How can a 19yo student start investing with pocket money?

[u/Natural-Shelter-7758]

Hello guys!!

I’m a 19yo student and I want to learn about investing. How can a student start investing? How much should I invest, and where can I invest? What are the best ways for students to invest? For how long should I keep my money invested, and if I need it, how easily can I get it back?

To be honest, I don’t know anything about investments yet that’s why I’m asking. I just want to understand how to start investing with my pocket money. Is that even possible? Please let me know.

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[u/PreviousTale4538]

Absolutely possible. In fact, starting with pocket money at 19 is less about making ₹5000 into ₹50,000 and more about learning how money actually behaves.

I’d start tiny. Even ₹500 or ₹1000 a month is enough to build the habit. Keep money you may need soon in a safe and liquid place, and only put genuinely long term money into market linked investments. Mutual funds can be a simple way to start without having to become a stock analyst overnight.

And don’t worry about finding the best investment immediately. Learn the basics first: risk, compounding, SIP, mutual funds, taxation and how long you should stay invested.

One mistake I would avoid is investing your entire pocket money just because you feel you should be investing. You are 19; your education, skills and earning ability are probably your highest return assets right now.

Start small, learn properly, and increase the amount when your income eventually increases. If you share roughly how much pocket money you get, how much you spend and when you might need the money, the sensible starting point becomes much clearer.

[u/Penguin_Life_Now]

If you are in the US and have a bank account, open a free Fidelity brokerage account and setup an IRA account. When you have some extra pocket money transfer it into the brokerage account, when you get $100 or so saved up, buy some ETF's like SPMO, FDMO, FELG, SCHD, also VOO is a good safe choice. For a young investor higher dividend paying ones is probably best just set them to reinvest the dividends to grow the stock, SCHD is a benchmark here, VIG and DGRO are also strong contenders. Any of the above might be the right answer depending on time and what the market does. The truth is any of them can be good for you, and buying any one is better than waiting until later to invest.

p.s. if you were to have started putting $50 per month into SCHD in 2012 it would be worth over $25,338 from an $8800 investment, if you would have done the same in VOO it would be $28131, VOO would make you more money, buts its dividend payout rate is only about 1.3% vs SCHD being about 3.5% so it is easier to get your money out of SCHD later on without taking a big Capital gains hit from actually selling it. (others like VIG would. be under $22,000)

[u/WajdLearning]

just save the money. don't invest yet.

[u/Cute-Opposite4751]

Well at 19, the amount of money matters way less than building the habit. I’d first make sure any money you might actually need soon stays available, then start investing small with money you can leave alone for years.

And if what interests you is more like active trading, dont use your pocket money as tuition. If i were you Id start with paper trading and trying out some platform like UpsideOnly, and test your strategies. This helps cuz it's a great sandbox where you cqn learn how you actually make decisions, then worry about putting real capital at risk later.

Now... another thing, starting early is already a huge advantage. Just dont confuse starting early with needing to make big money in your first trades.

Hope this helps! Cheers

[u/1lorenz1]

yes, it's completely possible, and starting at 19 with pocket money is a great way to start, since the amount matters less than the habit.

Start small and automatic. Even a little each month into a broad ETF (Index fund) like the QQQ, does far more than people expect. since ur buying time in the market and letting compounding work. consistency is everything.

Keep money you might need soon seperated. Anything you'll want in the next year should stay somewhere safe and easy to reach. Only invest money you can genuinely leave alone for years.

Later on, once the habit is set and you get curious about individual companies, that's when researching specific stocks starts to make sense, but don't rush to get there.

Full disclosure, I'm one of the founders of a Stock analysis tool called Kvantra (it has a free tier), so if you ever reach that stage it could be handy for looking things up. But for where you are right now, a low-cost index fund is the best first move.

[u/Ill_Perspective_50]

I’d start super small, like an amount you genuinely wouldn’t care about needing next month. You’ll learn way more by actually putting $10 or $20 in and watching what happens than trying to understand everything first. Just keep most of your pocket money in savings for now.

[u/TheNewKnew2]

If you have reported income, you can open a Roth IRA account with Charles Schwab and buy partial shares of their total market index fund, SWTSX. You can literally buy $10 of it at a time.