Being Practical

One way of being wiser is also being practical.

An aerial view of a portion of
Divisoria taken from the web

A couple of days ago, we (my wife and my daughter) decided that we will go shopping this weekend in the bargain capital of the Philippines: Divisoria.  We wanted to have our advance Christmas shopping to somehow beat the holiday rush.  However, I am having second thoughts to go there knowing fully well what to expect; traffic, congested places, crowd of people, etc.

I actually grew up in Manila and occasionally goes to Divisoria to buy toys.  Since relocating to the southern part of Manila a decade ago, I haven't been to that place for quite a long time.  So it seem that I would be in for a challenge especially for my daughter since this will be her first time to experience a very crowded place.

PNR Alabang Station

Saturday came and off we went.  Since I'm no longer familiar with the place, we initially planned to bring the car and park somewhere in SM Mall of Asia, and take a taxi to take us to the popular 168 Shopping Mall.  Then it came to me that we're going to Divisoria so we can purchase items at a lower cost so we can save a little and put those savings in our investment fund, so why not use a much lower cost of transportation.  We thought of taking the train of the Philippine National Railways (PNR).  A train trip from Alabang to Tutuban only costs P25.00.  There are three of us, so it's only a total of P75.00 and P150.00 for a round trip.  That's nothing compared if we use the car which entailed gas and toll fee which will approximately cost us P1,000.00.  

So we took the train trip and generally its a pleasant experience.  By the way, that's the first time we boarded a PNR train.  It's a one hour trip from Alabang to Tutuban and there are I think 16 stop overs.  Expect the train to be filled up with passengers starting from the EDSA/Magallanes station so you will be needing a certain amount of patience from thereon.

168 Shopping Mall in Divisoria

Upon reaching Tutuban station, we took the tricycle and asked the driver to bring us to the 168 mall.  As expected, the place is a big house full of people.  People who also wanted to beat the holiday rush.

I came to Divisoria with only one thing in mind, to buy toys to add up to my collection.  For me, a middle aged man who still has passion for toys is normal as long as I don't play with it.  My wife and daughter have different things in mind so I let them stroll around the mall and look for their own stuffs to buy.  However, I got disappointed when I only saw a handful of toy shops.  I am expecting that the toy shops would be the same with that of Greenhills where toy shops are just adjacent to each other and you will have a hard time buying stuffs you want because there are lots of stores to choose from.

Trunks of Dragonball

Suddenly, there was a lone toy store which caught my attention.  They didn't have much to offer but I was able to buy some.  I bought four Dragonball Z figurines and it costs me only P1,700.00 at P425.00 each.  I find the price reasonable since I saw the same items sold in a mall in Alabang at around P600-P700.  So its a good deal.  

My wife and daughter were able to buy items they wanted without so much dent to our budget which is great. :-) Some are gift items and some items are intended to be sold online.

We're able to finish our shopping by 2PM and we decided to go back to the train station so we can beat the rush our.  At exactly 2:30PM, the train left Tutuban station on our way back to Alabang.

As we reach home, we somehow felt good that we were able to purchase items at considerably low prices. We were able to endure the trip to and from Divisoria without hassle.  And maybe one of the most important thing is the first hand experience of our daughter of being exposed to the heart of a very busy district in Manila.  But most of all, we savor the rewards of being practical which we can apply to our everyday lives.

My First Missed Opportunity in Mutual Funds

Back in 2008, I was introduced by my former boss into mutual funds.  That was the first time I've heard of such a thing.  Before that, he told me that he will share something about investment.  The first thing that came into my mind was the stock market.  I was surprised when he told me things about mutual funds.  My first question was, "What is that?"

I was introduced into something which was very new to me.  I was not prepared for that.  I don't even know about Philequity.  Which at that time, or even up to now, is the #1 Mutual Fund company in the Philippines.

So since I really wanted to try something new during that time, I opened up an account. I was told to open up an equity fund.  Whatever it is, I listened to him knowing fully well that as my former boss, he will never do such a foolish thing to me. I later learned that an equity fund invest 90% of the fund in equities and 10% in government securities. I will have a separate post regarding mutual funds and its different classification.

Moving on,  I shelled out P5,000.00 as the minimum initial investment.  If I remember it right, the NAVPS of the fund during that time was 10.7.  After opening the account, I never tried to up to my investment.  As the price went down to 7.5, I was discouraged.  I've seen my money went down from the initial fund value.  As it recovered back and reached P20/share, I decided to sell all my shares.  Somehow, I was able to double my money.  Doubling my 5,000.00 to up to 10,000.00 doesn't even made me excited to keep going.  Instead, I kept on living from paycheck to paycheck.  My financial situation is in total disarray.

