"Buy low, sell high. Most people do the opposite."
Needless-to-say-but-I'll-say-it-anyway: Don't put
all your money anywhere.
Spread-it-around.
Read "The Only Investment Guide You'll Ever Need," by Andrew Tobias (or at least read the Chapter 1 at
http://www.amazon.com/Only-Investme...bs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1215948453&sr=8-1).
He's updated it since it gave me a-whack-on-the-side-of-the-head when I was a 20-something Pro Personality with a pocketful of nightclub money ("...frequently compensated for their appearances"). I met him years later in Washington, and chuckled that I had a-cellar-full-of detergent. He said "Me too! And I've also got a washer and dryer down there."
Smartest investment you can possibly make: pay off credit cards.
And when you read Tobias' mathematical rationale for loading-up-whenever-you-see-a-SCREAMING-deal-on, for instance, laundry detergent, you'll head for Sam's.
REAL smart, accomplished, RICH people-I-have-worked-for and who-have-worked-for-me all said three things:
1. Money-in-the-bank is slowly "rotting."
Savings account interest (i.e., ING) earns less than your money's losing sitting there.
Yes, HAVE a crash fund. Do use a money market fund.
Just don't make THE BANK rich at YOUR expense.
2. "Buy low, sell high. Most people do the opposite."
When was it ever scarier than 9/11/01?
CNBC's Jim Cramer got STINKIN' rich buying stock the-very-day the markets opened thereafter.
I doubled my money in Cisco and Intel then, and I'm kicking myself I didn't buy more.
It was such an obvious low point.
I bought real estate, in RI and Texas, in THREE down markets.
Think RI-in-2008 is scary? You should've seen Houston in '88.
I bought a nice-enough 3-bedroom house there in THAT recession for $39K.
'Never saw it again. Rented it out for 10 years then sold it.
But with the exception of atypical Block Island, I never held real estate for less than 10 years.
No, Citadel stock won't be @ $5 by Thursday.
3. Don't try to peg low or high points. "The trend is your friend."
Thus real estate, which may-NOT-have-bottomed-out-yet, is a SCREAMING deal right now.
Fortunes will be made by people -- shopping CAREFULLY -- who buy NOW, and can hold for as-long-as a dozen years.
(Read the CLASSIC "Nothing Down" by Robert Allen, also recently updated.)
(
http://www.amazon.com/Nothing-Down-...bs_sr_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1215948863&sr=1-2)
(His more-recent "Multiple Streams of Income" is also thought-provoking; but "Nothing Down" is a dang ROAD MAP to wealth.)
An ex-boss of mine is QUITE familiar with Las Vegas commerce, and real estate, which RIGHT NOW is on fire sale.
There will be a housing SHORTAGE there in a few years.
But now, houses and condos sit empty there.
But DO NOTHING before you pay-off those credit cards.
OK do ONE thing.
See today's deal @
www.woot.com (if it's not sold-out by the time you read this).
$39.99 well-spent.
I've got one and it's pretty cool...
