New To Investing? Here’s A Cheat Sheet For You
Reading hundreds of articles can be time-consuming. So, we have the best solution for you.
If you are someone who is looking to start investing in mutual funds, you would have, at one point, googled where to start. When you hit ‘Enter’, you would have been bombarded with thousands of articles, explaining what mutual funds are and where you can invest. Being a first-time investor, all this information might be too daunting and difficult to understand.
That’s why we are here to help you. We have created a cheat sheet for you, which will help choose the right mutual fund and you don’t have to spend a lot of time on it. This is the only thing you need to kickstart your financial journey.
Getting Ready Investing
- Firstly, you have to understand your goals. It could be anything from saving taxes to buying a house to going on your dream vacation. Write down your goals in a paper because the kind of assets that will be chosen by you depends on this step.
- In the second step, write down how much risk you are willing to take. In investing, high risk brings high returns and low risk brings low returns. Keeping this in mind, write down how much risk you are open to take.
- The third step is finding out how much time you are planning to stay invested. It could be 5 years or 15 years or even 30 years. You should write down that number in the paper as well.
If we create a matrix for it, it might look like the table below.
Goals
Risk Appetite
Investment Horizon
Saving for a down payment for a house
High
7 years
Buying a car
Medium
4 years
Going on a dream vacation
High
5 years
Saving for retirement
Medium to High
25 years
Choosing The Products
There are so many different kinds of financial products in the market - Mutual Funds, Stocks, Smart Deposits, Bank Fixed Deposits, Pension Schemes, Digital Gold, ETFs and so on. But choosing the right ones will depend on your goals and your risk. Since we have already figured out your goals and risk, all you need to do is choose the products. But what if you don’t know about these products? Don’t worry, we have figured that out for you too.
Financial Products
Risk
Return
Savings Account
Low
Low
Debt Funds / Smart Deposits
Low
Low
Corporate Bonds
Low
Low
Large Cap Mutual Funds
Low
Low
Public Provident Fund
Low
Low to Moderate
Digital Gold
Low
Low to Moderate
Multi Cap Mutual Funds
Medium
Moderate to High
Real Estate
Medium
Moderate
Equity & Small Cap Funds
High
High
Stocks
High
High
Cryptocurrencies
Very High
High
Creating A Plan
We have our goals, risk appetite and the suitable products. Now, all we have to do is combine both. The combined table will look like below.
Goals
Risk Appetite
Investment Horizon
Financial Products
Saving for a down payment for a house
High
7 years
Small Cap FundsEquity Funds Stocks
Buying a car
Medium
4 years
Mid Cap FundsMulti Cap Funds Real Estate
Going on a dream vacation
High
5 years
Equity Funds Stocks Small Cap Funds
Saving for retirement
High to Medium
25 years
PPF National Savings Certificate Mutual Funds Stocks
You must have noticed how we have chosen multiple products for every goal. This is called Portfolio Diversification. Instead of relying on only one product to do the work, you can choose multiple products to earn higher returns even when one of the products is not performing well. For example, if the real estate market is down, you can rest easy knowing that you would still be making returns from stocks.
Asset Classes & Ideal Portfolios
We can better this portfolio by including various asset classes. Well, how does that work? Let’s say that you have invested only in high risk instruments, then it is better to include some low risk assets such as debt mutual funds, bonds, and fixed deposits to minimize the losses. Also, instruments such as equity mutual funds, and stocks lack liquidity. So, in order to include liquidity in your portfolio, you should also be putting some of your money in smart deposits, fixed deposits, savings bank accounts, etc.,
If your goal is to accumulate wealth without a particular time horizon, the table would look something like this.
Goals
Risk Appetite
Investment Horizon
Ideal Portfolio
Wealth Accumulation
High
Ongoing
High Risk Stocks Equity Mutual Funds Small Cap Funds Low Risk Smart Deposits Bank Fixed Deposits
Tax Saving
Low to High
15 years
High Risk ELSS Low Risk PPF National Savings Certificate Insurance Policies
What To Do Now?
We have given you the financial products that will help you achieve your life goals. The next step is to choose a platform that will help you achieve your goals with ease. There are several online platforms that will aid you in this process, but the best platform would be the one that would automate your finances. We know a platform like that and that is Koshex!
Kosher would put your finances in auto-pilot mode, and if you input your goals and risk appetite, it will create a customized investment solution for you. So, you don’t have to worry about drawing tables and going through multiple product documents. We are here to save you time and hassle. Head to Koshex to create an account today and start your financial journey.