Investing

I would consider myself as risk averse. I haven’t capitalized on any of the trendy stocks and whatnot, but in general I am comfortable with my investment strategy. I think that is one of the more important things about investing. There are tons of investment videos and articles out there, but if I try a strategy that I am not comfortable with, if it does bad then I would dwell on it for a while. If it does well, then perhaps I get overzealous and make even riskier decisions.

I had a conversation with a friend recently that I should probably take more risks at least financially. After thinking about my current strategy and how I can iterate on it, I think that I would be comfortable with contributing more.

My thinking is that I’ll have the majority of my investments in mutual funds and index funds. Then, I’ll have some stocks that I’m tracking just for fun. I’ll choose these based on random articles that I read or advice from friends/family and after some research. I don’t really know much about the various metrics that are in financial reports and such. I try to read a little bit about the company mission and their products. If I am comfortable with what they are doing, then I am willing to buy some shares. After that, I want to get a core of dividend stocks. I keep reading about passive income and multiple revenue streams and blah blah blah. I sat on the information for a while, but I finally decided that it could be a good thing to consider. For these stocks, I’m probably just going to get companies that I think are solid and stable. Since these stocks will not be a large percentage of my portfolio, I’m not going to be gaining much from the dividends in the near future. Then, over the months and years, I’ll contribute more to each of the investments and I hope that they’ll grow enough to the point where I will have enough for retirement.

Over the long term, I’ll consider adding real estate to my investment strategy. I’m not really sure where I want to spend the rest of my life and I don’t think I’m settling down any time soon. I am pretty against investing in real estate that I am not living in. I’ll start investing in real estate when I am ready to buy a place and live there for an extended period of time. If I ever move from that place, I’ll think about renting it out. Renting comes with some headaches, but that’ll be a problem to think about for future me.