What We Can Learn about Investing from Generation Y
September 20, 2010People poke fun at Gen Y’ers because this was the generation where everyone got a trophy just for participating in a sport or activity. At the Little League “end of season” team parties, even the team that was dead last and the player that barely sniffed the field, went home with their trophy. While these parents (I know because I was one of them) were worrying about the delicate sensibilities of our little Millennials, they were fast at work learning technology.
This generation took computer classes in the 4th grade – remember them programming the VCR for their parents? I was so disappointed when my boys went off the college, I’d have to handle the TV remote (three of them on my coffee table) and figure out how to play a movie.
My husband and I hired one of our son’s friends from school to help us hook up our electronics when we got a new TV cabinet – well worth the money (and pizza). As investors, Gen Y’ers can channel these tech savvy skills to become great investors and we can learn from them. What can we do?
Embrace technology. Find good sources of information to make investment decisions, follow economic trends and track not just our investments but our spending. My son Brian has a Mint.com app on his iphone and tracks his cash flow. He also used CreditKarma.com to find ways to improve his credit rating.
Set things up automatically. Whether it is the 401(k) or transferring funds from checking to an emergency savings, in order to make sure money gets invested or saved get the human element out of it and set it up on automatic. With some 401(k) plans you can even set them up on “auto-escalation” so your contribution percentage goes up each year.
Listen and learn from the experts. Watch videos and read what the experts are saying. I am not talking about YouTube here – dancing wedding videos for entertainment. I am talking about the mind boggling amount of information available on financial websites such as www.Forbes.com and www.wsj.com. You can watch interviews with top money managers and economists — this access was unheard of 20 years ago!
We can take a lesson from Generation Y and use technology to help us reach our financial goals and make our lives much easier. I don’t know if anything can help me as I stare at my three remotes trying to play a DVD on my TV, but I do get my daily Wall Street Journal updates delivered to my email every morning and every evening like clockwork – it is so easy.