Lucky Amazon Stock Pick

Ramit Sethi shares a story about his early investing experience and buying Amazon stock as a teenager.

"I took my scholarship money which I got for college and put it in the stock market. I thought I was a genius in 1999. I lost half of that pretty fast. Funny enough though, I kept investing because I was working at a pizza place and doing some sales.

I used to think investing meant picking stocks, so I bought 3 stocks when I was in high school. One of them Excite@Home - bankrupt. Another one JDSU, why was I buying telecom stocks? I don't know - bankrupt. And then a third stock of a little company called Amazon.com, which I've held since then and it's awesome now.

The lesson for that - everyone goes 'Oh that's so cool Ramit!' I just gotta pick the next Amazon. No, you don't. You're never gonna pick the next Amazon. That was complete luck. Do not do that strategy. The real lesson is don't try to pick individual stocks. Pick a nice target date fund or index fund and then let it ride, and you will have more money than you know what to do with."