How $500 a Month in Vanguard ETFs Might Let You Be Awkward at a Beach House Someday

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When I was eleven, my mother gave me what she called “the soup folder”—a faded manila thing stuffed with coupons and recipes for varieties of bean soup. “Here,” she said, “if you can master this, you’ll never starve.” She had an unerring sense of what actually worried me, which was mostly that my siblings would abandon me at the mall food court with nothing but four dollars and a gnawing fear of bankruptcy. Little did I know, her wisdom extended beyond the culinary. Investing, I’ve since learned, is also just a matter of the right ingredients. You don’t chop onions—just budgets and dreams.

The basic stock market stew starts with capital (money you’d actually miss if lost), time (the suspense), and an asset sturdy enough to withstand the weekly news cycle. My recipe du jour relies on that most forgiving culinary tool: the ETF. Specifically, Vanguard’s—because I’ve noticed, at family gatherings, the people who bring up Vanguard the most tend to have working dishwashers and fewer visible stress rashes.

This is the tale of three such Vanguard ETFs, handy vessels I’m wholly convinced could, through the magic of automatic contributions and a small dose of denial, transform a mere $500 monthly into one million dollars. I don’t promise wild success, but you might achieve a level of mediocrity respectable enough to outshine your cousins at Thanksgiving.

1. Vanguard S&P 500 ETF: Where Mediocrity Is the Benchmark

Let’s start with Vanguard S&P 500 ETF (VOO). If there’s a more mainstream approach to investing, you’ll find it on a motivational calendar next to a cat hanging from a tree limb: stay the course, hang in there, and so on. VOO tracks the S&P 500. That’s 500 of the country’s biggest companies, none of whom will answer your emails about a coupon gone missing.

Historically, the S&P 500 has delivered something in the neighborhood of a 10% average annual return—which sounds suspiciously like the sort of promise my older brother made while holding my piggy bank: “You’ll get it back, with interest.” Mathematically, and with the help of a calculator designed for those with deep trust issues, that means your $500 a month grows to nearly $1.09 million in thirty years. Stretch it another decade (if eating bulk oatmeal hasn’t eroded your will to live), you’re north of $2.9 million. This assumes you’ve tucked your investments away in an IRA, forgotten the password, and not withdrawn funds to buy an ergonomic desk chair.

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Worth noting, VOO itself isn’t old enough to vote—it was launched in 2010. Still, since birth, it has offered up a remarkable 13.6% annualized return. Were you lucky (in the way that only your friend Mark, with his rent-controlled apartment and suspiciously youthful hair, is lucky) to catch this rate, the math says you’d break a million in 24 years, with $2.2 million at year 30. Of course, nothing gold can stay—not your return rate, not your patience, not your ability to decipher fund prospectuses without developing a rash.

The secret sauce? The S&P 500 is always culling its laggards and slotting in new darlings. It is, in this way, much like my father’s approach to family photos.

2. Vanguard S&P 500 Growth ETF: The “I Saw This Coming” Option

Here’s where we veer into slightly more ambitious terrain. The Vanguard S&P 500 Growth ETF (VOOG) is the realm of people who mistake their above-average Netflix queue for prescient market foresight. VOOG grabs only the growth stocks in the S&P 500—212 of them, compared to VOO’s more generous 500+ roster (numbers padded, of course, by companies who can’t decide what kind of stock they want to be when they grow up).

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Since 2010, VOOG has posted an eye-catching 16.4% annual return. For the incurably hopeful, $500 per month grows to just over $4 million in three decades—riches on par with having once bought original Beanie Babies, and actually kept them. You’re a millionaire by year 22, though that future assumes you’ve chosen ETFs over therapy in managing your compulsive need for certainty.

Will VOOG’s performance continue in a world increasingly run by very smart teenagers and supply chain algorithms? Maybe not. But for those who start early, or at least earlier than I started moisturizing, there’s a real chance at a seven-figure retirement account—and enough smugness to ruin group dinners.

3. Vanguard Russell 1000 Growth ETF: Because Mo’ Stocks, Mo’ Problems

Now, let’s zoom out yet again, as only those convinced of their own penchant for “thinking big” will. Instead of the 500, why not the largest 1,000 public companies in America? Enter the Vanguard Russell 1000 Growth ETF (VONG), the ETF for people who see no harm in ordering “just another appetizer” out of both curiosity and boredom.

VONG samples the Russell 1000 index’s growthiest stocks—currently a svelte portfolio of 387, because even ETFs experience scope creep. Since its 2010 debut, VONG wins the Vanguard beauty contest, not that the others are sore losers. With a 16.9% average annual return, it’s racked up gains impressive enough that, at $500 per month, you’d clear a million in less than 21 years. Come year 30, we’re talking nearly $4.5 million, or enough to soften the sting of not being invited to your high school reunion.

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Will this performance persist? The world’s financial future is about as predictable as my father’s opinions on oat milk. But VONG, like good soup and my mother’s optimism, stands a solid chance of transforming modest effort into something that, after decades, looks suspiciously like success.

To summarize (as much for you as for my future self, who will have forgotten the password to every account): Pick your index, automate your deposits, and prepare to someday sit quietly at a beach house, the proud owner of a casually discussed million dollars, still worrying—of course—about what happens if the dishwasher breaks down. 🏖️

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2025-07-27 14:12