JL Collins

JL Collins has some good advice. Unbiased and simple to follow rules for long term investment: https://jlcollinsnh.com/ Good introduction: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T71ibcZAX3I

I recommend the book or the blog posts of JL Collin. His posts are all about how to achieve financial independence https://jlcollinsnh.com/

You've got several great strategies here along the ETF / Index Fund / Vanguard route, which I would endorse, as well as some subreddits I know too well! JL Collins's 'Stock Series' is an excellent set of articles / blogs that I've recommended to heaps of people over the years - https://jlcollinsnh.com/stock-series/ It helped me, and in turn my beautiful wife and several friends, properly understand the WHY behind these kind of recommendations. It has expanded over the years - my advice is to read them until they get boring, because the boring ones are probably 2 steps ahead of where you are today. You can return later. Good luck!

For what it's worth, I believe this phrase, at least within the realm of financial bloggers, originated here: https://jlcollinsnh.com/2011/06/06/why-you-need-f-you-money/ I've followed a few, Get Rich Slowly, Mr. Money Mustache, and Jim Collins, which has a great series of posts on long-term investing. I'm wrapping up six months of unemployment this week, and I didn't have a care in the world during that time. We didn't lose money, our investments grew more than ever, and we spent lots of time together however we pleased. I'm not able to retire permanently, and I return to paid work on Tuesday, but there is great peace of mind in having "f-you money," especially if you do live a bit frugally and keep your mandatory, recurring expenses low.

i am just a random internet person and definitely not a financial advisor. i did find this really helpful when i didn't know much about wealth over long time horizons. https://jlcollinsnh.com/manifesto/ - skim this, see if it's interesting to you follow up with https://jlcollinsnh.com/stock-series/ if so

It depends actually what is your purpose. If you intend to learn about stock trading for personal finance reasons you can follow a lot of blogs or podcasts in the FIRE (Financial Independence Retire Early) community. Some examples are the stock series of JL Collins (https://jlcollinsnh.com/stock-series/) and the Mad Fientist (https://www.madfientist.com/, the blog is a bit tax focused, but it goes well with the Podcast). If you want to learn about active trading then you need vastly different resources and not really my expertise. Just wanted to mention that there are basically two philosophies here and based on either what knowledge you want to gain or how much risk you want to take as an investor you will need to choose what to learn.

> strongest correlating factor with financial independence and overall net worth If the only way people save is "force saving" by diving headfirst into something that sucks all of their other assets in, sure. How could we make housing a terrible investment? * It should be illiquid. We’ll make it something that takes weeks, no – wait – even better, months of time and effort to buy or sell. * It should be something that locks its owner in one geographical area. That’ll limit their options and keep ’em docile for their employers! * It should be leveraged! Oh, oh this one is great! This is how we’ll get people to swallow those low returns! (copied from amusing thought experiment for another perspective: https://jlcollinsnh.com/2013/05/29/why-your-house-is-a-terrible-invest… That said, I bought a place to live anyways.

JL Collins [1] has a great talk at Google I discovered while perusing youtube[2]. He taps into Warren's advice of not watching the markets too closely (mentioned in your second link). [1] https://jlcollinsnh.com/manifesto/ [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T71ibcZAX3I

The best advice I’ve ever gotten: https://jlcollinsnh.com/stock-series/

Start with the stock series from jcollinsh (financial blogger) http://jlcollinsnh.com/stock-series/ This gives a good intro to why index funds are probably your best bet. If you are willing to put in a lot of additional time and research, you may be able to do better picking individual stocks, but probably not.

