This is intended as a short diatribe on wealth building, but I realize it looks more like an ad for "Stash" - it's not. It's a case for micro-investing.
I started with 2 test accounts. One at "Acorns" and the other at "Stash Invest". I quickly determined that Stash provided a far more intuitive platform, more investment opportunities, and much more flexibility. After 6 months I closed the Acorns account and moved the assets over to Stash.
"Stash Invest" is a mobile application that lets you invest as little as $5 twice per day (two daily fixed trading windows), with near zero fees. I haven't found a cheaper or easier way to accumulate equity - by Roth, Traditional, or Regular account.
It took almost 2 years exactly to turn $1 into $10,000 ($10,014 to be exact). 24 months of daily $5 investments - a cup of coffee, a six-pack of beer, a pack of smokes, or snacks, redirected into equities. The strange thing is that the 2 years went by in the blink of an eye. But I guess that's why they call it "The Magic of Compound Interest".
If someone was trying to "Make a Million" to coin a phrase, this means that the hard part is over. The hard part is taking $1 and making it $10,000. Taking $10,000 and making it $1,000,000, on the other hand, that's easy. Any Bozo with an iPhone and some time can do that.
The hard part is walking that 1st mile. Most people won't do it. They'll tell you they can't do it (but the truth is - they won't do it). I guess it's just as well, because our economy depends on the financially unsophisticated and undisciplined. But at the end of the day, it's a simple choice. Everybody has $5.
What you do with the money that's in your pocket today will determine your financial future.
Full Disclosure: Over the 24 month term of the experiment, I committed to investing $5, twice daily. This $10 daily investment was the norm on 99 percent of the days. However, it's important to note that when a person commits to such a discipline, opportunities arise to increase the investment amount or frequency. This happened from time to time - an example would be the $50 birthday check Aunt Mable sent me. I committed have of this amount, or $25, to Stash on my birthday.