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Warren Buffet and Charlie Munger. Half of my portfolio is in BRK.
My parents taught me to use a bank savings account when I was very young, and to balance a checking account when I got my first job. I know now they were extremely frugal about some things due to their lives during the depression. When they were in their 60’s and70’s I told them to spend some money and travel – because I was their executor and if they didn’t spend some of their savings then my sister, brother, and I eventually would.
Late in his life, I told my Dad that it was due to his influence that I knew exactly how much I had in my bank, retirement, and investment accounts (I use Quicken, and can update whenever I want). He said he didn’t do that anymore, that he just asked a bank teller to print out his balances. Then he confessed he had way too much money in his checking account and needed to do something about it. By that time he didn’t need to worry about finances at all.
My parents started me on my interest in saving and investing as they were financially savvy. Jonathan and many writers of Humble Dollar continue to have a large influence. It is one of the first sites I read every morning, and I have followed Jonathan since his time at the Wall Street Journal. John Bogle is another. I like straightforward thinking with no hidden agenda to sell me something.
I’ll echo Carmaker Park and say Jonathan; the diversity of voices he’s collected here is unique. And this site led me to Adam Grossman, who is the type of financial advisor that is hard to find—fee only, a good listener, and a believer in “slow and steady.”
Hard to narrow it to one, but I would have to say Burton Malkiel because I got my hands on a copy of Random Walk when I was about thirty and couldn’t put it down. The concept of low cost index fund investing resonated with me and put me on the path to financial independence.
*Carma Park. Dang autocorrect.
My parents, but not in the way you might think. It was because I vowed to use and save money opposite the way they did. They were frugal, did not waste, but were scarred by the depression. They never invested, kept what they had in a checking account and in retirement lived on Social Security alone.
My parents rarely spoke about money — they certainly didn’t lecture my siblings and I when we were growing up. But day in, day out, their actions and decisions were consistent — they grew their own vegetables, they changed the oil in their cars themselves, they researched large purchases (which dishwasher does Consumer Reports rank highest in terms of reliability and performance), they lived below their means. So they are the greatest influencers of my financial thinking.
I would also rank Jonathan Clements and Dave Ramsey at the top of the list. I started reading Jonathan’s “Getting Going” column in the Wall Street Journal in 1992. A few years later, when my first child was born, I immediately opened a Vanguard college savings account per Jonathan’s advice in that column. At first, we could only spare $50 a month. We added more as we could. The end result was that both of our children graduated from college debt free. I have such gratitude and appreciation for Jonathan’s “Getting Going” columns that helped make that possible.
Warren Buffett. Unfortunately it took me to my 60’s to try to follow all the wisdom that I read for years that he gave out free of charge.
We lived on the blue-collar side of a very affluent suburban town. I rode the same bike for years while my friends from church always had the latest and greatest living on the other side of town. But we always had enough and were content. Mom could have been a founding member of the Bogleheads. She never missed Wall Street Week with Louis Rukeyser or MoneyTalk with Bob Brinker. But her lasting financial influence is that God will provide for all of your needs (Philippians 4:19). He has, He does, and He will.
My mother was the family financial manager, influenced me the most and I suppose ultimately drove my ambition to get degreed in the field. To my knowledge, she had little formal training in finance so was mostly self taught through periodicals (Money magazine, et al). She generally favored securities offering stable cash flow (e.g., utility stocks). Her gut proved right.
a few of the most influential people from early in my journey include Scott Pape, Dave Ramsay, Robery Kiyosaki, Vicki Robins, Pete Adeney, JL collins and I am pretty stoaked to discover Jonathan Clements and get stuck into his books next!
Jonathan! I’ve been reading Jonathan’s writings for many years, because what he says makes so much sense.
Thank you for the kind words!
Jesus has. I don’t say that to try to sound pious.
One of my most consistent prayers is that my thinking—all of it, including financial thinking—would be pleasing to Jesus, and would resemble how Jesus would think if he were living my life here today.
In the bio I use at the end of my articles, I say that I am “equally comfortable talking about Luke 6:43, Section 643 of the Internal Revenue Code and the 6-4-3 double play.” Luke 6:43 says, “For no good tree bears bad fruit, nor again does a bad tree bear good fruit.” That does not mean that the goal is trying to be good enough to earn a status as a good tree. It’s the other way around. When Jesus changes you from the inside, it shows in your life. As the next verse says, “for each tree is known by its own fruit. For figs are not gathered from thornbushes, nor are grapes picked from a bramble bush.”
Clark Howard. I began listening to him when I was 16. Saved up to fund my Roth IRA when I turned 18 in 2005 and haven’t looked back since. I should’ve stayed tried and true to his advice of simplicity. I tinkered with stock and options trading in college then got too cute with niche ETFs in the 2010s. Looking back, I should’ve opened fewer accounts and stuck with a few core ETFs/index mutual funds.
My dad always invested in stocks, and while he didn’t directly educate me on the ins and outs, I always understood that this was something you should strive to do.
Later, after making too many mistakes while trying to be a picker of individual stocks, I saw the light of index investing. This was thanks to John Bogle and Vanguard, and—not to make him blush but—regular reading of Jonathan’s WSJ columns.
There was no instruction in investing, but I learned frugal living from my parents, and the habit of hard work. My father’s example of putting talent and time toward something useful remains a guiding light for me.
My maternal grandfather was also not a stock investor. But as a child in the early 1970s, I spent half a dozen summers with him on his farm listening to him talk about commodity markets, economics, diversification–of crops, and other financial topics. His voice is in my head today.
My father and maternal grandfather had the largest impact – in that they talked about stocks and investing. There were no lectures – but when the opportunity came up, they would give me good guidance.
After them, William Bernstein had a huge impact – especially his four books Investing for Adults.
Finally, Andrew Tobias’s book The Only Investment Guide You’ll Ever Need. It was the first investment book that I ever read. His arguments for saving money, and how to do that resonated with me.
I keep meaning to read that book by Tobias, as several Humble Dollar readers have mentioned it. Thanks for reminding me of it again.