When buying on leverage is actively encouraged to the masses, a crash usually follows. Before the 1929 crash, buying stock/equites on extreme margins became normal; Before the 2008 crash, buying real estate on extreme margins became normal; today we are seeing higher education being purchased on extreme margins. Now higher education is a different beast than the others, so it is hard to say how a economic event stemmed from student loans will manifest itself, but it is a real concern. I highly recommend JL Collins Stock Series blog posts and specifically this article on market events of the past 100 years: http://jlcollinsnh.com/2017/07/26/time-machine-and-the-future-returns-…

Stock being certainly higher risks than housing and still people invest a lot in stocks. I would say low cost index funds are a much lower risk investment than a mortgage. They also have the advantage of being very liquid in the case of actually needing your money. Rent is not a sunk cost, this is a common misconception. There are many good reasons to buy a home, but do not think of it as an "investment". Compared to other investment options, it's a pretty terrible one. I highly recommend reading this article to learn more - http://jlcollinsnh.com/2013/05/29/why-your-house-is-a-terrible-investm…

I think it's incorrect to compare marginal rates as well. It makes more sense to compare your Effective Rate in retirement versus your Marginal Rate of today. This article explains the math: http://www.gocurrycracker.com/roth-sucks/ Your effective tax rate is likely to be much less than your marginal rate. Also, for anyone interested in financial independence and simple investing with your 401k and IRAs, I'd like to recommend the Stock Series here: http://jlcollinsnh.com/stock-series/

Most people have a financial adviser, but for the industrious I recommend: http://jlcollinsnh.com/stock-series/ And for the lazy, this is a good resource: https://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Lazy_portfolios

In the same vein, and my favorite, is Jim Collins' "How I failed my daughter and a simple path to wealth": http://jlcollinsnh.com/2011/06/08/how-i-failed-my-daughter-and-a-simpl…

One reason is that you get greater returns by diversifying. Unfortunately, diversifying correctly is hard. A second reason is that younger people typically can afford to invest more aggressively and older people should typically invest more conservatively. So an investment strategy depends on your personal goals and attitude towards risk. Finally, it doesn't take personal aptitude into account. By investing in an index fund you can inexpensively get average performance, but you can get greater gains by investing your money in a way where you can do better than average. Start a company, real estate, art, etc. This is a pretty great intro: http://jlcollinsnh.com/stock-series/

Reminds me of https://jlcollinsnh.com/2023/03/02/why-your-house-is-a-terrible-invest… “Hey I’ve got an idea. We’re always talking about good investments. What if we came up with the worst possible investment we can construct? What might that look like?” Well, let’s see now (pulling out our lined yellow pad), let’s make a list. To be really terrible: - It should be not just an initial, but if we do it right, a relentlessly ongoing drain on the cash reserves of the owner. - It should be illiquid. We’ll make it something that takes weeks, no – wait – even better, months of time and effort to buy or sell. - It should be expensive to buy and sell. We’ll add very high transaction costs. Let’s say 5% commissions on the deal, coming and going. - It should be complex to buy or sell. That way we can ladle on lots of extra fees and reports and documents we can charge for. - It should generate low returns. Certainly no more than the inflation rate. Maybe a bit less. - It should be leveraged! Oh, oh this one is great! This is how we’ll get people to swallow those low returns! If the price goes up a little bit, leverage will magnify this and people will convince themselves it’s actually a good investment! Nah, don’t worry about it. Most will never even consider that leverage is also very high risk and could just as easily wipe them out."

If you have money to invest, invest in low-cost, broad-based index funds. I personally bias slightly towards small cap (said more precisely: I avoid biasing toward large-cap, but to many people, that looks like biasing towards small caps). One specific choice is VTSAX from Vanguard, but there are many others. Keep an emergency fund of 2-4 months in cash or equivalents, and invest everything else that you can when young. Don’t buy the flashy new car, the rounds of $15 drinks, don’t carry a credit card balance, etc. When the inevitable market gyrations come, do not take the money out. Don’t try to time the market. If you don’t have much money to get started, consider real estate as a second job. The leveraged nature of that bet is one of the few ways to start from relatively little money and build a nest egg. It’s a second job, though. If you pay a PM to manage it, the PM makes more current income than you do in most cases. In addition to jacquesm’s advice to read MMM, I also recommend the jlcollins stock series: http://jlcollinsnh.com/stock-series/

