Category Archives: How To Invest
4 Financial Markets to Look For When Investing – Lesson #7
When beginning to analyze the market for where you want to focus your investments, it’s important to understand the different financial markets.
Diversification is key to a strong portfolio and it begins with the Top-Down formula which has Markets as the main first step.
4 Financial Markets to Understand, Dissect and Invest In
1. Sector Funds – most stocks will be found in [...]
Lesson # 6 – Investing Plan for Buying Stocks
Planning can be broken down into parts to help figure out exactly how to begin the stock buying process.
6 Rules of Preparation for Buying Stocks
1. Objective – before buying into a company or purchasing an ETF consider your objectives. How much are you willing to pay. How much do you want to sell for or to stay until you feel [...]
Why Financial Planning Formulas Suck!
As the lessons for investing and planning my financial future progress, I am constantly amazed that the ‘experts’ push all these formulas that must be used for bettering my financial goals.
No offense experts – but let’s get real!
Rule of 72
Let’s take any number and apply the formula.
The way the formula works is like this – 72 divided by any % [...]
Lesson #5 What are Bonds
What is a bond?
Bonds are considered to be the less risky of the two choices: Stocks and Bonds.
However, understanding exactly how bonds work is an interesting concept. Unlike stocks which you buy into the company, with a bond you actually are lending the money – you are the bank!
3 Types of Bonds:
1. Corporate bonds – this is when businesses and [...]
Lesson #4 – Brief Intro on Stocks
What is a Stock?
The easiest answer to this is a piece of the company’s ownership. It can be teeny tiny part or relatively big depending on your investment criteria.
For instance, you’ve always wanted to own a McDonald’s store, but can’t afford to get the real deal. You certainly can afford to buy 10, 100, 1000 shares. You might not be doing [...]
Lesson #3 Common Financial and Investing Mistakes Made by Investors
Avoiding mistakes is an art that we all wish we can master. But with all things in life, we have to experience or at least be extremely aware of the mistakes that are common and can/will be made when starting out something new and even if we’re pros.
What are the most common Financial, Investing Mistakes to Avoid:
Diversification- or lack of [...]
Lesson #2 Budgeting for Investing!
This is a biggie. Not everyone can send in $1000-$5000 a month to their brokerage firms. I certainly know I can’t do that!
But it is important to figure out what you can invest and how often:
Are you starting out with a lump sum? From my experience, this seems to be the way most investors start out. It can either be [...]
Lesson #1 – Find your Financial Goals
This is a really tough start. I mean, I’m sure we all know what we want as far as our financial goals :
Get the greatest return on our money!
But that’s sooo much easier said than done.
This is the first lesson of Investools, and in some ways I don’t totally agree with it.
Defining your Financial Goals
How many years until you reach [...]
Confession Time – Switching Brokers and Starting to Invest
In the past few weeks I’ve had an interesting turn of events.
My girlfriend, who has been with Ameritrade for years, was in negotiations with them. I’ve been using Scottrade for over seven years and have been trying to convince her to switch over due to the $7 a trade price which is way better than Ameritrade’s $9.99. Instead the tables [...]
