Get Started Snapshot
Name & Nickname: Cooper ‘Clee’ Lee
Age: 28
Hometown & current home: Sydney & Sydney
Profession: Unemployed (ordinarily, Finance)
Favourite book: To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee 
Favourite money-saving hack: Putting the washing machine on a delayed start so it goes off in the early hours of the morning when electricity is cheaper
Most extravagant purchase: A 1992 Holden Rodeo

What was your relationship with money like growing up?

I was a good saver growing up, mainly because I never had an appetite for buying things. Plus, each year I would invite as many people as I could to my birthday parties, which would always give my bank balance a good boost!

What was your first job? (And how much did you get paid?)

I got my first job after finishing school, working in the production and packing team for a vet pharmaceutical company.

I remember we would pack dog dental sticks into packets, then pack those packets into boxes, those boxes into bigger boxes, and finally stack the big boxes onto pallets and send them off. Not the most stimulating work, but good experience and decent pay, around $30 an hour.

How did you first come across investing?

There were probably two converging forces that introduced me to investing. The first was a family friend who is a stockpicker. Hearing about his job was essentially my first introduction to investing as a way to build wealth.

The second was the fact I was starting a Commerce degree at uni around the same time, which introduced me to some of the "what" and "how" detail behind investing.

Was there a memorable early investment?

During Covid I bought into Bubs Australia, an infant goat formula company. I didn't have much of a thesis outside of believing that lockdowns ending would allow Daigou sales channels to pick up again.

A couple of days after I bought, the share price rocketed and I thought I was a genius, even though the price movement had nothing to do with my reasoning. Eventually the shares exploded again as "Operation Fly Formula" gave Bubs a gateway into the US market. However, since then, all hope was lost as poor governance slowly chipped away at the share price.

Despite ultimately coming out at a loss, I did enjoy the chance to attend an EGM held by the company to settle a board dispute. This was an awesome experience where my measly $300 shareholding (down from my initial $500) gave me a seat next to billionaire shareholders as they pleaded their case on who should be running the company. It was a feisty and eye-opening experience, well worth the loss.

How are you currently investing and can you provide a breakdown of your portfolio?

Being a good follower of Equity Mates, I invest through a core and satellite approach. My core covers US, Europe and Aus markets. I've mainly got thematic ETFs in my satellite portfolio. I also have a few individual companies, but only small positions to satiate my risk-seeking habits. Plus a little bit of Bitcoin.

Where do you see investing taking you?

I see investing as an avenue to help me build the wealth needed to live the life I would like to live. Living on a rural property, travelling the world, supporting my family, and having some fun along the way are all goals driving my investing journey.

What is one super extravagant and outlandish purchase that you hope investing will be able to buy you in the future?

If I were to somehow invest my way to riches, I reckon a mega yacht to sail around the world would be my most extravagant purchase. Cruising the waters, dropping anchor at different sites around the world, parking up at the Monaco GP and Rottnest Island would be the dream!

If you only had 25 words to convince someone to invest, what would you say?

If the sharemarket were to never go higher than it is today, then losing your money will be the least of your concerns.

• We want to hear your ‘How I Got Started’ stories. Respond to this email if you would like to be featured and we’ll get in touch!

Be sure to catch Cooper as he joins Jess in the last portion of todays Get Started Investing. The pair chat Cooper’s renewed ETF strategy and how he’s thinking about investing at the moment.

If you’ve been delaying investing or have someone in your life who wants to, this is the sign to start and go on the journey with Jess. (Spotify | Apple | YouTube)

Why ETF fees matter more than you think

We recently did an episode on the cheapest ETFs in Australia, and it's worth walking through one example that really puts the impact of fees into perspective. (Spotify | Apple | YouTube)

Using ASIC's MoneySmart fee calculator, Ren ran the numbers on a simple scenario: $1,000 invested per month, over 30 years, at a 10% annual return.

The only variable? The fee.

Ren: The difference between 0.5% and 0.05% may not feel like a lot, but it can mean hundreds of thousands of dollars in difference in retirement. We're not exaggerating. That is how much small differences in fees add up to.

At 0.5%, you'd retire with $1.87 million. At 0.05%, that becomes $2.06 million.

That's a $200,000 difference from a gap that looks like a rounding error.

The principle is simple: fees are one of the few things you can actually control as an investor. The market will do what it does. But every basis point you save compounds in your favour over time.