More than likely 15k may not be enough to fully latch on but giving thought to the ROI on the cups of coffee out there these days it is food for thought.... perhaps on a smaller scale.
Spending is not investing. We invest a regular chunk of our income. We live on a budget and money to invest is a regular part of our budget. We also keep a fixed amount of ready cash, we call it the "special fund," in a savings account for expenses you don't really plan ahead for, like a new water heater, a new computer, or brakes on the car. Then we replenish that fund. My husband controls our spending, but I can spend whatever I need to on groceries and clothes for the girls and myself. But I'm pretty frugal and he has never questioned me about it.
No idea what happened. On another note my house still isn't rented and it's almost the first. If you're going to get into rental properties make sure you got 2 to 3 months of rent on standby!
from what I've heard house flipping is even riskier I'm still thinking about buying another house and then turning it into a rental. Just have to make sure I have ample stores of cash and to treat it as a long term investment. Not short term money maker
The actual highest guaranteed return on investment is .025% or whatever you get in the savings account at the bank, as you probable know nothing beyond that is guaranteed. I like mutual funds because they are diverse so if one stock in the fund fails the others balance it out. Also most good mutual funds are professionally managed so bad stocks get traded out for better ones. That is where I invest my money and I am pumped with the return I have right now.
Aren't CD or Government bonds more safe, guaranteed and higher than savings? Also not trying to stir anything as mutual funds are good. But I've read several articles where the brokers not only make the bulk of the money, but when they trade it's for them self, not for the consumer interest. I forget how it works out so that the customer pays the price while the broker reaps the benefits. Either way it doesn't totally discount the other benefits of mutual funds.
Mutual funds are not all the same. You can put your money in funds that concentrate on different types of investment, and also with different levels of risk. The advantage is that any risk is spread over a number of different investments, so if one does not do well, it's balanced against others that are doing well. There is plenty of literature out there that analyzes different funds and their returns over time. Some have a consistently higher rate of return than others.
A fine point of clarification perhaps, but. CDs are generally higher yield than savings, but have a time horizon before you can access them without penalty, the longer the horizon the higher the yield. If you know you have a fixed peeps of time before needing the $, perhaps worth looking at. Government/municipal bonds, generally are low risk, again generally with fairly long maturities. They are not guaranteed...per se, but are generally backed by the 'faith and credit' of these bodies, increasingly both are on the slide e.g. Detroit, several cities in California, et al. Google articles about Meredith Whitney and you'll find a lot written on municipal defaults. Sorry if I missed it earlier, did the OP, state how long they were willing to lock up their $?
Additionally the different no load/fund classes have different fee and commission structures, very much worth looking into depending on the investing time horizon.
You're absolutely right. I became a joint owner of a number of investments the day after we married. I knew nothing about that stuff up until then. But in the past seven years, I have learned a lot. It's absolutely a requirement that you educate yourself about investing before you jump in.
