If I Had Just $500 Today, Here’s How I’d Build It to $23,000 (Step-by-Step)
The Table With AO
80,306 views
If Anthony O’Neal had to start investing from scratch in September 2026, this is exactly how he’d do it.
Anthony breaks down his simple 80/20 investing strategy, what he would do with his first $500, where to find extra money in your existing budget, and why waiting for the “perfect” time to enter the market could cost you years of growth. He also explains the order of accounts he would prioritize, how an emergency fund protects your investments, and how consistently investing just $107 a month could potentially grow into more than $250,000 over 30 years.
MENTIONED HERE
🚗Stop OverpayingFor Car Insurance: https://www.anthonyoneal.com/carinsur...
📈 Start Investing Today: https://www.anthonyoneal.com/invest
📖 Order "Stop Living Paycheck to Paycheck" (+$275 in free bonuses): https://www.anthonyoneal.com/book
Take the free Freedom Score™ assessment and find out exactly where you are: anthonyoneal.com/freedomscore
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
📘 STOP LIVING PAYCHECK TO PAYCHECK — OUT NOW
The Escape Plan, all 5 phases, in your hands.
Order + get Take Your Seat at the Table free: https://www.anthonyoneal.com/book
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
⏱️ IN THIS EPISODE
00:00 – Introduction: How Anthony would invest his first $500 using an 80/20 strategy
06:06 – Why you can apply the same investing formula even if you only have $25 or $100
11:15 – Why boring, low-cost index funds can become the foundation of long-term wealth
20:43 – How to find your first $500 without getting a raise or starting a side hustle
21:05 – Four everyday expenses that may be quietly eating up your investing money
30:40 – Why an all-time market high is not automatically a reason to wait
34:11 – Why an emergency fund gives you the ability to stay invested when markets fall
38:15 – The order Anthony recommends: 401(k) match → Roth IRA → brokerage account
40:01 – How $107 a month could potentially grow to roughly $252,000 over 30 years
42:39 – The 3 investing mistakes that can destroy a good strategy
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
🎁 FREE TOOLS & RESOURCES
Freedom Score™ Assessment → anthonyoneal.com/freedomscore
Budget + debt payoff templates → anthonyoneal.com/tools
Weekly email (money that actually works) → anthonyoneal.com/newsletter
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
🔵 THE FREEDOM CIRCLE™
Not another course. A financial operating system — weekly live coaching with me, monthly masterclasses, the roadmap, and a community that holds you to it.
Founding membership: https://www.anthonyoneal.com/freedomc...
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
🤝 TRUSTED PARTNERS
These are companies I've vetted and use language I'd use with my own family. Some links are affiliate links — see disclosure below:
High-Yield Savings Account → https://www.anthonyoneal.com/savings
Investing → https://www.anthonyoneal.com/invest
Term Life Insurance → https://www.anthonyoneal.com/lifeinsu...
Car Insurance → https://www.anthonyoneal.com/carinsur...
Raise Your Credit Score → https://www.anthonyoneal.com/kikoff
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
🎤 BOOK ANTHONY TO SPEAK
Churches, universities, credit unions, conferences, and corporate events.
Speaking kit + availability: https://www.anthonyoneal.com/contact
📈 SPONSOR THE SHOW
Reach a high-intent audience of people actively fixing their money.
Media kit + rates: partner@anthonyoneal.com
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
📲 CONNECT WITH ANTHONY
Website → https://www.anthonyoneal.com
Instagram → Instagram: anthonyoneal
TikTok → TikTok: anthonyoneal
X → x.com/anthonyoneal
LinkedIn → linkedin.com/in/anthonyoneal
Facebook → facebook.com/anthonyoneal
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
👋 ABOUT ANTHONY
Anthony O'Neal is a two-time national bestselling author, financial educator, and generational wealth architect who has spent more than a decade helping people get out of debt and build wealth that outlives them. He is an adjunct professor of Consumer Economics at Virginia Union University and a doctoral candidate in Finance and Investing. Through The Table, his books, and The Freedom Circle™, he's on a mission to eliminate $1 billion in consumer debt and build $500 million in wealth by 2053.
Faith supports the work — it doesn't replace it. Debt is the enemy, never the person.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
AFFILIATE DISCLOSURE
Some links above are affiliate links. If you use them, I may earn a commission at no additional cost to you. I only partner with companies I believe in, and a commission never changes what I recommend or what I say on this show.
DISCLAIMER
This content is for educational and informational purposes only and is not financial, investment, tax, legal, or insurance advice. Anthony O'Neal is not a licensed financial advisor, attorney, or tax professional, and no fiduciary relationship is created by watching this content. Your situation is unique — consult a qualified professional before making financial decisions. Results discussed are not guarantees.
#AnthonyONeal #TheTable #MoneyThatWorks
20 Comments
If I Had Just $500 Today, Here’s How I’d Build It to $23,000 (Step-by-Step)
The Table With AO
80,306 views
If Anthony O’Neal had to start investing from scratch in September 2026, this is exactly how he’d do it.
