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Like I said no one ever lost a penny in a 50/50 mix over any 10 or 20 year period
should be your sig line if that was allowed here
I got a load of them ....there is just so much In myth and old wives tales that just get perpetuated over and over from misinformed people to misinformed people and it just gets parroted over and over ..
Most experienced investors know better but the problem is newbies and those on the fence hear this stuff and the same misinformation can make them have poor decions.
I prefer some will find a way while others just find an excuse as my tag line
The problem is you ran on myth and misinformation from day 1 ...because everything you listed as an objection and including your reference to gambling is false ....
There is a big difference between just market volatility and market risk .
The natural cycling of broad markets and funds is only volatility ...market risk comes from betting on individual companies or using long term money to meet short term obligations ....or trying to time the ins and outs ..
Like I said no one ever lost a penny in a 50/50 mix over any 10 or 20 year period.
We had 120 30 year rolling cycles for Retirement time frames ...with a 50/50 and a 4% draw you ended with more than you started 90% of them , 30 years later ...
Not having money to invest because you have little savings is a personal issue , not a market problem .
so in your case simply just saying you never had money to invest suffices ...but when you start with all these excuses about markets falling and gambling and all the other malarkey you try to convince either us or yourself with is just a lot of bologna.....
Markets have grown lots of money over typical accumulation and retirement stages for many of us ....
Because you can’t accomplish something yourself does not mean there is anything inherently wrong with what it is you can’t accomplish doing ,that is just mental masturbation.
This is In no way chastising you ...we get it , you had a hard time saving based on the career path you picked ....but I am saying what you try to hand us as reasons for not being invested don’t pass the smell test and the results most of us get from our 401ks and iras when we don’t exhibit poor investor behavior says long term investing works well
Which all affirms my point that I made in this thread. It's about the income. If I lose my income then at some point I would have to draw from the investments. I don't make enough to build up these intermediate buffers between job loss and drawing down from a depressed investment account to pay the mortgage. At least not as quickly. What you guys could do in 3 years, it will take me 9.
This board is filled with engineers, people from the tech industry and the like who make something like double or more household median income, but they seem to either not realize or acknowledge that they are top 10%ers. The kind of people who, if they tighten their belts, can max out their 401k limits easily. To save 20k a year I would have to live on ramen. Which, as I've said before on here, I actually tried to do for a couple years and it nearly cost me my marriage.
I'm much more representative of average, although even with me, relative to most teachers I'm actually better off & the fact I have any money to invest is proof of that. Most of my peers have only just paid off their student loans or are still paying. Few of them have free & clear cars, while we paid cash for our cars and save/invest what would typically go toward a car payment. Based on my discussion with the car salesman, that puts me in the top 1/6th or so of his customers.
I often feel that my role here is to remind you guys what "normal" is like.
To be an capital-I Investor you must have "extra" extra money. Varies based on CoL but the starting point is probably a good 30k more a year than I make, which means pushing the 100k level. You're telling me what I said earlier - I need to make more money. Well, teachers don't make more money, and I'm too old to make going back to the drawing board & retraining for another field a good option unless I'm forced to do so by something drastic. At my income level, at the end of the process whatever investing I do will be at best a supplement to my retirement. With my gains I'll be able to buy a car or two free & clear, do an improvement to the house, help one kid through college, something like that. That is all. That's with "good investor behavior" and assuming things go well.
Last edited by redguard57; 05-26-2020 at 07:28 PM..
Investing is supposed to be done, and truly can only be done, by people who have considerable excess money.
Absolutely not true. When I started investing (right before the crash of Oct '87) I was making under $30K/yr and living in one of the most expensive cities in the world (SF). Yet I was able to save some money -and- invest in my first IRA that year.
Someone with even just $50 can start investing. Most people start slow and over time their portfolio grows.
The only barrier to investing is someone convincing themselves "investing is only for people who have considerable excess money."
Absolutely not true. When I started investing (right before the crash of Oct '87) I was making under $30K/yr and living in one of the most expensive cities in the world (SF). Yet I was able to save some money -and- invest in my first IRA that year.
Someone with even just $50 can start investing. Most people start slow and over time their portfolio grows.
The only barrier to investing is someone convincing themselves "investing is only for people who have considerable excess money."
