rich girl, poor girl

the older sister invited me to follow her to an investment workshop as a replacement of her husband who couldn't make it today.

to be honest, i had other plans, that is a friend's wedding. buuuut, with my bank account reaching to nil while my credit card reaching its max, and the fact that following the sister is means nil on spending (she even pays for the food! yay!), i opted for the workshop.

hee, i know, i'm awesomely smart at cost saving.

so anyways, there i was, somewhat uninterested and very sleepy (i had to get up at 6am and left home at 7.15am on a Sunday. anyone would start a rally...) at the workshop which was at some lame hotel somewhere in shah alam, i think, looking around skeptically at the crowd of people who attended. the participants were 100% malay. now now, i don't mean to be racist to my own kind, but let's just admit that Malays are not the smartest in investments. in fact, i'll be really honest  here, for the first hour or so of the beginning of the workshop, i really believed i was lured into joining an MLM / Ponzi scheme gathering. especially seeing that the speakers (and some of the participants) acting too hyped up and kept overusing those damn annoying motivational lines ("kalau anda mahu kaya angkat tangan and say 'i'!!")

urgh. (=.=)

but as the day progressed, i found that it's very enlightening. an eye-opener really. i felt like finally having that parent to child talk about money. finally knowing all those things you should know (but never thought of asking) about money. how much of our salary to keep as savings, how to make a financial portfolio, the importance of side income and passive income, the three most profitable investments -- house, gold and stock shares, and how to invest in each the smart way.

now, only very recently have i realized that i came from a family that knows nothing, and i mean absolutely nothing about financial planning. my parents never taught me anything at all about savings and the importance of money. sure, my mum set up a bank account for each of my siblings and put in bits of her money in those accounts each month and had those accounts given to us to manage by ourselves when each of us reached the age of 18... or 12, can't quite recall now... but, i never remembered her telling us explicitly what to do with that account. we were also quite well-off back when i was young, and the fact that my dad came from a poor family probably made him pamper us too much when he had money. when we were in school, we received allowance money for school lunches each month. supposedly to teach us how to manage our own spending. looking back, it's quite redundant as we could always just ask for more money when we ran out, and we also receive a separate spending money whenever we go out with friends. didn't teach me anything about smart spending, i'd say. it also didn't help that i never understood the difference between wants and needs as a child. everything i wanted was a need. everything i needed was a want. so needless to say, that little bank account i was handed to? drained to nil in no time when i finally learnt how to go to a bank to withdraw money.

yeah, that was how bad my financial education and management was.

fast forward to when i started working. imagine little me, fresh graduate and just started on the working life, with absolutely no money in my accounts. but i didn't realize there's something wrong yet. ah well, yea yea i know, we have to save some money each month for the future yadda yadda... but i never knew how much to keep. as long as there's something in there, right? so... that means, i'll keep RM10 in my bank and the rest is for partying! yeay! *pats self on the back*

fast forward some more, 2 years and a half and i still have that same RM10 in my bank account while the rest is out partying. lets add a credit card to the mix. DEBTS. woo hoo.

okay, okay, so RM10 in my bank account is a bit overkill... i have la, about a few hundred untouched in that childhood account, and like, RM100 in my current one just to keep the account active while i wait for the monthly salary. but nothing more. nothing. nil. ilek.

this shit never bothered me until recently everyone (by everyone i just mean the bestie and the older sister) starting to get into the home buying trend. being classic me *eyeroll*, i must have what other people have. must. have. or go to hell. yeah, that's just me. so obviously i got into this whole house buying craze. started looking up every swanky apartments i see, searching up the price and dreaming of living the city life in a swanky apartment. however, my dreams was shattered, or rather, halted, after consulting the older sister (who has been attending classes on property in preparation to buy her own house) and the bestie. i remembered distinctly feeling my heart sinks when my older sister told me "lia, don't buy out of emotions. you may like the house and is head over heels with it, but calculate first how much you are making, and deduct your expenses e.g. car, food, gas, savings and such... now do you still have the money for the monthly fee?" then feeling it sinks further by the bestie's quiet question of "you know that the bank ain't gonna pay 100% of the house right... you have to pay 10% of the house yourself... and that's not even included the lawyer fees and shits... you have to have at least 15 to 30k in your bank for that..."

i hit the realization that... i have nothing. absolutely nothing. and i can't buy a house on nothing. meanwhile, i'm chasing time, taking mortgage time and also the fact that home prices are gonna get higher and higher into consideration. i need to buy a house now, but i can't, because i have nothing. i was indeed shattered.

but then i came for the workshop. basically what i get from it is the three most profitable investments are gold, stock shares and property. and each has its own strength. invest in gold because gold is an easily liquidated asset. if one is in need of a quick emergency cash, just sell the gold. invest in stock shares because it actually doesn't cost much if you pick the right thing to invest in. (i like the tip of buying shares on things of necessities, such as TNB, astro or LGM, as the price will only go up if a crisis strike. and did you know that it only costs between nil to RM10 to register at a broker? neither did i.)invest in property, well everyone knows this one... property price will never ever ever ever go down.

for me though, the take home message is that, before i start investing, i have to have my finance in check. ensure that i have a steady amount of savings (30% is what they suggested). look for ways to generate side income, and create an account for my side income. keep track of what goes in and what goes out. minimize unnecessary splurge (well, let's just put it out there that zero-ing that is fucking impossible... girl loves her fancy thangs.) only then can i start investing. and my first investment? a house, of course! well, now that i know the basic of gold and stock shares investment too, maybe one day i can dabble in those too... you know, for duit dapur as they say. ;)

wish me luck, hoping for a smarter, and richer me soon.