When advising our clients to stay the course (i.e. stay fully invested), our advice is not based on wishful thinking about the markets. The advice is grounded in historical reality, and in a hope for the future.

These past few weeks have seen extreme stock market volatility, the WHO declaring a pandemic, and the U.S. implementing travel restrictions and many other measures (with more to come, assuredly) to help combat the spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus.

Our thoughts on the current stock market malaise -- and accompanying Coronavirus fears.

I won’t tell you that skipping lattes will make you a millionaire (because I don’t believe that). I’m not going to spend-shame anyone in this post. But I will forever maintain that frugality is a darn-near surefire way of building wealth. If you spend meaningfully less money than you make (that is, saving 15% or more of your income), it necessarily follows that you will build wealth. That’s not an opinion; it’s math. If you can only save 10%, then start there. But ultimately, work up toward a 20% savings rate…and then move higher from there. We have multiple clients saving more than 50% of their after-tax income.

Statements you will hear outside TWG’s walls, but not inside them: “Money is really cheap right now.” “I get a tax deduction on this, so it’s a good deal.” “The dealership is providing interest-free financing on the new model, so I’ll buy new.” “We refinanced and are saving $300/month on our payments.”

My wife Krista told me a great story from her trip to Costco yesterday with our two sons, Ford (age 3 ½ ) and Teddy (age 2). Krista bought yogurt for each of the boys. Our younger son Teddy quickly finished his yogurt and immediately began to cry for more. Ford responded by feeding his own yogurt to Teddy, spoonful by spoonful. He did that without any prompting from Mom.