What's the single best piece of financial advice you've ever received?
u/LearninEarnin ·
Reddit — r/investing
· May 22, 2026 at 18:45
· ⬆ 78 pts
· 💬 85 comments
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Summary
Post is about a personal finance habit: “pay yourself first” to automate savings before spending.
Author’s thesis is that this simple, willpower-free approach is the single best financial advice for building wealth over time.
Quality assessment: This is general life advice / noise, not researched due diligence or a market thesis.
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The best one I ever got was stupidly simple: "pay yourself first, before the bills, before the fun, before anything", and the person who told me meant it literally, as in the moment your paycheck hits you move a fixed amount to savings before you even look at your balance, because the money you never see you never miss and you stop building your life around whatever's left over after everyone else gets paid first. Took me an embarrassingly long time to actually do it, but once I did it became the only financial habit that actually stuck without requiring constant willpower.