If you’re somewhere in your mid-20s and have just kicked off your career, there are three things we can predict about you with complete certainty:

1. 1. You have come to terms with the fact that adulting, in reality, is not as laid-back as had been dreamt up by our YA-drama-obsessed brains.                                
   2. You wish pretty much everyday that there had been a subject in school called ‘How not to freak out when you realise point no.1’ AKA ‘Personal Finance’ that would’ve prepared you a little better for this chaos.                      and..         
   3. This blog is exactly what you need to read right now.

Not because adulting is a feat we have unlocked and achieved completely — (still regret not being able to properly chop an onion) — but because in the process of figuring it out, there are a few personal finance truth bombs that we’ve unearthed which are definitely worth sharing.

So here we go!

Truth Bomb #1

It’s not that complicated.

Yes, you read that right — you don’t have to be a finance expert in order to understand how to manage your own money.

For most of us merely using the words ‘budgeting’ and ‘personal finance’ clout our approach to the matter, and we end up zoning out and putting it off until it’s absolutely necessary — by which time it’s already a bit too late.

But here’s the thing: once you cut out the noise, and skip the jargon — at the core of it, money management is about building a better habit, and not about ditching fun for a complicated excel sheet.

It’s simply about finding the balance between spending, saving, investing and the occasional splurging (yes, you are allowed to do that as well every now and then).

Truth Bomb #2

It’s never too early to start investing, and it’s never too small an amount to invest.

The most important and yet, often overlooked part about making money is that your money can also be making more money.

Yes, we’re talking about investing. And yes, we know how difficult it is to even think of putting investment on the priority list when the amount that is left behind each month after paying off the bills is just about enough to get that electronic accessory you’ve been wanting, or the sneakers that are on sale.

But that’s the thing — you don’t have to choose between spending and investing because there are now a number of ways to start with a minimum investment amount.

And one such way is the Deciml App.

Deciml works on the simple idea of round-up investing –

• You ordered food,
• Paid ₹299 for it online via a digital wallet or your card,
• Deciml rounds up this amount to the next 10 which in this case, is 300
• And invests your digital spare change of ₹1 in a Mutual Fund.

Now, ₹1 may seem like an insignificant amount to invest but imagine rounding up every transaction — small and big, from petrol to long shopping lists — and investing every digital spare change of yours — from ₹1 to ₹10 (or more!), and letting your money grow over a significant period of time from something little to something amazing.

Because therein lies truth bomb #2.5 — successful investing is mainly about how long you stay invested, rather than how much you are investing.

Truth Bomb #3

Automation is your buddy..

If you can make it easier for yourself, why not?

Other daily matters almost always take precedence over saving and investing, and before you know it — it’s either the end of the month already (and you’re running low on money) or it’s too much of an effort to do it now (and you’d rather be focussing your energies elsewhere).

Deciml helps you automate your investments, and thereby regulates investing as a habit for you. Besides round-up investing (which is also automated: the app promptly calculates your spare change and auto-invests it for you), you can also auto-invest small amounts on a daily basis, even if you don’t spend.

Say you decide to invest ₹50 per day. At the end of the month, you’ve still managed to invest ₹1,500 — which by itself can sound like too big a number to commit to investing, but when auto-invested daily — it’s small, yet significant and happens without you having to put in any added effort at all!

Rounding It Up.

Let’s just face it: adulting can be chaotic, but a part of it — how you manage and grow your money — doesn’t and shouldn’t have to be.

Start small, but start now — and tell us if you unearth any truth bombs of your own!

Know more about investing for beginners: www.deciml.in .

Start investing your spare change: Download the Deciml app.