And at the time there wasn't really anything out there in terms of programs or courses or, you know, the internet, wasn't what it was now, what it is now.

And I know I sound old saying that, but this was like 10, 11, 12 years ago. Right. So it wasn't as prolific. It wasn't like you couldn't. Yes, there was Google, but you're not to the extent of like the information that we have now. So I started learning my myself, and it was a hard, slow journey, really hard. I went to seminars and I was like one of the very few women in the room. I went to courses, I kind of just got so much education. I took, you know, as, as much online stuff as I could possibly do, but Oh my God, it was so dry. And, and just almost in case capable of Zuora, absorbing the information that was in it. But I learned and learned and learned and eventually got to the point where I had enough together in terms of, I felt like I was ready.

Uh, and I finally started investing in, I started with $3,000 and that was a big moment because I'd finally got in. Right. What I didn't realize at the time was I actually started way too late. And you might be thinking, yeah, but you started after the crash. So you like, you missed the, you know, big recession and good for you cause you got in and you made him some money. No, I know. I didn't. Yes. We've been in the last decade. We've been, it's been the longest bull history, uh, in like for as long as they've been recording it. Uh, and yes, it's gone up pretty much consistently since then. However I got in when the market had pretty much already rebounded and was already back at the point that it was before it even started crashing. So I missed the biggest opportunity in a decade.

Literally, you know, they say that there's a correction every seven or so years. This one's been a lot longer. It's been 10 positive plus the 10 year Mark now. Um, uh, I missed out and what I know now, Paul, is that actually the rich understand that corrections and crashes are an opportunity to basically get everything on sale that the biggest opportunity of a decade and for some people, a lifetime, that that is the moment that you make the most money because in no other period of time, do you get the kind of returns that you get when the market rebounds, which it always does, the market always rebounds. And so at the time when I started investing, you know, I waited until quote unquote, I was kind of, I guess, ready enough, but I delayed. I waited way too long. And I wish in hindsight now I do.

Didn't like I was thinking way too, too short term. I let the fear of all of the headlines sway my mindset. I worried way too much about risk. I made it super complicated, which it's not. I doubted myself so much and I took way too long to start in the beginning. I also didn't have a plan and I massively research. So it actually missed out on a lot. Obviously, fortunately I started over 10 years ago. So now I have a decade of experience and a decade of understanding and learning about how to invest in international markets around the world and in different assets. So now I can look back on that on hindsight and learn from my mistakes and learn when the next correction comes. That it's actually the best way. Right? And once I started kind of understanding that there's so much more to learn about it, I started really diving in to following the best investors.

And as Tony Robbins says, success leaves clues, right? And there was an easy way. I did things the hard way, but there was some much easier way. And when I realized this and I started going, okay, who are the, who are these people? You know, I spoke about looking at the people in your life or your mentors or expanders of who have the thing that you want, who have what you are wanting to create because they have the answers. And when you see that they have something, you understand that maybe you can do it too. What I realized back then was I could actually hack investors, meaning, do a bit of investor hacking and just model what works. So success leaves clues. And so if they leave clues, why don't I just model what works? So I set out to find the most profitable investors model, their framework, model, the success that they used and invest with the same strategy.

And so there's a bunch of principles essentially that I now use as that underpin my investing strategy and underpin my investing plan that has enabled us to get to over a million dollars in investment assets. So as you know, I didn't start with that. I started with $3,000 that I had worked my tail off to save up. And, you know, my journey even said before that, of getting to a place where I was kind of, you know, ready to invest and ready to put money down and back myself. And since then, I've continued to invest. It's not a one time thing that I knew and understood that it is not a one time thing. And part of the biggest success of getting to this place now is continuously investing, not only reinvesting the dividends you get paid and reinvesting all rental returns, for example. So, um, I have one house that is one property that is part of our investment portfolio.

It's not all stocks, not all shares. Uh, it's about, it's about 50 50. And so invest, re-investing all profits and dividends and returns plus maximizing on capital growth plus re-investing additional money. And that happens when you have the right money management strategy, right? Like proper money management tool. That means you're paying yourself first and you continuously save money and you invest that money every single month or every, every single quarter. And so those principles are what have got me to where I am today. And yes, I said, I've told you that I've done things the hard way. And I learnt the hard way, but I'm actually really fortunate that I can use those lessons and apply them to making the next million and helping all of my clients make their first a hundred K and then put them on the path to make their first million dollars in, uh, in terms of creating a portfolio that they can build faster, more, successfully, more efficiently.

And so now I have that wealth of knowledge and experience to help other people do the same thing. And so, you know, the first hundred K is almost like the hardest, you know, first thousand dollars that first 10,000, it's like, Oh, that's hard. The first hundred thousand kinda like it, it feels hard. It's certainly felt hard for me, but once you cross over that threshold, it, it becomes so much easier because everything starts compounding. Everything just starts clicking into place. It's like a tipping point and literally success and building a multi six figure portfolio at least becomes inevitable because once you put in all of those things and those principles, it means that it happens automatically, like because everything's in place for it to happen. So I'm going to talk about those principles in the next upcoming podcast episodes. You can also get all of this, uh, all of these principles, essentially in the training that I put into a masterclass training, it's only 60 minutes.

So I've been talking with you now for the last half an hour, but this has been about my story. The actual training is not my story. It's the principles that underpin how I've got to where I am now. And so if you want to go and get that training is completely free, you can go to go.ms. wellthy.com and sign up. You can get instant access is it's an on demand training. And I show you what those principles are that I have learned from investor hacking, right? Because they're the things that would literally change how much wealth you create and how fast you do it. Alright, I am going to finish it up there and I'm going to record a couple more hours in the coming weeks about what they are. If you don't go and get that masterclass, that, that training and get those principles, then, uh, you can get them in the coming weeks and months when I record the next few, uh, in, in podcast episodes. But until then, I hope to see you on the training and I will see you in the next episode.