In this article, ‘How to Make Investing Tasks Easy to Create Your Investment Mix (Personal Finance Tips for Canadians)’, we briefly cover the following topics:

• SAVINGS ACCOUNT
• INVESTMENT MIX
• MUTUAL FUNDS
• EXCHANGE TRADED FUNDS (ETFs)
• ROBO ADVISOR​

​Coming up with your own investing strategies is never simple and easy.

​There’s the thought about where you should put your money - so that you could make your hard-earned money work for you. 

​Some Canadians might have some ideas.

But there are those who might have no clue at all on how and where to effectively invest their money.

​If you look at it, somehow, learning about investing could be a whole new journey for you.

​And you may even ask, “Who could find time to devote about this personal finance topic?”. Not to mention the fact that you may not even have enough money to work on your budget, more so, setting aside some amount for investments.

But how could other Canadians do it?

If you are new to investing, or you have just started raising a family, this task of investing can in fact, be very complicated.

It is true that the concept of investing could be overwhelming.

​“Why not just leave my money in the bank? It will earn an interest anyway, right?”

Opening a savings account is a safe way to save money especially if you have not navigated the many other forms of investments.

​At least, there’s that goal on your part to get started with something. That’s a good start. 

When you decide to open and maintain a savings account, make sure that your money is earning the highest interest rate your bank could offer - compared to other financial products. 

​You can do a comparison online, search available rates and and see if you are getting a favourable interest rate.

If you are looking to grow your money in many other ways, and you are considering a much longer period of time to invest your money, you have several options to look at your investment mix.

​Others look at investing in a combination of, for example:  

• High-Yield Bonds; 
  
• Government Bonds;
  
• Short-Term Bonds;
  
• Real Estate;
  
• Emerging Markets;
  
• Dividend Stocks;
  
• US Stocks;
  
• Foreign Stocks; and of course,
  
• Canadian Stocks.

Given these technical, financial, and investment terms, a beginner may be confused on how much should be devoted in each part of the investment mix.

Ever heard the investment strategy using diversification? The concept is investing your money across plenty of different baskets.

Many investors have looked at mutual funds for many years, as their investment vehicle.

​In fact, according to the website:  The Investment Funds Institute of Canada ‘Stats and Facts’, ​mutual funds make up about thirty-one percent (31%) of ‘Canadians’ financial wealth’. 

Then, came the concept of Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs). 
​
How popular ETFs have become in the recent years?

You can read more about ETFs, with this interesting article by the Globe and Mail, “The popularity of ETFs in Canada is growing at an amazing speed". 

Investing in ETFs makes a lot of sense, given the idea of diversification, risk-management, and the simple investment approach.

One can invest in ETFs regularly, depending on how much you can set aside on a specific schedule.

​Ever heard of a robo advisor?

According to Wealthsimple, “A robo advisor is a service that uses highly specialized software to do the job of wealth managers or investment advisors…” (Wealth managers are those who manage and ‘decide what type of investments you should be making and then tinker with those investments over time.’)

To get started as an investor using Wealthsimple, you simply have to answer a set of questions to know your ‘appetite for risk’ and put your money across appropriate investments, doing necessary adjustments depending on the situation of the market.

Robo-advisors invest on ETFs and could help you build an investment mix, depending on the level of risks you’re basically comfortable with, whether you’re looking at a Balanced Fund, Conservative Fund or Growth Fund. 

Learn more about investing using Robo-advisors.

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