Rules for Investing

- Rule of 72 (Double Your Money)

- Rule of 114 (triple Your Money)

- Rule of 144 (quadruple Your Money)

- Rule of 70 (Inflation)

- 4% Withdrawal Rule

- 100 Minus Age Rule

- 10, 5, 3 Rule

- 50-30-20 Rule

- 3X Emergency Rule

- 40â„… EMI Rule

- Life Insurance Rule

- Do you consider yourself wealthy?

- Pay yourself first rule

 Rule of 72

No. of years required to double your money at a given rate, you just divide 72 by interest rate

Eg, if you want to know how long it will take to double your money at 8% interest, divide 72 by 8 and get 9 years 

At 6% rate, it will take 12 yrs

At 9% rate, it will take 8 yrs

Rule of 114 (triple)
Use this to estimate how long it will take to triple your money. It works the same way as the rule of 72. Divide 114 by interest rate to know in how many years $10,000 will become $30,000

Rule of 144 (quadruple)
Similarly, this tells you in how much time your investment will quadruple in value. For instance, if interest rate is 12%, $10,000 becomes $40,000 in 12 years

These rules provide only a rough idea. The actual amount after compounding may vary

Rule of 70

Divide 70 by the current inflation rate to know how fast the value of your investment will get reduced to half its present value.

The inflation rate of 7% will reduce the value of your money to half in 10 years.

 4% Rule for Financial Freedom

 Corpus Reqd = 25 times of your estimated Annual Expenses.

Eg- if your annual expense after 50 years of age is $30,000 and you wish to take VRS then the corpus with you required is $0.75 million.

Put 50% of this into fixed income & 50% into equity.

Withdraw 4% every yr, i.e. $30,000.

 

This rule works for 96% of the time in 30 year period

100 minus your age rule

This rule is used for asset allocation. Subtract your age from 100 to find out, how much of your portfolio should be allocated to equities

Suppose your Age is 30 so (100 - 30 = 70)

Equity : 70%

Debt: 30%

 But if your Age is 60 so (100 - 60 = 40)

 Equity : 40%

Debt: 60%

10-5-3 Rule

 One should have reasonable returns expectations

10â„… Rate of return - Equity / Mutual Funds

5â„… - Debts ( Fixed Deposits or Other Debt instruments)

3â„… - Savings Account

 50-30-20 Rule - about the allocation of income to expense

Divide your income into

50℅ - Needs  (Groceries, rent, EMI, etc)

30℅ - Wants  (Entertainment, vacations, etc)

20℅ - Savings  (Equity, MFs, Debt, FD, etc)

 

At least try to save 20â„… of your income.

You can definitely save more

 3X Emergency Rule

Always put at least 3 times your monthly income in Emergency funds for emergencies such as loss of employment, medical emergency, etc.

3 X Monthly Income

In fact, one can have around 6 X Monthly Income in liquid or near liquid assets to be on a safer side

 40℅ EMI Rule

 Never go beyond 40℅ of your income into EMIs.

Say you earn,  $15,000 per month. So you should not have EMIs of more than $6,000.

This Rule is generally used by Finance companies to provide loans. You can use it to manage your finances.

 Life Insurance Rule

Always have Sum Assured as 20 times of your Annual Income

20 X Annual Income

Say you earn $150,000 annually, you should at least have $3 million insurance by following this Rule

DO YOU CONSIDER YOURSELF WEALTHY?

A rule-of-thumb formula used by Thomas J Stanley & William D Danko in ‘The Millionaire Next Door, a book that studies self-made American millionaires can help determine if you are one

(Age x pre-tax income) / 10 = net worth

The logic behind the formula is that the older you are and the more money you make, the more net worth you should have. Dividing by 10 is a rule-of-thumb that fits American conditions. So if...

Pay yourself first rule
Right from your first salary, put away a little for your retirement. Experts say 10% of your income should go into this. It is important to increase the amount as your income rises over the years

If every month you invest 100$ in a plan that grows 8.5% annually and increase your investment by 10% every year, after 30 years you will have $0.5 million

These rules are equally useful for young, youth, and old. Hope you will find them simple, useful, and handy.