{"id":1916,"date":"2021-02-27T14:46:57","date_gmt":"2021-02-27T22:46:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dadspersonalfinance.com\/?p=1916"},"modified":"2021-02-27T21:09:10","modified_gmt":"2021-02-28T05:09:10","slug":"investing-the-beginning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dadspersonalfinance.com\/investing-the-beginning\/","title":{"rendered":"Investing – the beginning"},"content":{"rendered":"
Photo by\u00a0Alexander Mils<\/a>\u00a0on\u00a0Unsplash.<\/a><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Investing will be discussed continually throughout the blog.\u00a0 I feel it is important to give you a taste at this point before we get too far down the road. \u00a0\u00a0Recall that investing is a simple formula just like losing weight.\u00a0 Losing weight is eat less and move more.\u00a0 Investing is all about making more money, spend less and invest the difference.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n If you are reading this, the assumption is that you are close or you already have your debt paid off.\u00a0 If you haven\u2019t created your budget and paid off your debt, then you should go back and complete those two tasks first.\u00a0 Then come back after your debt is under control.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The first thing that you must learn is that your house is not an investment.\u00a0 Too many times people will leave college and go out and buy a car and a house and think that they are setting themselves up for life.\u00a0 Well, there are a few issues with this thinking.\u00a0 The thought behind this is that we all know of stories where our parents or grandparents bought a house 30, 40 or 50 years ago and when they eventually sell their house or leave it to their heirs, there appears to be a windfall.\u00a0 This is a bit misleading and if you compared the funds spent on the house vs other investments, you will see that the gains are not all that great.\u00a0 We will go into the numbers in a later blog entry.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Today\u2019s lifestyle is much different than that of our ancestors.\u00a0 We tend not to live in houses for more than five years.\u00a0 It is difficult for appreciation to cover the closing costs of the buy and sell in such a short period of time.\u00a0 Especially if you consider that interest rates are low.\u00a0 Also, should you lose your job and cannot make the payments, the house does not put money in your pocket.\u00a0 True assets bring a regular return on investment.\u00a0 Also, consider the fact that if you do not pay your property taxes then you will lose your house.\u00a0 So do you really even own your house?<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The very first investment people come up against is the 401K.\u00a0 Most W2 jobs at this point have some type of 401K. When I say W2 job, this is just another way of saying that your work for someone else.\u00a0 \u00a0If you are self-employed then you can open up a solo 401K, SEP IRA, or ROTH IRA.\u00a0 This can be a great way to go as you will obtain help with the growth of your account by compound interest on the tax deferred portion of your salary that remains within your account.\u00a0 A good rule of thumb is that you should at least invest enough into the 401K to obtain any matching that your company provides.\u00a0 \u00a0Of course matching doesn\u2019t apply to the self-employed.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n If you are not investing elsewhere then you should start with your company\u2019s 401K.\u00a0 If you are investing elsewhere then you should run an investment comparison study to determine which investment entities bring you the best ROI (return on investment).\u00a0 You may even determine that you can invest in both your personal investment and the 401K.\u00a0 Run the numbers.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n