Decent money, and probably great growth potential. A starting teacher in 1987 would have made around 19.5k, which was approximately median personal income for men at the time. So you were making around 30% more than a typical male. I'll grant you it was in SF.
Still, that's the equivalent of about 60k today when a normal college graduate starting out can expect about 45k. I only just reached the 60k level this year after 8 years of working, during which time I needed to pay off debt. You guys had much cheaper college. I had it cheaper than young people today, which is mind-boggling and a travesty.
I should clarify that people at any income level are better off if they invest something, but they shouldn't put money in it they may need to live if SHTF, and for those of us dependent on a paycheck job, the S may HTF at any time. My original contention was that they should have a more robust emergency fund than is commonly thrown around. Like I said, I have 15 months worth, and only feel comfortable investing over that, which I was only able to start doing in 2018.
A big mistake I made was putting ALL my savings in the market. When SHTF I had to choose between drawing on it and locking in losses or taking out debt. Interest rates were low so debt was the better answer, and I came out ahead. But it was stressful for 3+ years to say the least. That's something I'd like to avoid now. My original contention was that average people should have a more robust emergency fund than is commonly thrown around. Like I said, I have 15 months worth, and only feel comfortable investing over that, which I was only able to start doing in 2018.
Things are different than they were in the 80s. Based on my experience of dealing with two of the "worst recessions since the great depression" in just 12 years, a job search in such conditions can easily take a year. This ain't the old days when you could beat the street or bring the secretary flowers & get to the head of the line for a job. So I plan accordingly.
Last edited by redguard57; 05-26-2020 at 09:27 PM..
Decent money, and probably great growth potential. A starting teacher in 1987 would have made around 19.5k, which was approximately median personal income for men at the time. So you were making around 30% more than a typical male. I'll grant you it was in SF.
Still, that's the equivalent of about 60k today when a normal college graduate starting out can expect about 45k. I only just reached the 60k level this year after 8 years of working, during which time I needed to pay off debt. You guys had much cheaper college. I had it cheaper than young people today, which is mind-boggling and a travesty.
I should clarify that people at any income level are better off if they invest something, but they shouldn't put money in it they may need to live if SHTF, and for those of us dependent on a paycheck job, the S may HTF at any time. My original contention was that they should have a more robust emergency fund than is commonly thrown around. Like I said, I have 15 months worth, and only feel comfortable investing over that, which I was only able to start doing in 2018.
A big mistake I made was putting ALL my savings in the market. When SHTF I had to choose between drawing on it and locking in losses or taking out debt. Interest rates were low so debt was the better answer, and I came out ahead. But it was stressful for 3+ years to say the least. That's something I'd like to avoid now. My original contention was that average people should have a more robust emergency fund than is commonly thrown around. Like I said, I have 15 months worth, and only feel comfortable investing over that, which I was only able to start doing in 2018.
Things are different than they were in the 80s. Based on my experience of dealing with two of the "worst recessions since the great depression" in just 12 years, a job search in such conditions can easily take a year. This ain't the old days when you could beat the street or bring the secretary flowers & get to the head of the line for a job. So I plan accordingly.
the flaw in what you are saying is this .. people always said to my wife and i when we were working . how do you find the time to go to the gym every day ...the answer is we don't find the time we make the time .
the same thing applies to saving and investing .
most of us normal earning folks don't have excess money to invest , we make the excess money we invest ....it comes out of our housing choices and transportation choices and what we choose to spend our money on , and yes that includes paying for kids to go to school if we can't afford to fund our own retirement lives properly . . ....
my tag line about finding a way has never been more truer ..people find a way to fund their ira's and 401k's in to equities ...
they will do whatever they have to , so as to avoid touching that money . they pretend it doesn't exist .
there is not one of us who has not gone through ILLNESS-DIVORCE -JOB LOSS ..but we all dont emerge the same ...
i know when i hit rough patches i did side work so as to create money for investing . i was an hvac tech by day , ran my own little company at night and did side work and played gigs with a band as drummer ...
being poor was never going to be an option since as most know i grew up in a nyc housing project and there was no way i was ever raising my family in one .
this stuff is like dieting ...most who need to lose weight have no physical reason they can't .. they just need to eat less and move more ... they all have a reason they think they can't lose weight , but those who really want to will find a way.
people are inherently lazy ...an object at rest stays at rest and most people who don't meet their financial goals just want to stay in their comfort zone . they do what they do and that's it .
there is always a way , many will never find that way , but they will find excuses.
there is always owning less house , different transportation , student loans for kids when parents cant fund their own retirements properly ... there are a hundred ways kids can fund school , i don't know of any loans parents with limited resources can borrow and fund retirement .
there is also relocating or changing career paths for those who are not lazy or don't want to be that body at rest .
but that is how we MAKE the money to invest because few of us have these excess funds you like to speak of .
