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Note that we have some Incomplete Pages That Require Work on this site:-)
Note that we have some Incomplete Pages That Require Work on this site:-)
Moving from country to country as I did in my adult years meant that I had to worry about saving and investment in a lot of countries. This meant in particular I needed to figure out a way to invest money for the future. Coming from Australia the best place to “put your money” is real-estate. While a lot of money can be made that way in the US there were other places, such as the stock market, that pulled.
I set out to find out about the stock market. Below you will find the distilled set of thoughts I have as of today on how to invest in the stock market. Its based on the books below and is the information I wish I had of had when I first arrived in the US.
But there is a little more. The kids are getting to the age where they need to start assuming responsibility for their financial health. Rather than just trot out the advice to the kids any time they'd listen to us, I thought we'd try a different approach. On the kids birthday or christmas when we didn't feel like the gift list was particularly inspired, we work with the kids set up an investment account and then seeded it with a small amount of cash to allow them to “buy something.” But before they got the gift, they had to sit down and answer a set of questions to help them understand how to think about investing and what might work for them. In particular, the questions were there to help them discover why they should start an investment strategy early, like right now.
Below are the questions we gave as “homework” on the relevant birthday / event. The list is basically copies of the emails we sent to the kids. I publish this because other parents have expressed an interest in helping their kids get started in preparing for the future.
A few questions to help you understand impact of various investment decisions:
Note: For questions 1 and 4 this calculator site might help.
Here are the books that I wish I’d had when I started investing. None of these books are new but sometimes good understanding of the basics is timeless:
You might be wondering what approach I take in investing in stocks as a result of all of this. A lot of this section is also a response to what I know about my psychology I've put it in place to help me NOT do stupid things:
Good luck!