According to many financial investors, 7% is an excellent return rate for most, while 5% is enough to be considered a 'good' return. Still, an investor may make more or less than the average percentage since everything depends on the investment's circumstances.
A good return on investment is generally considered to be about 7% per year, based on the average historic return of the S&P 500 index, and adjusting for inflation. But of course what one investor considers a good return might not be ideal for someone else.
Is a rate of return of 8% a good average annual return? The answer is yes if you're investing in government bonds, which shouldn't be as risky as investing in stocks.
To make money in stocks, you must protect the money you have. Live to invest another day by following this simple rule: Always sell a stock it if falls 7%-8% below what you paid for it. No questions asked. This basic principle helps you cap your potential downside.
Equities also typically offer appealing long term expected returns. On a 7% expected return, the doubling time falls to a decade. These are not forecasts, but the rule of 72 is a handy way to take a financial measure, like a rate of interest, and translate it into something which many people will find more tangible.
Divide 72 by your average expected annual return
If instead your average expected annual return was a more modest 7% (accounting for the typical annual inflation of around 3%), dividing 72 by 7 would result in 10.3, meaning it would take slightly over a decade for your money to double under those conditions.
The value of $10,000 in 20 years depends on factors like inflation and investment returns. Assuming an average annual inflation rate of 2%, the future value of $10,000 would be approximately $6,730 in today's dollars. However, investing an average annual return of 7% could grow to around $38,697.
At 10%, you could double your initial investment every seven years (72 divided by 10). In a less-risky investment such as bonds, which have averaged a return of about 5% to 6% over the same time period, you could expect to double your money in about 12 years (72 divided by 6).
Rule 1: Never lose money.
This is considered by many to be Buffett's most important rule and is the foundation of his investment philosophy.
Estimate your total savings needs
The first is the rule of 25: You should have 25 times your planned annual spending saved before you retire. That means that if you plan to spend $30,000 during your first year in retirement, you should have $750,000 invested when you walk away from your desk.
According to the S&P 500 index, the average historical return is approximately 10% without inflation. However, that doesn't mean that an investor is always going to make 10% on investment return. In the case of the stock market, people can make, on average, from 5% to 7% on returns.
It is not worth your time to do any investment if it cannot bring you 12 to 15 percent per year. Investing properly is not a gamble. We should not lose money in the stock market on a long term basis. In fact, a near guaranteed return of 15% or higher is a realistic expectation.
Key return on investment statistics
Average annual return on stocks: 13.8 percent. Average annual return on international stocks: 5.8 percent. Average annual return on bonds: 1.6 percent. Average annual return on gold: 0.8 percent.
Buffett's 5/25 rule is not only a great strategy for investing but also a useful tool for maximizing productivity. The rule is simple: identify the 25 most important things on your to-do list, prioritize them, and then focus on the top five items while ignoring the rest.
Buffett personally lost about $23 billion in the financial crisis of 2008, and his company, Berkshire Hathaway, lost its revered AAA rating. 23 So how can he tell us to never lose money?
Rule No.
1 is never lose money.
If you earn 7%, your money will double in a little over 10 years. You can also use the Rule of 72 to plug in interest rates from credit card debt, a car loan, home mortgage, or student loan to figure out how many years it'll take your money to double for someone else.
How long has it historically taken a stock investment to double? NYU business professor Aswath Damodaran has done the math. According to his math, since 1949 S&P 500 investments have doubled ten times, or an average of about seven years each time.
If you expect your wealth to grow by 12% a year, then it would take 6 years (72/12 = 6) to double.
Investing in the Stock Market
So, if you invested your $1,000,000, it would generate $100,000 in interest in the first year ($1,000,000 X 0.10 = $100,000). If you let it compound annually for 10 years, you would generate $1,593,742 in returns for a total of over $2,1593,742.
In order to hit your goal of $1 million in 10 years, SmartAsset's savings calculator estimates that you would need to save around $7,900 per month. This is if you're just putting your money into a high-yield savings account with an average annual percentage yield (APY) of 1.10%.
It tracked a hypothetical $10,000 investment in the S&P 500 stock index made on Jan 1, 1980 through the end of 2022. If the money was left untouched, the $10,000 invested in 1980 was worth $1.26 million at the end of 2022.