patrick.net

With all the headwinds we are facing in this country, I am timid of doing anything long term, especially those investment vehicles that are dependent on trusting that the government and those companies won't render all your gains and then some, worthless

My advice would be educate yourself, we are all different and should have different paths to get to our different goals. I remember reading Millionaire Next Door as a child, and thought it rather simple and uninspiring. I also think Taleb spoke poorly of that book in Fooled By Randomness

I'm a gambler, and prefer short term strikes. That being said, I applied to have my trading acct approved for options last week. I plan to risk some scratch on betting against WFC. The puts seem pricy (maybe I'm still confused as to how they work), but I intend to buy some July 31/30/29 WFC puts this week,,,,,

Get your own brokerage account, but take it easy until you learn the ropes. I have three investment vehicles, a pension, a 401k, and social security, I have just about zero faith that any of those will be there for me later but I still put money in them.

For the last few years I've been educating myself regarding investing in physical silver and gold, making smaller buys, purchasing quietly through private sellers.

At 42 myself, and single, RE purchase makes little sense to me any longer. When I'm 55 I'll move into a government subsidized retirement community.

Sure RE investment is great, subsidized/propped up by the government, banks, and the backs of your fellow Americans, you really can't lose on that either.

everything says

I have three investment vehicles, a pension, a 401k, and social security, I have just about zero faith that any of those will be there for me later but I still put money in them.

uhh... you have no choice but to put money in pension & social.

Yes I do. I could quit my job.

everything says

Yes I do. I could quit my job.

that's not a choice... is it?

clambo, some of your generalizations about relations between the sexes.

B.A.C.A.H. says

bg, i did not assume you were a man.

I didn't think you were assuming that.

I am back on this thread reviewing everyone's suggestions. Continuing to try to learn how to fish.

Read the posts at Bogelheads website and read their wiki pages. They suggest you invest in three index funds at Vanguard with low costs and adjust your asset allocation as needed (you can tweak as needed or add extras, but that's basically it.) Since no one can predict stocks, it's the easiest, safest and lowest cost way to invest. And you do it yourself!

http://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Main_Page

cool resource, thanks !

Read zerohedge.com

There are no easy answers in this completely rigged market/economy but the fundamentals for precious metals are solid for the long term.

Actually, guns, ammo and canned food are deserving of a few thousand of your worthless BERNANKBUX.

And FFS please don't listen to these guys that are leveraged 30:1 in real estate. You're going to get burned doing that.

Facebooksux says

Actually, guns, ammo and canned food are deserving of a few thousand of your worthless BERNANKBUX.

How goddamn depressing. It's fucking 1953 again.

zerohedge.com is good. Big agriculture, energy, miners/precious metals or healthcare stocks are more conservative, safer bets (although I don't trade them much). If they pay a dividend even better. Don't leverage or go on margin, I'd avoid housing, unless you can pair up with e-man ;) Maybe invest part into foreign currencies as well (pretty much anything is more attractive than the USD now). It's best to educate yourself first and find out what your preferences and accepted levels of risk are. Don't listen to others (not even me), find your own niche/mix of securities you'd like to gamble in.

The Zurich Axioms is by far the best personal finance book I have ever read:

http://www.amazon.com/The-Zurich-Axioms-M-Gunther/dp/1897597495/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1358317688&sr=8-1&keywords=zurich+axioms

Even if you only want to invest conservatively it is very useful to read books on trading. "Investment" is a form of diluted, low frequency speculation.

I suggest

The Art of Speculation by Philip L. Carret
The Story of a Speculator by Arthur W. Cutton

These are time-proven classics. But the meaning of wealth has never changed.

This one is also pretty good:

http://www.amazon.com/Battle-Investment-Survival-G-Loeb/dp/157898887X

Most great finance books were written in the 1930's.

If you want something more contemporary, you should definitely read

The Alchemy of Finance by George Soros

One of my observations is that the market tend to transfer wealth from the mass to the few. I think it is not unreasonable to assume that common sense is your worst enemy in the world of investment.

bg says

When I thought I was going to maybe try to buy a house, I stopped funding my Roth.

I'm not sure about this, but I think you can withdraw any funds that you have deposited into a Roth IRA at any time without penalty or taxes. You can't withdraw earnings, but you can withdraw the contributions. With this in mind I have opted to fully fund my Roth even though I had plans to buy a house -- the logic is that the Roth contribution limit is something you can't get back, so use it while you have it, and if you decide later you need the money you can get it back, and if not you will have the advantage of it being in the Roth. There are multiple advantages of being in an IRA.