Fast forward, after reading the Simplify book series of Bro. Bo Sanchez, that's when I realized that I am a fool.  I allowed an opportunity of a lifetime in the form of Philequity, to slip through my hands.  Now, the NAVPS of that same fund is 34.6.  The NAVPS trend makes me say tsk, tsk, tsk. :-(.  See the uptrend from 2008 to 2015? 

Reading inspirational books made me decide that I must shape up or else my future will be compromised.  I know it's somehow late in getting my hands wet in the world of investments, but I am sure that it is not too late.

Social Awareness

Even when I was a kid, I already love to read.  I read newspapers and comic book.  Well, I won't feel ashamed if I tell you that I also read local comics like Pilipino, Espesyal and Aliwan. Haha. There's no need to be ashamed if it's a part of the Filipino culture. J

To all potential readers, especially to the Pinoy readers, I hope you still remember these thing from the past.  It used to be one of the Pinoy's favorite past times long before the evolution of the internet. J

Ok, going to the newspaper, as a kid, I used to skip everything except for one thing, the comic section. Well what do you expect from a kid? Ok, aside from the comic section, I look at the sports section.  At least,somehow I am aware of what's happening in the world of sports. Haha.

Moving forward, as I grew older I started to read majority of the sections.  However, I never fully appreciated the business section.  I don't even know what the PHISIX means, now known as the PSEI.  I don't know how the stock market works.  I have no idea how the business sector operates. I know nothing about investments.  Not even an idea on financial planning.  That's what I call financial illiteracy.  I will share something about this on my future posts.

Nowadays, I am gaining knowledge on proper financial planning and is now more aware on what's happening around me especially on the business sector.  A large part of the learning I got came from the internet.  It came from free materials which we can get from the web.  There's Bloomberg Philippines, ANC On the Money, etc.

          
       

There's a vast source of information that up to know still remains untapped.  Especially to us Filipinos. Statistics says that only <5% of the Filipinos knows how to invest.  Obviously, I wanted to be part of that 5%.  But honestly, I wanted that percentage to grow as the years go by.  

My Goals For The Future

I'm sure that most of us wants to be financially free.  Free from everything.  Free from debts.  We want to avoid where to look for money in cases of emergency.  We want money to be always available when we need it without resorting to loans or something which would turn into liabilities.

I mentioned in my previous post that somehow I made mistakes on how I handled my earnings.  My hard earned money.  I failed big time when it comes to financial planning.  Well, I can say I failed big time because up to now I don't have a clear picture on how much will I have if I retire. But when it comes to dealing with personal obligations, I can say that I am successful.

With these reasons in mind, I am firm that my goal for my future is to be financially free.  We should have a firm grasp of our goal so we won't be mislead to other directions.  There would be distractions along the way as we aim to achieve our goals.   So we need to be very firm on whatever we want to achieve for ourselves.  Think of our family, our children's future.  Make them our inspirations as we make our journey towards financial freedom and financial security.

We only need our plans to be structured and well-defined.  And most of all, we should have the discipline to follow whatever plans we made.  Regardless how structured and defined our plans may be, without the proper discipline, still, we may not be able to achieve our goals.

The Older, The Wiser

For my initial post, I decided to use "The Older, The Wiser", as the title to somehow serve as a springboard to kick-off future posts.

Now, why do I choose such a title?  I already had written several blogs here at Blogger but that was several years ago.  If I can remember it right, my last post was 2011.  It’s already quite some time.  I had written blogs of different varieties.  I see it difficult to maintain several blogs. There is a possibility of losing focus of your subject.  It’s possible to lose connection with your audience.  Or maybe I am not yet that good in writing. 

Even before I started to write those blogs and up to now, I committed mistakes which somehow resulted to missed opportunities.  That’s the main reason why I opted to choose “The Older, The Wiser” as the title of both the blog and of this initial post.  Because I know that as I grew older, deep inside me that I have already learned from those past actions.  I have regretted committing the same mistakes all over again.  I consider those mistakes as an ingredient to success. 

Successful people somehow failed on their journey to success.  If there is truth to the adage that we need to fail in order for us to succeed, then I am very much willing to take on that path.  And with this blog, I’m hoping that I can clearly share the message to, and at the same time learn, from my potential audience.