Last edited by mathjak107; 05-27-2020 at 02:45 AM..
Absolutely not true. When I started investing (right before the crash of Oct '87) I was making under $30K/yr and living in one of the most expensive cities in the world (SF). Yet I was able to save some money -and- invest in my first IRA that year.
Someone with even just $50 can start investing. Most people start slow and over time their portfolio grows.
The only barrier to investing is someone convincing themselves "investing is only for people who have considerable excess money."
That wasn't the start of my career, that was several years in.
What you're throwing out are excuses.
If you don't want to invest because <reasons, yet more reasons> then don't.
Can't imagine why an investing subforum would appeal to anyone who doesn't want to and/or has decided they can't invest.
that is the part i don't get ...to keep talking about the market's natural volatility and cycles that are ALWAYS CAUSED BY EVENTS and start introducing every what if this , what if that in to the equation makes little sense in a forum where people invest and many have been finding and creating the money to invest all their working lives .
look at mystical tiger ... he is not a high earner but he works hard to control expenses so he can CREATE money to invest . AND YES , MOST DO HAVE EMERGENCY FUNDS FIRST SET UP . IF NOT ALL DO .
i understand making choices in life that shape your financial out come and you end up with little savings from those choices one made . but trying to bring in all this negative stuff about the natural market cycles which are historically higher highs and higher lows over time, despite all the stuff that sends us in to a negative cycle does not make much sense in an investing forum.
this is more something pertaining to career path choices , and location as it pertains to discretionary income allocation than the pros and cons of investing.
the bottom line is you can't invest money you don't have .
the negatives of investing in broad based diversified portfolio's , if there are any , have nothing to do with it in this case . . . there is just not enough savings to invest and yet cover short term needs .
but and a big but , there are portfolios that are not very volatile , that hold as much as 20-25% cash instruments as a portfolio position and make money up or down , so again the choices were out there .
this is an example of what i mean by learning to play the cards you are dealt instead of spending all your time blaming the dealer or finding reasons to blame the dealer
Last edited by mathjak107; 05-27-2020 at 05:13 AM..
I understand and can somehow relate to redguard because I was poor from start and the only reason I am happy now is because I aged in the mid-40s, and as my saying goes, Life Begins In Mid 40s.
But at his age of late 20s/early 30s, it is really tough and you would never find me on this thread at those age. I was barely keeping ends meet and still in CC debt as salary is low. I was earning below median income at $40K when I was early 30s.
To redguard, keep at it, that's all I can say. Trust the market, it goes down yes but it will also go up and truly, at your age, a down market is your best friend and the more reason to be in the market. The amounts will go up over time due to compounding and you are young and alot can still happen like promotions, change of careers, higher paying job somewhere else, etc.
I understand and can somehow relate to redguard because I was poor from start and the only reason I am happy now is because I aged in the mid-40s, and as my saying goes, Life Begins In Mid 40s.
But at his age of late 20s/early 30s, it is really tough and you would never find me on this thread at those age. I was barely keeping ends meet and still in CC debt as salary is low. I was earning below median income at $40K when I was early 30s.
To redguard, keep at it, that's all I can say. Trust the market, it goes down yes but it will also go up and truly, at your age, a down market is your best friend and the more reason to be in the market. The amounts will go up over time due to compounding and you are young and a lot can still happen like promotions, change of careers, higher paying job somewhere else, etc.
when i was in school in my teens i answered the phone for a Manhattan firm called first investors. i think they are now called foresters ...one of their sales people ended up talking me in to a 50 dollar a month plan .. i invested 50 a month in the first investors fund for income .it actually was a high yield bond fund .
i had no clue what i bought . all i knew was a bill came every month and i mailed away 50 bucks ..it was a way of life for years .
as i started to take an interest in my 20's it gave me some seed money . i still have a life policy they sold me as a teen ... i have not made a payment in 35 years now as it feeds itself ..
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