Each individual investor has a finite window of time to save and invest.

During this time, investors must accumulate all the savings and returns they are ever going to get before they pass their earning years and retire. We define this period as—from the time they begin investing until the time they need to tap that money for retirement—their Personal Period of Return®.

Investing is Individual: The Journey of $1

The financial industry circulates a chart that illustrates how a single dollar invested in 1926 could snowball into $18,000 after 89 years. The chart is designed to make investors consider what would happen if they invested not $1, but $1,000—or $10,000.

The investor might walk away thinking that after 89 years, one good investment could net them $18,000,000, or even better, $180,000,000, if they had even more money at the start.

So why isn’t everyone in the United States rich?

The problem is, they don't have 89 years to invest—and they don't have the same 89 years with the same market conditions as that dollar experienced on its journey to becoming a small fortune. They have their Personal Period of Return®, which is as unique to them as their fingerprints.

Maximize Opportunity During the Time You Have

A trust fund kid is lucky—that kid can start investing at 18 years old. A person who gets divorced, or loses a business at middle age, on the other hand, may have to start over from zero 30 or 45.

If they both plan to retire at 65, these two people have radically different Personal Periods of Return.

Two other investors may both have a Personal Period of Return® of exactly 20 years, but if the first person had invested from 1974 to 1994, and the other invested from 1994 to 2014, their Personal Period of Return® will look nothing alike.

What all of those hypothetical investors share in common, however, is an obligation to maximize their returns and minimize their losses during the time that they do have—whatever the market conditions may be.

All Personal Periods of Return. have one thing in common: they are all too short. If investors had nine decades, they could potentially turn $1 into $18,000—but they don't.

All they have are the strategies and tactics they employ to maximize returns and minimize losses before their investment window closes. 401(k)s lull investors into setting their investments to autopilot, when if fact, investing should be active, involved and prioritized higher in life.

Maximization and optimization require attention, changes, maximum growth, and minimum loss along with skilled execution.

Life is short—and your Personal Period of Return® is even shorter.

Investing involves risk, including loss of principal.

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