Anthony breaks down his simple 80/20 investing strategy, what he would do with his first $500, where to find extra money in your existing budget, and why waiting for the “perfect” time to enter the market could cost you years of growth. He also explains the order of accounts he would prioritize, how an emergency fund protects your investments, and how consistently investing just $107 a month could potentially grow into more than $250,000 over 30 years.
MENTIONED HERE
🚗Stop OverpayingFor Car Insurance: https://www.anthonyoneal.com/carinsur...
📈 Start Investing Today: https://www.anthonyoneal.com/invest
📖 Order "Stop Living Paycheck to Paycheck" (+$275 in free bonuses): https://www.anthonyoneal.com/book
Take the free Freedom Score™ assessment and find out exactly where you are: anthonyoneal.com/freedomscore
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
📘 STOP LIVING PAYCHECK TO PAYCHECK — OUT NOW
The Escape Plan, all 5 phases, in your hands.
Order + get Take Your Seat at the Table free: https://www.anthonyoneal.com/book
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
⏱️ IN THIS EPISODE
00:00 – Introduction: How Anthony would invest his first $500 using an 80/20 strategy
06:06 – Why you can apply the same investing formula even if you only have $25 or $100
11:15 – Why boring, low-cost index funds can become the foundation of long-term wealth
20:43 – How to find your first $500 without getting a raise or starting a side hustle
21:05 – Four everyday expenses that may be quietly eating up your investing money
30:40 – Why an all-time market high is not automatically a reason to wait
34:11 – Why an emergency fund gives you the ability to stay invested when markets fall
38:15 – The order Anthony recommends: 401(k) match → Roth IRA → brokerage account
40:01 – How $107 a month could potentially grow to roughly $252,000 over 30 years
42:39 – The 3 investing mistakes that can destroy a good strategy
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
🎁 FREE TOOLS & RESOURCES
Freedom Score™ Assessment → anthonyoneal.com/freedomscore
Budget + debt payoff templates → anthonyoneal.com/tools
Weekly email (money that actually works) → anthonyoneal.com/newsletter
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
🔵 THE FREEDOM CIRCLE™
Not another course. A financial operating system — weekly live coaching with me, monthly masterclasses, the roadmap, and a community that holds you to it.
Founding membership: https://www.anthonyoneal.com/freedomc...
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
🤝 TRUSTED PARTNERS
These are companies I've vetted and use language I'd use with my own family. Some links are affiliate links — see disclosure below:
High-Yield Savings Account → https://www.anthonyoneal.com/savings
Investing → https://www.anthonyoneal.com/invest
Term Life Insurance → https://www.anthonyoneal.com/lifeinsu...
Car Insurance → https://www.anthonyoneal.com/carinsur...
Raise Your Credit Score → https://www.anthonyoneal.com/kikoff
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
🎤 BOOK ANTHONY TO SPEAK
Churches, universities, credit unions, conferences, and corporate events.
Speaking kit + availability: https://www.anthonyoneal.com/contact
📈 SPONSOR THE SHOW
Reach a high-intent audience of people actively fixing their money.
Media kit + rates: partner@anthonyoneal.com
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
📲 CONNECT WITH ANTHONY
Website → https://www.anthonyoneal.com
Instagram → Instagram: anthonyoneal
TikTok → TikTok: anthonyoneal
X → x.com/anthonyoneal
LinkedIn → linkedin.com/in/anthonyoneal
Facebook → facebook.com/anthonyoneal
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
👋 ABOUT ANTHONY
Anthony O'Neal is a two-time national bestselling author, financial educator, and generational wealth architect who has spent more than a decade helping people get out of debt and build wealth that outlives them. He is an adjunct professor of Consumer Economics at Virginia Union University and a doctoral candidate in Finance and Investing. Through The Table, his books, and The Freedom Circle™, he's on a mission to eliminate $1 billion in consumer debt and build $500 million in wealth by 2053.
Faith supports the work — it doesn't replace it. Debt is the enemy, never the person.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
AFFILIATE DISCLOSURE
Some links above are affiliate links. If you use them, I may earn a commission at no additional cost to you. I only partner with companies I believe in, and a commission never changes what I recommend or what I say on this show.
DISCLAIMER
This content is for educational and informational purposes only and is not financial, investment, tax, legal, or insurance advice. Anthony O'Neal is not a licensed financial advisor, attorney, or tax professional, and no fiduciary relationship is created by watching this content. Your situation is unique — consult a qualified professional before making financial decisions. Results discussed are not guarantees.
#AnthonyONeal #TheTable #MoneyThatWorks
🚗Stop OverpayingFor Car Insurance: https://www.anthonyoneal.com/carinsurance
📈 Start Investing Today: https://www.anthonyoneal.com/invest
📖 Order "Stop Living Paycheck to Paycheck" (+$275 in free bonuses): https://www.anthonyoneal.com/book