How to Build Long-Term Wealth with Simple, Low-Cost, Time-Tested Investing
Julian R. Sterling
These are the companion files of Stock Market Investing for Beginners by Julian R. Sterling.The book on Amazon →
One Excel workbook that puts figures on the two illustrations the book deliberately leaves without
them, corrected where it was wrong and closing on a checks sheet of 38 controls, every one
green. Around it: a blank version for your own figures, twelve working documents to print,
forty questions that mark themselves, and three cases the book names and never takes to a number.
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Six workbooks, the printable documents and the read-me. Each group below can also be
downloaded on its own. Last revised 24 September 2026.
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The book contains two worked illustrations, and both say of themselves that they use
“no real figures”. That caution is right — nobody can promise a
return — but it leaves a beginner told twice that the numbers matter enormously and shown
none. Nobody develops a feel for compounding by reading a paragraph about acceleration.
So: someone puts aside 300 a month at an illustrative seven per cent. Start at 25, contribute
for ten years, then stop for good — and finish with 405,132.
Start at 35 and contribute for thirty years — three times the money in
— and finish with 363,863. The early investor puts in a third as much and
ends up ahead.
And here is the line that explains the psychology: almost exactly half of her
final total appears in the last ten years, two decades after her final
contribution. In her thirties the balance grew by amounts that looked like nothing. Someone
judging the strategy by its first decade would have been looking at the years that made it work.
On costs, the same treatment. One percentage point a year, over a working life, costs
23 per cent of the final pot. But the useful way to hold it is this: the
higher-cost investor hands over 70,317 more in fees and ends up
170,885 poorer. Every 1 paid in fees costs 2.43 of final wealth.
The fee is not the cost — it is less than half of it.
One sheet exists because neither chapter mentions it: 739,000 in forty years buys what
about 275,000 buys today. A beginner shown a large nominal figure without being told what
it will buy has been handed a number rather than an answer.
The last sheet is not an illustration. It is a blank calculator for your figures, and it answers
the two questions worth making a habit of: what one more year of waiting costs, and what half a
point of extra fee takes away. Thirty-eight checks.
Revised: the early starter wins on a third of the money at seven per cent, but not at every
return. Ten years from 25 beat thirty years from 35 only above 6.28 per cent a
year; at four per cent the late investor finishes 64,188 ahead, and the second
sheet now solves that rate for any inputs. The 83,000 of fees in the read-me is the higher-cost
investor’s total (83,343); the 2.43 is measured on the extra 70,317. The fee sheet’s
column headings sat one column off, the inflation-linked result is 377,817, not 377,476, and the
year-by-year tables now follow the ages you type instead of a fixed 25 to 64.
Change the return from seven per cent to four. The totals fall a long way, and only one of the two
lessons survives intact. The fee still costs about the same share of the result: 21.3 per cent of the
pot instead of 23.1. But the late starter now finishes ahead, 209,982 against 145,794, because ten
early years outgrow thirty later ones only above 6.28 per cent a year. That is the point of
the file. The figures are not a forecast and were never meant to be; the shape of the answer
is what you test, and the file tells you where it stops holding. What survives at any rate is that
each 1 paid in early works harder: at four per cent it becomes 4.05, against 1.94 for the late
starter’s.
What the arithmetic cannot settle
It cannot tell you what markets will do. Real returns arrive unevenly, with long stretches of
disappointment, and no single year resembles an average — which is exactly why the years when
a plan feels like it is failing are the ones that decide it. The workbook cannot price that
difficulty, and it does not try. It makes two forces visible, time and cost, so that they can be
weighed with something better than an adjective.
The same model, for your own figures
The workbook with its fifteen inputs emptied. Enter your own contribution, return, costs and ages; the checks sheet counts what is still missing and runs fifteen tests that hold for any inputs.
Chapters 4 and 8 · Appendix F
A blank compounding and costs model
The yearly contribution, the return, inflation, a low and a higher cost, and the four ages of the two illustrations, then the six lines of the calculator. The file gives the early and the late investor at the finish, the return at which they draw level, the two costs in money and at the finish, the loss per 1 of extra fee, and every total in today’s money. The tables follow the ages you type, up to sixty years.
The book’s inputs are listed in a text file inside the archive. Type them back in and the file returns 405,132 against 363,863, and 738,846 against 567,961.
Twelve pages to print and use. A4, with margins wide enough for US Letter.
Chapters 4 and 8 · Appendix F · the three cases
Twelve working documents
The seven questions to ask of any projection somebody shows you, answered for the book’s illustration. The checks before the first contribution. The plan on one page, beside the book’s saver. The two numbers to read before any decision. Early against late, decade by decade. The fee audit, every layer turned into money. Two funds side by side. What the pot buys in today’s money. The catch-up table by starting age. The rule for a falling market, written before the fall. The yearly review against the plan’s path. And the contribution record.
