My new year's resolution is to help my daughter become a millionaire for about $2.50 each week.

How, you might ask?

I am going to open an investment account for her. I’m not talking about an education savings account—that’s a given. I want to open a brokerage account for my daughter and begin investing in the broader market.

My daughter will have a financial advisor (me) and a brokerage account at age three. I’m ashamed I didn’t start earlier because, as it turns out, I’m an actual financial advisor and I should have known better.

Now, here’s how my daughter is going to become a millionaire. It’s this magical tool called compound interest. The longer your money is in the market, the greater your chance for exponential growth.

So, exactly how much could my daughter have in her brokerage account at different stages in her life?

To help me figure that out, I began to wonder what would have happened if my parents had started investing for me the day I was born: August 2, 1980.

Now I’m not talking about anything crazy.

My assumptions are these. My parents opened an account with $100 when I was born and then invested $10 a month in the S&P 500 (and reinvested the dividends) until I started college; then, they cut me off.

No more free ride for me.

Up to that point, they would have invested about $2,400 and the account would have had a value of $18,158 when I went to college. Not a bad return. You can play with your own numbers here.

But then, let’s assume I’m a slacker and I forgot about the account and I never invested another penny. I forgot I had the account, but I continued reinvesting the dividends.

When I went to retire at age 67, I remembered my parents had invested this money and so I finally found the statements that had been stacking in the back of my closet and opened one up.

Here’s what I might discover: if the market’s compound annualized growth rate performed as it had from 1960 to December 2019, that small amount would now be worth $2,078,771.33.

That’s mindblowing and and it’s also the power of compound interest.

If you haven’t set up an investment account for your kid, you should do it now. There are some regulatory intricacies to doing so, but your financial advisor can help you figure it out. Also, I recommend setting up your investments on autopilot and also making sure your advisor has access to fractional shares.

Oh, by the way, had they waited until I was three (like I’m doing with Eloise) I would have had nearly $300,000.00 less at retirement. So you really should start now and also, please don’t tell Eloise that my slacking cost her $300,000.

I should add, past performance is no guarantee of future performance and this is not investment advice.

Kevin Lum is a financial advisor and the CEO of Foundry Financial with offices in Los Angeles and Washington, DC. He is passionate about impact investing, good coffee and his daughter, Eloise. You can follow him on Instagram.