10 Lessons Learned

Today's Newsletter:

• Quote From Aristotle

• 10 Lessons Learned

• A Money Question

Quote

“The more you know, the more you know you don’t know .” - Aristotle

I have been investing since I was 18. The past decade and a half I have spent learning as much as possible about money, investing, and how it interacts in our lives. One thing is certain the more I learn, the more questions I have.

10 Lessons Learned

Before we get started, I wanted to say thank you. Thank you for taking the time to subscribe and engage with this newsletter. It has been fun to write and I hope each of you has gotten value through it.

Today is my 32nd birthday. This will be my 15th year investing. I wanted to share with all of you 10 lessons I have learned along the way. Each lesson has been learned through a personal experience, not a textbook. Is that important? I tend to find many lessons with money have to be experienced personally to hit home. As such, I am only going to share ones I have been through.

1. Money buys peace of mind, not happiness.

   Our society places a large weight on money. There is no way around it. Yet, once your needs (food, shelter, water) are met, more money has a diminishing return. Money is a tool not an endless dopamine rush.

2. There is no perfect investment portfolio.

   For years, I would try to analyze and overanalyze every investment out there. It was paralysis by analysis. The truth is every investment portfolio will leave you wanting a little more. What matters more is your ability to stick with it.

3. The years of return outweigh the yearly returns.

   The returns of your investment portfolio matter. Yet, the years of return or years of compounding matter far more than any individual year. Do everything you can to stay in the game longer.

4. Good investing is boring.

   My investment strategy is boring and it works. I used to think I needed a fancy new strategy each year. The truth is you need to get educated, stack the odds, and stick to it for decades. Keep the campfire stories to memories made not stocks picked.

5. Cash is king.

   I used to want to get every dollar I had invested. More money invested means more compounding, right? Remember how yearly returns matter more than an individual year. To get that you have to stay in the game, cash can allow you to do that.

6. Your primary residence is a relational investment, not a financial one.

   I know I know you have made money over the past few years on your house. It also costs a lot to maintain, you might pay for a mortgage, you certainly pay property taxes on it, and it is illiquid. For those reasons, I do not consider a personal residence to be a financial investment. Yet, it can be one of your most relational investments.

7. Picking individual stocks is hard.

   Full disclosure, I do not pick individual stocks as a long-term investment strategy. I tried it for a few years, it is really hard. The data doesn’t support it. I know each weekend your neighbor tells you of his stock-picking prowess. Just remember the large majority (90+ percent) of active funds (the ones that pick stocks) underperform their benchmarks over a decade. These are the smartest people in the room.

8. Discipline drives returns.

   We think PE ratios, earning calls, leading indicators, and projections lead to returns. The truth is what leads to returns is discipline. The best investment I have made are the ones I have stuck with the longest. The ones I regret the most are the ones I have exited too early.

9. More positions does not mean more diversification.

   I used to subscribe to the belief that having 30+ funds in my portfolio meant I was more diversified. It did not. “Perceived complexity” is a concept made up by the financial industry to help them, not you.

10. Know the game you are playing.

    You are playing a different game than me. What do I mean? The money you have saved and invested should be earmarked for a future goal. Your goals are different than mine. Know what game you are playing and invest in a way to win that game.

A Money Question?

“What is the best investment you have made?”

I love investing in the stock market. Yet the best investments I have made have nothing to do with returns. They have to do with how I have used that money to build relationships, create experiences, and bring joy to my family’s life.

Always remember my friends, money is a tool that is meant to be used.

Work with Jacob

I help athletes and entrepreneurs pay less in taxes, coordinate their financial life, and invest for the long run.

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Until Next Time, My Friends

JL Strategic Wealth, LLC is a Registered Investment Advisor, located in the State of Missouri. JL Strategic Wealth provides investment advisory and related services for clients nationally. JL Strategic Wealth will maintain all applicable registration and licenses as required by the various states in which JL Strategic Wealth conducts business, as applicable. JL Strategic Wealth renders individualized responses to persons in a particular state only after complying with all regulatory requirements, or pursuant to an applicable state exemption or exclusion. Nothing in this content is intended to be, and you should not consider anything in this content to be, investment, accounting, tax, or legal advice.