How Much Is 5 Dimes

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Investing With Nickels and Dimes

Earl Crawley, 69, meliorate known as Mr. Earl, earns $twenty,000 a year as a parking-lot bellboy. But he has amassed a stock portfolio worth more than $500,000.

How did you go started investing?
Soon after I started working for Mercantile Bank in Baltimore 44 years ago, 1 of the bankers took me aside and told me I didn't take enough instruction to get very far at the depository financial institution. He suggested I invest in stocks.

Where did you get the money?
I did it with good old-fashioned nickels and dimes. My mother taught me how to budget, which made me appreciate how a little money can grow. I saved what I could from odd jobs, such equally backyard-cut and window-washing, that I did in addition to my 24-hour interval chore. I used that money to buy one share of IBM stock dorsum in 1981.

How did you learn how to invest?
I really didn't know enough to exist scared. In school I was considered a slow learner -- dyslexic, information technology'southward called now. My true gift from God is my ability to listen, and that's how I'm able to inquire questions and use tips from the brokers, financial planners and banking company customers I see every solar day.

Do y'all have a formula for picking stocks?
When I first started out, I had to be conservative and take my fourth dimension because I couldn't beget to lose money. Now I await for companies with stability that pay dividends. I read the stock pages just don't claim to know everything about them. I have a banker, only many times I'll go where my spirit leads me.

Any stocks you're excited most now?
I've been buying shares of ExxonMobil.

We've heard that you're helping others invest.
I started an investment guild at my church. And I've been coaching a couple of immature men, such as bar-and-grill cook Antawn Davenport and Dana Mouse Smith, who toured with the late rapper Tupac Shakur. They tin can assist spread the message that people can do whatsoever they set their minds to do.

Crawley is featured in the current season of the PBS TV show "MoneyTrack." Sentinel the video.

-- Interview by David Benjamin