When I sold my software business, I realised that in order to capitalise fully on many years of effort, I would need to make my money work. Being an independent-minded individual, I was loathe to put my nest-egg in the hands of someone else, so I decided that I should manage my own investments. And thus overnight, I became transformed from a software engineer and business owner into a fledgling investor.

I cannot say I didn't make mistakes, I made plenty! But after a while I started to find that this investing game is not so difficult as it sounds. In fact, most people go out of their way to make it more difficult than it is.

Then something happened that made me realise that I had become a very good investor. There was a discussion on one of the public boards of the Motley Fool website about whether it was possible to beat the market. I weighed in airily, that of course it was possible to beat the market. After a while it occurred to me, that if I really believed it, I should prove it. And so I did. In September 2016 I put together a portfolio of $25,000 invested in stocks and stated that this investment would certainly beat the market over 5 years. At the completion, the portfolio value stood at $116,018 - a gain of 364.12%. Over the same period the S&P 500 rose 106.73%. I had beaten the market by 257% over a 5 year period. Or in Dollar terms, an S&P fund would have gained $25,425 - a respectable double - whereas my portfolio gained a whopping $89,014. This represents a compound annual growth rate of 36% as against 16% for the S&P 500! (See The Portfolio).

The secret of my success? Mainly to keep things simple and follow a few basic principles.

Despite all this, I am still very much a fledgling investor today. One of the important lessons that I have learned, is that you will never stop learning in the field of investing. However good your results become, there are always ways to improve. (And so I expect this site to keep growing and improving.)

Once I realised that I could do a lot to help other fledglings I started helping some of my friends and family, and it has been gratifying for me to see them do well with their investments.

By collecting together the best investing principles and practices in one place, I am hoping to help many other fledglings to find their wings and see their investments soar!

Ian Richards