A few weeks ago, I wrote an article about my best investing moves and the worst ones. As investors, we live various experiences and have the chance to learn from them. My fellow blogger ATL at Amber Tree Leaves commented on this article telling he that  if could go back in time and start over again, he would immediately start investing with a systematic plan. The idea is to invest, even a small amount of money, on a regular basis. You could do it once a month or, even easier, invest every two weeks at the same time you receive your paycheck. If you choose the latter, it’s like reducing your salary at first, but you won’t feel the difference after a short while. After reading his comment, I thought; this advice is so simple, and it’s the best advice for all investors.

Time in the Market is the Most Effective Investing Strategy

We can spend all day debating about the best investing strategy. Some will tell you passive indexing with ETFs is way to go, some others will choose investing with an advisor and others like me will put their focus on dividend growth investing. The fact is that while I’m a firm believer in my own investing strategy, the truth is that being invested in the stock market for a long time remains the best strategy above all no matter what you do with your portfolio.

Let’s do some math to see how this works in real life. Assume you have $140 to invest bi-weekly. This would make a total of $3,640 per year. It’s not a big amount and it is easily affordable by just about anyone, at any age. I’ve used the Financial Mentor calculator to run several calculations. The idea is to start the scenarios at different ages, and stop at 65 to see how much your portfolio would be worth. I used a 4% investment return as a starting point:

source: author’s table

Data: