Financial Philosophies

I've mentioned my brother on this blog once, and I guess it made him sound pretty bad because I talked about his spending. So I wanted to kind of clarify that.

I think that in the long run, my brother will make a lot more money than me. We're really close in age (we're both in university at the same time and will be graduating in the same year together) but we have really different philosophies towards money.

My brother lives by the idea that you have to spend money to make money. My parents are afraid he's only got the spending part down and nothing else, because that's all they see. But the truth is, my brother is really smart. While in school he invests his money into different types of investments, like stocks. And he manages to make some money at it too. He thinks that he should take risks and learn while he's young. Last year, he got a $1000 bursary. Instead of using it to pay for school, he started investing it. He said that he'd rather make mistakes now and learn from it so that he can make smarter financial decisions after he graduates.

My whole financial philosophy is slow and steady wins the race. I hoard money and put it into savings accounts. The idea of having debt makes me nervous, which is why I'm working so hard at having my debts paid off before graduating.

The thing is, I'm not enough of a risk taker. I'll always be working at making money, but my brother will always be making his money work for him. So even though he spends a lot now and doesn't have as much to show for it, I'm confident that he'll make more money than me in the long run. And that makes me both proud and happy as a big sister.