Super Young Retirement Savers

DividendGuy · Post by **DividendGuy** » Sun Dec 18, 2011 11:52 pm

Just checked out an article on Yahoo! that profiles some young prolific savers. The first kid in the suit with the $10k investment portfolio is especially interesting.
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/super-you ... tml?page=1

m741 · Post by **m741** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 12:58 am

Some of these are a stretch... saving $1k at 16 isn't particularly impressive. Still, nice to see an article about financial prudence.
As usual, the comments are mostly infuriating.

akratic · Post by **akratic** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 1:42 am

I found the 18 year old with $300k in the bank having worked as a babysitter and in retail to be even more infuriating than the comments.

jennypenny · Post by **jennypenny** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 2:20 am

@akratic-If I remember the story right (she's a local), that girl in Princeton resells textbooks or something for a cut of the profit. And yes, her parents match what she banks. Still pretty good (and annoying).
Around here mother's helpers make $10-$12 per kid per hour so you can make a lot more than minimum wage. In the summer you can get $150-200 per kid per week. You usually get use of the parents' car and gas money so it's a nice deal. In our town, the parents will also purchase the MH a pool membership so they can take the kids to the pool. No one around here actually wants to raise their own children so it's a great way to earn some money.

Spartan_Warrior · Post by **Spartan_Warrior** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 2:27 am

@jennypenny: Know if she's single? LOL

C40 · Post by **C40** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 5:37 am

Akratic - what's infuriating about the girl with $300k?
I found myself a little confused by her section and wondering how much of that money could've possible been earned and saved by her, verses received as gifts from parents/family. I'm guessing there was more than just "matching" by her parents.

m741 · Post by **m741** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 7:11 am

I suspect the assumption there is that most of the money came from her parents.
I don't think it's possible to accumulate so much money at a young age without being entrepreneurial in a way that can be leveraged. For instance, it's possible to make that much if you start a successful website, or start a business and earn enough to hire many people to work for you.
The article says she tutored and sold textbooks. This is non-leveraged employment. A back-of-the-napkin calculation: suppose she clears $50/hour after taxes - not inconceivable for a tutor, but on the high end. It says she started saving at age 11. She would have had to work 6000 hours, which would translate to roughly 20 hours/week from age 11-18, at the same time as doing school work - and never spending a cent. That simply doesn't seem plausible to me.

m741 · Post by **m741** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 7:13 am

Actually, re-reading the article, she said she'd 'try to put $50/month' in her savings account. Hardly a lot of saving, even for a child. Over 7 years, that's just $4,200! Where did the other $295k come from?

LonerMatt · Post by **LonerMatt** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 9:00 am

I'm only 22 and consider myself very young in thinking about retirement seriously.
Put to shame.

akratic · Post by **akratic** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 2:16 pm

Yeah the infuriating part of that girl's story is she discredits the entire article and the rest of the kids. It's so patently obvious that she couldn't actually have amassed $300k by age 18 working unskilled hourly jobs.
I mean, I get it, she's from a rich suburb, and obviously had significant help. But without her in the article, you're not wondering how much help the other kids had, you're just happy for them.
PS: I was mostly just echoing m741 above me with the word choice of "infuriating". It's a stronger word than I'd normally use, but for the writeup about this girl, I'll stand by it.

jennypenny · Post by **jennypenny** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 3:10 pm

I agree she shouldn't have been included in the article. I was just trying to explain that her story could be true. What's impressive is that she has that much money in an account that *she* controls and she hasn't succumbed to peer pressure and spent it. And I guess the fact that she's even working at all.

FreeUrChains · Post by **FreeUrChains** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 5:49 pm

EVERY Yahoo article is pro-consumerism, pro-working your entire life to help keep the government afloat (which it keeps spending more then it has, hmm interesting)
I believe the Managers and Overlord's at Yahoo are themselves manipulating their own writer's stories to persuade the masses of internet viewers (mostly North Americans, Europeans, Russians, Indians, Chinese, and Japanese) to be anti-ERE.
So i only go onto Yahoo to read the Stories for a laugh now, but then it infuriates me somehow. How they control the minds of the people.
So i am starting to believe that almost every Yahoo article's Opposite is really the Truth and way to be. (within ERE reason)
Either way, these kids will be millionaires by age 25, if they wish to work

. Especially with great Saving/Investing Attitudes and Behaviors. It all comes down to the choices we make Day-to-Day throughout our lives, that help us find and act on the Truth and follow True Freedom.

FreeUrChains · Post by **FreeUrChains** » Mon Dec 19, 2011 5:52 pm

Also, they have increased their Comment filtering system, now only approx. 1000 comments make it thru/ article!!!
Over 10k+-100k are truely submitted within hours!
(Filled with the ERE Truth)

C40 · Post by **C40** » Tue Dec 20, 2011 12:29 am

ahh.... I see.
I now have really low expectations of quality when reading articles on yahoo news. I've come to expect poorly written and disposable articles with misleading headlines. So I took the omission of the actual sources of her money to just be a common article problem.
I'm asking myself right now why I still regularly browse yahoo news...

Emanuel · Post by **Emanuel** » Tue Dec 20, 2011 2:41 am

Yahoo bought Associated Content last year (the biggest content farm until now) and its all about ad dollars and the bottom line. Stay away from it if you want quality material.

dot_com_vet · Post by **dot_com_vet** » Tue Dec 20, 2011 5:50 am

Regarding the $300k net worth. I'm guessing that's including a college fund, heavily boosted with gifts from family.
From wikipedia on 529 plans:
"Finally, everyone is eligible to take advantage of a 529 plan, and the amounts that can be put in are substantial (over $300,000 per beneficiary in many state plans)"

mikeBOS · Post by **mikeBOS** » Tue Dec 20, 2011 9:53 am

I wonder if she'll be wise enough to invest it in something other than college

Post by **jacob** » Tue Dec 20, 2011 10:51 pm

To keep in mind: That girl almost surely didn't write the story or decide what kind of spin or words to use. Yet she'll still be the one taking the heat for it and she will probably be reading people's comments.

teewonk · Post by **teewonk** » Tue Dec 20, 2011 11:05 pm

I knew a guy in high school who had $10K to invest. He's a multi-hundred-millionaire now. (Not from the $10K, but from his entrepreneurship.)
The more I think about it, the more it seems like the segment on the Princeton girl is designed to stir up controversy and catch attention. It caught ours. Chalk it up to "Worldviews subconsciously shaped on our behalf for us."