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  • AJCII

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    photo?
    Eudaimonia

DIY Investing

Purpose:
To understand the drawbacks of using 'advisors'
To gain knowledge about proper investing principles
To provide helpful links
To discuss our portfolios
To help people realize that CAN do it themselves
To pat ourselves on the back for taking responsibility for our financial future!!

Latest group announcement

Stuff

This is just an ongoing collection of stuff I have found that might be helpful to someone.

AMT (tax) stuff:
IRS worksheet:
view link

About stock options and the AMT:
view link

General article:
view link

To be continued eventually....

photo
about 1 year ago

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I'm Back

Hello everyone I thought i would leave a quick note to let all of you know I'm back on line. Holley and i are now living in West Chester Pa. were I'm teaching a a full professor at West Chester University. Holley's green thumb has really gotten greener this year.
photo of AJCII

liquidity!

Been into my own advice since I started and cringe when I see what my unions "Financial advisors" return on the pensions millions. My own investments started conservative and have stayed that way(with occasional cheap shots at distressed companies). I look forward to input from other perspectives if not what to do then what not to do. Thanx Joel
photo of tangoaddict
2 replies - last reply

What to do

Hello,

I am a novice with portfolios, and I do have a professional manager whose integrity I do trust. As soon as I can get my work life more in balance, I will spend more time learning and monitoring my small nest egg together with my advisor.

I understand that no one has a crystal ball, but I wonder about the intermediate? term outlook especially for the domestic market. Again, I don't really grasp economics well, but I wonder about the structural problems in the U.S. with so much debt, etc.

I just turned 65 (and there are some benefits), and although I don't intend to withdraw funds from my portfolio for maybe 8-10 years at least, if my portfolio crashes as it did in the 2001-2002? market, I don't know that I would I would have enough time to recover more than my original capital investment level. So what's the point...I don't know whether forecasters or technical analysis methods tend to forecase such a looming crash in the near future.

My current portfolio is:

Equitites-Mutual Funds, ETF,
Columbia Fund Series Trust Mid Cap Value Fund Class B 13.7%
Growth Fund America Inc, Class B 14.5%
Rydex Trust S&P 50 Pure Value 12.9%
Rydex ETF Trust S&P Midcap 400 Pure VAlue 15.8%
Capital Income Builder Fd, Class B 25.0%
Thornburg Invest Trust Invt Inc Builder Cl A 14.9%
Henderson Euro Focus
EFT Global Div Achievers--mainly European
Kensington Inter'l Real Estate - global
Stock
Alianz SE sponsorsed - stock

What are other peoples' approaches as to when they think the market might take a major correction???

Thanks,

Sue
photo of enodeus
5 replies - last reply

What to do

Hello,

I am a novice with portfolios, and I do have a professional manager whose integrity I do trust. As soon as I can get my work life more in balance, I will spend more time learning and monitoring my small nest egg together with my advisor.

I understand that no one has a crystal ball, but I wonder about the intermediate? term outlook especially for the domestic market. Again, I don't really grasp economics well, but I wonder about the structural problems in the U.S. with so much debt, etc.

I just turned 65 (and there are some benefits), and although I don't intend to withdraw funds from my portfolio for maybe 8-10 years at least, if my portfolio crashes as it did in the 2001-2002? market, I don't know that I would I would have enough time to recover more than my original capital investment level. So what's the point...I don't know whether forecasters or technical analysis methods tend to forecase such a looming crash in the near future.

My current portfolio is:

Equitites-Mutual Funds, ETF,
Columbia Fund Series Trust Mid Cap Value Fund Class B 13.7%
Growth Fund America Inc, Class B 14.5%
Rydex Trust S&P 50 Pure Value 12.9%
Rydex ETF Trust S&P Midcap 400 Pure VAlue 15.8%
Capital Income Builder Fd, Class B 25.0%
Thornburg Invest Trust Invt Inc Builder Cl A 14.9%
Henderson Euro Focus
EFT Global Div Achievers--mainly European
Kensington Inter'l Real Estate - global
Stock
Alianz SE sponsorsed - stock

What are other peoples' approaches as to when they think the market might take a major correction???

Thanks,

Sue
photo of enodeus

2008 tax breaks

I just read that people in the 10% or 15% bracket there will no tax on long term capital gains or qualified dividends starting this year till 2010 sounds good to me. I wondering what a change in the administration will have on stocks and mutual funds.

photo of philea25
1 reply - last reply

Portfolios

You guys are providing some great posts. Thank you!!

I'm interested to see how other people set up their portfolio. This should have been easy for me but I got caught in analysis paralysis. Then I read the adage "The worst enemy of a good plan is a great plan", and it was easy after that.

Here's mine (all Vanguard, except for 1 international fund):

Bonds - 35%
High Yield Corporate 5%
GNMA 10%
Total Bond Index: 10%
Inflation Protected Securities 10%

Domestic Stock Funds: 50%
Large US stocks
Health care specialty 5%
Windsor II 10%
Total Stock Market Index 20%
Mid/small US Stocks
REIT index 5%
Vanguard Total Stock Market 10%

International Stock Funds: 20%
Total Int'l Stock index: 5%
International Explorer 5%
Emerging Markets: 5%
Tweedy Browne Global Value: 5%

(I need to unemotionally rebalance some $ back into bonds, I'm down to a 27% allocation. )

If anyone is interested, I have a wonderful series of 4 articles by Jonathan Clements on how to set up a good (not perfect) portfolio that I can send you. I can't find it on the web.

photo of Eudaimonia
4 replies - last reply

Gold as inflation hedge

Hello everyone. I hope everybody enjoyed their holidays.

Been thinking about adding a small amount of gold stocks to my portfolio as a small hedge against inflation should it rear its ugly head. So far the Fed seems to have been making good progress balancing its anti-inflation efforts with those promoting overall economic growth. I am, at this point, fairly well diversified but am always wary of inflationary pressures (remember the nightmare of the 70's?).

Any suggestions or thoughts about gold in this role and potential equities to invest in?

JM

photo of JamesMorrison
6 replies - last reply

ETF's over Mutual funds?

Hi everyone. I just wanted to get people's opinions on ETF's (or Ishares). Exchange traded funds work somewhat like mutual funds except 1) they aren't managed and 2) they are much much much cheaper and 3) you can trade them like stocks. I have a couple of mutual funds in my IRA and to be honest I'm not putting anymore money in them as I'm sick of paying loads and fees to a) the fund and b) the broker. I've held some ETF's for a while now and they seem to perform wonderfully. ETF's basically form indexes of different, sectors, regions, metals, mining, etc etc etc I love them. Anyone got any thoughts or concerns?

photo of hlancaster
5 replies - last reply

DIY its your money

I needed something to get involved in after my husband died. I went to morningstar.com and entered the classes,free, to increase my knowledge of different places to put money and how the market works. It was great. Takes work and pays off.

photo of philea25
4 replies - last reply

DIY

I'm all for it once you know what you're doing. Lets face it...there are tricks to every trade and yes...even stock trades.

I have found that no matter how educated he/she may be, its impossible to know everything about every subject.

To invest wisley in any enterprise one should know as much as possible about the subject. Therefore I recommend the CD "Principles of Technical Analysis and Chart reading in Trading Stocks", produced by an Investment Advisor with over 30 years experience in trading stocks on Wall Street.

If you have this experience then you don't need the CD. If not, you'll be investing and trading blind...a sure way to loose your shirt.

You can get more information on this subject at view link

photo of adavidcol