A workbook that marks itself. Answer in the yellow cells; the marking fills in as you go.
All parts of the book
Forty questions on the book
Eight on early against late, eight on the cost of a fee, six on today’s money, five on the calculator, five on reading the numbers, and eight on the three cases below. Numbers are marked to a tolerance, multiple choice to the letter, and the score sheet counts your errors part by part: that is your revision list.
Nothing is hidden. The marking sheet holds every answer, every tolerance, and the reason for each answer.
New material, not a restatement. Three situations the chapters name and never take to a number. Each case is one workbook: the note is the first sheet, the model is the rest, and a checks sheet closes it. Type your own figures in and every finding recomputes.
Chapters 4 and 8 · Case one
The lost decade, first or last
Chapter 8’s saver, with one decade at nothing and the other thirty years at 9.44 per cent (ADDED), so that the forty years grow exactly as seven per cent does. A single sum ends at 509,664 whichever way round. The saver does not: 1,079,380 with the lost decade first, 593,525 with it last, against 738,846 on the steady path. At 35 the lost-first saver holds 35,704, less than she paid in, and finishes best.
Chapter 8 · Case two
Selling after the fall
The same saver meets a 30 per cent fall at 45 and a three-year recovery to trend (ADDED). Staying ends at 751,020, above the steady path. Selling, saving into cash at 2 per cent (ADDED) and buying back above the old peak, two years later, ends at 555,030: one sale costs 195,991, 1.15 times what one point of fees costs over forty years. Never going back ends at 245,396.
Chapters 4 and 8 · Case three
The price of waiting
To reach the low-cost pot of 738,846 at 65 takes 300 a month from 25, 626.68 from 35 and 1,428.79 from 45. One point of fees is 90.26 more a month for forty years, or 3.65 years of delay. Chapter 4’s late starter draws level with the early one on 334.03 a month, only 34 more, but for thirty years: 120,249 in all against 36,000.
thirty-eight controls, each stating its own verdict: the book’s figure beside the computed one, and the tests that hold for any inputs; in the blank set and the cases, each control states its own verdict and the file ends ALL OK
ADDED
a figure the book does not give, used in the cases and marked wherever it appears
Every figure is illustrative and none is a forecast. This is education, not advice; all investing
carries the risk of loss, and your own situation may need qualified guidance.
Opening the files
The workbooks open in Microsoft Excel, LibreOffice Calc, Google Sheets and Numbers; the PDF
prints on A4 or US Letter. They use no macros and no add-ins, so nothing needs to be enabled or
trusted. If your spreadsheet asks to update links on opening, decline — there are none.
What changed, and when
24 Sep 2026
The workbook corrected, 38 checks. The early starter’s win holds only above 6.28 per cent a year, not at any return: at four per cent the late investor finishes 64,188 ahead. The read-me’s 83,000 of fees is the total, 83,343; the 2.43 is measured on the extra 70,317. The fee sheet’s headings sat one column off; the inflation-linked result is 377,817, not 377,476; the tables follow the ages on the first sheet; the checks test at the precision the book prints. The page’s title said thirty years of fees; the illustration runs forty. Every figure the book prints was re-verified. Added: a blank set, twelve working documents, forty questions that mark themselves, and three cases.
Articles on this book
9 of the calculations in this workbook, worked out in full.
All articles.
How accurate is the rule of 72?At 7 per cent the rule gives 10.29 years to double against an exact 10.24. It is exact at 7.85 per cent and within 2 per cent between 4 and 12 per cent.
How do you calculate your average cost per share?Total paid, fees included, divided by shares held: 3,975 for 120 shares of a fund bought at 40, 32 and 25 is 33.125 a share, not the 32.33 average price.
How do you calculate dividend yield on cost?Divide today's annual dividend by what you paid, fees included. A 1.20 dividend growing 6% lifts yield on cost from 2.99% to 5.36% in ten years.
The other books with companion files. The full list of titles is on the
author page.
How to Read a Commercial LeaseThe three refinements chapter 19 names and never performs, and the renewal rate below which the mark-to-market is worth nothing.
How to Read a Real Estate Loan AgreementThe cure ratio in closed form, the four-point window in which the cheap cure works, and the cure sized to the wrong threshold.
The CBAM Compliance HandbookWhat 2027 really costs, how big the buffer should be, and the term the surrender formula counts twice.
Private Markets PerformanceThirty-one of the thirty-three figures chapter 19 publishes reproduce exactly — and the two that do not are named rather than quietly adopted.
The Private Equity Fund Controller PlaybookThe book defines IRR, DPI, RVPI and TVPI, tells you to update them at the exit, and prints not one value. Computed: a 1.833× deal inside a fund at 0.892 TVPI.