For example, you can withdraw funds from an IRA as part of a "rollover" transaction, and you have some amount of time (30 days? 45 days?) to roll them back into an IRA (I think even the same one) without penalty..so, say you have some other source of downpayment $ (a loan from parents, for example) that otherwise wouldn't be good with the bank, you can use the IRA, close the deal, get the loan and pay back the IRA...not losing your contribution base.

You also (probably) have the option of rolling your IRA into your 401K, and then getting a 401K loan to fund the down payment of the house. There are restrictions, but you basically get to borrow money from yourself -- the interest goes back to you, and into your 401K...and over time you pay the principal back in and again don't lose the contribution base...

Also I think funds in an IRA have some protection against bankruptcy and maybe law suits, etc...

Something to consider.

http://www.youtube.com/embed/QzE76nUSjL8

Be aware of these simple, real price histories.
http://patrick.net/?p=1219038
VERY instructive, surely.
I would claim that it is COMPELLING that these histories are kept nearly never seen. So, I first conclude that the 'establishment' are conpersons FIRST.

ttsmyf says

Be aware of these simple, real price histories.

http://patrick.net/?p=1219038

VERY instructive, surely.

I would claim that it is COMPELLING that these histories are kept nearly never seen. So, I first conclude that the 'establishment' are conpersons FIRST.

@ ttsmfy: I looked at your thread a while back. I don't mean to be dense, but can you help me understand what I am looking at?

I see a curve for housing that looks like it has a similar shape as that of the stock market. Are you arguing that the stock market is in as much of a bubble as housing has been? Is your point that both are equally risky? I am not sure what you want me to conclude, but that it my stab at it.

@swebb Thanks. I had heard that before, but didn't act on it. This year, I have started funding my Roth.

@E-man: Most of what I have in my roth has been there a long time. I think it is probably good for me to go back to funding it. Even with the delay on withdrawals.

Hi bg,
Thanks for asking -- I don’t write as clear as I think I am! An initial question please -- this is the chart that got me started, is the content promptly clear to you, pretending that you hadn’t yet seen any other such of my pages?

Here’s my thinking ... People interested in something as a candidate long-term investment commonly examine its long-term past price history. This is soundly done after inflation-adjustment of US$ prices -- what I have done. For credibility of my charts, see the above URL for the WSJ chart, and this for the NYT chart:
http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2006/08/26/weekinreview/27leon_graph2.html

Long-term investors seek increasing prices, of course -- BUT the past is dominated by serial herd behaviors: “Real Homes, Real Dow” at http://www.showrealhist.com/RHandRD.html
Individuals’ experiences were overwhelmingly timing-dependent. People uninformed of these serial herd behaviors are people fooled. This fooling of the people is USA history to date.

Here I wrote
http://occupywallst.org/higher-education-panders-to-intellectual-savagery/
“The public be suckered” is both (1) this track record, and (2) keeping it unseen.
Obviously, these simple price histories are very instructive. Keeping them seldom seen by the people is intellectual savagery.

Basically, I show the past soundly, so that people can do their own thinking ... To me, these charts are very instructive at a glance; I figure that the ‘establishment’ strongly agrees with me -- and therefore nearly never shows them! I like saying that this status quo is ‘education’ as a four letter word.

See just below the first chart here
http://www.showrealhist.com/RD_RJShomes_PSav.html
for latest prices and extrapolated histories.

BTW, Robert Shiller published such inflation-adjusted price histories in book Irrational Exuberance: stocks, early 2000, 1st ed.; and homes, early 2005, 2nd ed. Both books best sellers; Shiller updates data at irrationalexuberance.com/
AND, the ‘establishment’ STILL continues with “The public be suckered”!

bg,
You wrote
I need to know what to do with the cash I am saving. I am not sure how to proceed.
Barclays (888)710-8756 has online savings account, 1%/yr, no minimum, FDIC insured, details convenient. Best safe choice I know of now.
As I believe: bond prices now, and stock prices now, are artificially plenty HIGH, due to Fed manipulating markets -- I avoid such.

Barclays (888)710-8756 has online savings account, 1%/yr, no minimum, FDIC insured, details convenient. Best safe choice I know of now.

If you are putting money in a 1%/yr account, you are losing money to inflation.

bg,
To hopefully aid your understanding of my figuring of indicated overpricings, please see section "Bubbles relative to GDP" near the bottom of
http://www.showrealhist.com/RD_RJShomes_PSav.html