"The time to invest is NOW."

Best-selling financial author Dr. Ric Edelman, chairman and CEO of Edelman Financial Services, host of the nationally syndicated Ric Edelman radio show, acclaimed financial advisor and, oh yeah, a Rowan alumnus who donated (with his wife Jean) $1 million to help build the University's planetarium, offered plain-spoken investment advice to several hundred listeners in the Eynon Ballroom March 24.

Edelman's upbeat advice, geared mostly to the dozens of Rowan undergraduates attending, was this: Invest in the stock market. Invest now. You may never have a better opportunity for investing again.

The market, which hit an all-time high of 14,000 in July 2007, lost half its value in the ongoing recession and that makes the purchase of stocks now, before the market rebounds, cheap, Edelman said.

The 1980 Glassboro State College graduate said his eponymous financial firm invests billions of dollars for thousands of individuals and families and that it's entirely possible for students to set aside and invest as little as $3 per day – the price of a cup of Starbucks coffee – and have $1 million in retirement savings by the time they're 65.

"It all comes down to the power of compound interest," Edelman said. "Interest earning interest on interest is the key to getting rich in America. You get a job, you invest a little, and you leave it alone. And the sooner you start, the richer you're going to get."

His address, sponsored by the Rohrer College of Business Financial Management Association, came in the midst of a dogged global recession that, in the third week of March, was showing signs of easing.

Edelman warned that inflation in America runs, on average, 3.2% per year and that with bank interest on savings paying 2.5% or less, putting all of one's money in banks is tantamount to "going broke safely."

He said despite the daily ups and downs of the stock market, it has consistently produced long-term returns for investors averaging 10 percent or better since 1926.

"Jobs produce current income but they do not produce wealth," he said. "To build wealth you take some of what you earn and you invest it in the stock market."

The 2004 inductee into the Financial Advisor Hall of Fame has been ranked among the top 100 advisers in the U.S. five times by Barron's , a weekly investment publication of The Wall Street Journal.

A #1 New York Times best-selling author, his seven books on personal finance include: The Truth About Money; Ordinary People, Extraordinary Wealth; The New Rules of Money; Discover the Wealth Within You; What You Need to Do Now; The Lies About Money; and Rescue Your Money.

Edelman suggested that believing in Social Security to take care of all Americans in retirement is akin to believing in ghosts and that the only thing most people can truly put stock in (besides the stock market) is themselves.

The key, he said, is to invest broadly and consistently, from about age 20 onward.

Edelman said those "older" investors in their 30s, 40s, 50s and beyond could still enjoy golden retirement years but the longer they wait, the steeper the climb.

"Fifty year olds need to save and invest $80 a day to have $1 million by age 65," he said.

Like everything else, the time to buy stocks is when they're on sale and they're on sale now, he said.

"Buying low, selling high, is the way to building wealth," he said.

In addition to dispensing more than an hour of free financial advice, Edelman signed free copies of his book, The Truth About Money, and chatted briefly with students, faculty and staff after his lecture.

Ryan Martin, 21, a senior accounting and finance major from Middletown, said Edelman's talk was reassuring.

"I was never nervous about my future but I came to educate myself further," he said. "It was enlightening."