How Much Money To Invest

Mutual funds are one of the few buzzing investment options these days. Millennials are turning towards mutual funds as they get a much-needed flexibility of investing a small amount frequently. After knowing that you can invest in small amounts, the next question that arises is "how much of my salary should be invested in mutual funds?" We have covered the following in this article:

50:30:20 Rule

Every earning individual should mandatorily implement the rule of 50:30:20 in their financial plan. This is very important, especially for breadwinners. Implementing this rule will ensure that their future is bright. The 50:30:20 rule says that 50% of your income must be spent on needs, 30% on wants, while the remaining 20% must be utilised to build an emergency corpus.

Needs are those without which you cannot sustain your daily life. These are groceries, house rent or EMI, utilities, and so on. You can never compromise on needs, and you have no choice but to spend on them. Wants are those that are not absolutely necessary, but you are making use of them in order to make your life better. A few examples of these are gym membership, vacation, movie tickets, subscriptions to online streaming sites, and so on. It is advisable for anyone to limit their spending on wants as much as possible.

The remaining 20% of your income must be saved to build an emergency corpus which is at least thrice your monthly salary. Once that is done, you can start investing. Therefore, your investments in mutual funds should be 20% of your monthly salary. If you are able to cut down on spending on wants, then you can utilise the same in increasing your mutual fund investment.

Importance of Investing in Mutual Funds

Millennials are investing in mutual funds as they offer much-needed flexibility. One can invest a small amount periodically. However, this is not the only factor that is making mutual funds so popular these days. Mutual funds are one of the few investment vehicles that have the potential to offer inflation-beating returns.

Inflation is something that reduces the worth of your money or investment over time. A product costing Rs 100 today may cost Rs 175 after five years. If your investment doesn't produce inflation-beating returns, then inflation at the rate of 8% will eat half of it in a period of eight years. The table below shows the impact of inflation (8%) on your investment of Rs 1,00,000:

Original amount	Rs 1,00,000
At the end of the first year	Rs 92,000
At the end of the second year	Rs 84,640
At the end of the third year	Rs 77,869
At the end of the fourth year	Rs 71,639
At the end of the fifth year	Rs 65,908
At the end of the sixth year	Rs 60,636
At the end of the seventh year	Rs 55,785
At the end of the eighth year	Rs 51,322

Therefore, in order to retain and realise the real worth of your investment, it is imperative that you earn inflation-beating returns. The best way to do this is by investing in mutual funds.

Long Term Planning

Mutual funds can be of great help to plan your future. In fact, the best utilisation of mutual funds happens when you stay invested for an extended period (five years or more). The power of compounding, coupled with a long-term investment horizon gives investors excellent returns in the long run. When the markets are favourable, mutual funds can offer returns in the range of 15% to 18%.

Let's consider an example of two friends Ram and Sham. Mr Ram starts investing Rs 1,00,000 a year in mutual funds at the age of 25 years. Mr Sham starts investing in the same mutual funds at the age of 35 years. Let's consider the scheme to be offering an annual interest of 10%. Both Ram and Sham decided to redeem their investment at the age of 58 years. The following table shows the difference in the sum accumulated by Ram and Sham:

Age	Ram starts at the age of 25 years	Sham starts at the age of 35 years
25	Rs 1,10,000	–
26	Rs 2,31,000	–
27	Rs 3,64,100	–
35	Rs 20,38,428	Rs 1,10,000
36	Rs 23,52,271	Rs 2,31,000
56	Rs 2,21,25,154	Rs 78,54,302
57	Rs 2,44,47,670	Rs 87,49,733
58	Rs 2,70,02,437	Rs 97,34,706

Note: The power of compounding enhances the corpus accumulated every year. The numbers in the table above do not show the full calculations.

Conclusion

It is crucial to implement 50:30:20 rule in your financial plan. One should invest at least 20% of their salary in mutual funds and can later increase whenever possible. The effect of inflation has made it essential for investors to look at options such as mutual funds to prevent their investment from losing its value over time.

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