The Private Credit InvestorThe two coverage ratios are not measured on the same thing: the erosion is 47.7 per cent, not the 28.7 the headline implies.
The Distressed Debt InvestorWhere the fulcrum security actually breaks, and what an 80-cent recovery is worth once composition and time are priced.
The Real Estate Debt InvestorThe margin against the return on capital, the floor priced, and what prepayment protection buys.
The Fund Finance ProfessionalChapter 8 builds the reported-to-eligible NAV bridge; chapter 9 computes every ratio without it. Two points at every state — and what a subscription line does to the IRR.
Office Real EstateA six per cent yield that returns 3.2 per cent once the re-letting cycle is paid for, and the headline-to-net-effective rent arithmetic.
Real Estate FinanceFour people look at one building and reach four numbers; the lender is whole only above 105,109,489, twelve per cent below today’s value rather than forty.
Retail Real EstateThe occupancy cost of every unit in a centre, the sixteen per cent of the rent roll no tenant can sustain, and the right-size-convert-or-hold decision priced.
Sale and LeasebackA €179.5 million transaction end to end, with rent cover measured on the entity that actually signs the lease.
Self-Storage Real EstateThe cohort engine behind a 590-unit store, and the rate increase on existing customers priced against the move-outs it causes.
Financial Risk ManagementA fund inside every limit that cannot meet a redemption — and the number that decides it is the one with no currency attached.
Business ValuationThree advisers land 26.8 per cent apart on one company, and the whole gap turns out to be 1.96 points of perpetual growth.
Quantitative FinanceThree models agree to a quarter of one per cent about a number that one unobservable input moves a hundred and three times as much.
Asset ManagementFour people quote four returns for one mandate, all correct and 2.7017 points apart — forty-eight times the manager’s net skill.
Alternative InvestmentsA manager reports 13.29 per cent and the endowment earns 6.26 — both correct, and only a third of the advertised advantage arrives.
Credit AnalysisFour defensible EBITDAs on one borrower give leverage from 3.19x to 6.47x — and the add-back argument is fifty times the covenant headroom.
Venture CapitalOne company out of twenty-eight returns 56.7 per cent of the fund, and half the capital goes in after the decision — at half the return.
Machine Learning for FinanceFive people quote the accuracy of one credit model, all five are right, and the number that decides how much money it makes is none of them.
Commercial Real Estate InvestingThe equity earned 8.6647 per cent and the investor received exactly 8.0000 — the preferred return, and nothing above it.
Mergers and AcquisitionsThe board paper says the deal creates 13,436,667 of value. The arithmetic says it destroys 17,530,855. Nobody is lying.
DerivativesThe treasury report says the hedge cost 1,233,698. That is the interest differential, not a cost.
Treasury ManagementFive cash balances for one company, all correct and 145,600,000 apart — and the revolver that is two-thirds of the liquidity leaves at a revenue fall of 8.4127 per cent.
Financial Planning and AnalysisRevenue 3.0190 per cent above budget and operating profit 16.3209 per cent below it, in the same quarter, with every figure correctly stated.
Energy TradingA position report that is 91.7031 per cent hedged and correctly computed, on a book that is short 2,542,000 MWh — and a margin call of 198,400,000 the next morning.
Construction Cost ControlA contract sum of 26,301,102 became a final account of 29,153,363 on the building that was drawn — and 85.8 per cent of what was lost was knowable on the day it was signed.
Trade FinanceSix routes to payment on one 4,200,000 export order cost between 178,040 and 223,268, a spread worth 14.8 per cent of the margin, and a day of buyer credit costs 1,031.76.
Cost AccountingOne factory costed twice on the same 13,440,000 of overhead, and 4,053,091 moves between four product families.
Pricing StrategyA list price of 148.00, a pocket price of 112.51, and the nine deductions in between — with what one point of price is actually worth.
Contract ManagementA bid 5.50 a unit cheaper, signed on paper worth 9.81 a unit more — and 94.68 per cent of it was knowable on the day of signature.
Capital MarketsFour defensible readings of one bond, the cost of an issue under each convention, and the placement discount computed at a constant discount.
Financial RegulationThree ratios pass and the fourth is in breach by 1,956.0 million: the output floor, the liquidity buffer after encumbrance, and the loan split.
Bank ManagementFour defensible readings of one balance sheet, the deposit beta measured two ways, and the liquidity that lasts 3.9 days.
The Real Estate WorkoutFour ways out of one broken loan, discounted to today, and the 58.7 cents at which a payoff beats enforcement.
Go beyond the companion files
Stock Market Investing for Beginners develops the complete framework behind these models, with the assumptions, trade-offs and worked examples tied together.
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