> a gobsmackingly terrible investment decision Speaking only about the "investment" part of home ownership, I found this blog post insightful, and maybe interesting enough to share here: http://jlcollinsnh.com/2013/05/29/why-your-house-is-a-terrible-investm… Here is a somewhat paraphrased version of the author's main points: * Not just an initial, but a relentlessly ongoing drain on the cash reserves of the owner requiring an endless parade of repairs and maintenance without which it will crumble * Illiquid. It takes months of time and effort to buy or sell * Expensive to buy and sell with very high transaction costs: 5%+ commissions, buying and selling * Undiversified. Represents a disproportionate percentage of a person’s net worth * Complex to buy or sell * Lots of extra fees and reports and documents you must pay for * Generates low returns. At or below the inflation rate * Leveraged. If the price goes up a little bit, leverage will magnify this and people will convince themselves it’s actually a good investment! Most will never consider that leverage is also very high risk and could just as easily wipe them out * Mortgaged. You pay interest on the loans. Many people borrow money against it more than once * Unproductive. Never pays interest, never pays dividends * Immobile. Fixed to one geographical spot so at any given time only a tiny group (if any) of potential buyers for it will exist * Subject to the fortunes of a single neighborhood * Fragile.…

Quick answer: You could do a lot worse than parking it in an index fund, so yeah, that's a good approach :) If you have a 401(k) or other retirement account, it is quite common for those to offer an S&P 500 index fund where you could invest your money. If you want to do it in a taxable brokerage account, you should open an account with Vanguard and buy their Total Stock Market index fund (VTSMX, or VTSAX if you have more than $10,000 to invest). Then stay the course - if the market tanks 50% the day after you put your money in, don't panic. Wait it out. Your investment horizon here is at the very least 10 years. But that's the quick, the-best-time-to-invest-is-tomorrow-so-just-do-it answer. There are a number of things you should do if you want to learn more about how to invest your money in stocks (and maybe bonds): 0) A good resource to get started quickly is If You Can, by William Bernstein: https://smile.amazon.com/If-You-Can-Millennials-Slowly-ebook/dp/B00JCC… But you can skip it if you want to dive deeper with the stuff that follows. 1) Learn about what investing in the stock market means, what's the nature of it and what to expect from it. I have two recommendations here: 1.1) jlcollinsnh's Stock Series: http://jlcollinsnh.com/stock-series/ He recently released a book (The Simple Path to Wealth) which is supposedly a better-edited version of the Stock Series. He's a rather optimistic guy, but what…

The stock market has liquidity, fungibility, low transaction costs, etc etc. https://jlcollinsnh.com/2013/05/29/why-your-house-is-a-terrible-invest…

Famous article by JL Collins: https://jlcollinsnh.com/2013/05/29/why-your-house-is-a-terrible-invest… Another thing to keep in mind is the lumpy nature of costs, meaning you need to have access to cash to pay for multiple major maintenance projects in one year. My largest single-year expenditure for maintenance was 25k in a LCOL area pre-pandemic. That would probably translate to 50k today. If you have to dump that on a credit card, good luck digging yourself out of that hole. It's common to hear that renting means you might need to move at the end of any 12-month period. Well, that cuts both ways. You have the option to move away at the end of any 12-month period too. Lots of folks had to turn down job offers in the aftermath of the housing crisis because of their homes.

I would argue the most important step in "riding the bull" as the OP puts it is having savings[0]. In the context of keeping a job, having a savings cushion relieves a lot of stress and makes it much easier to make good long-term decisions (like taking the risk of leaving a company in a downward spiral for something unknown, but hopefully better.) 0 - https://jlcollinsnh.com/2011/06/06/why-you-need-f-you-money/

The Simple Path to Wealth by J L Collins https://jlcollinsnh.com/category/the-book-the-simple-path-to-wealth/

Here’s an interesting analysis of shortage: https://constructionphysics.substack.com/p/is-there-a-housing-shortage… I like the comment: “I think one of the problems in this discussion is that the word ‘shortage’ doesn't have a clear meaning. If gas is $6 a gallon, should we say there is a shortage of gas? If I get stuck in traffic on the way to work, can I say there is a shortage of roads? If I have to park 4 blocks away from my apartment, is there a shortage of parking?” And a one-sided view on why your home is not an investment: https://jlcollinsnh.com/2013/05/29/why-your-house-is-a-terrible-invest…

Since this article didn't link to this prior work, I feel like I should: https://jlcollinsnh.com/2013/05/29/why-your-house-is-a-terrible-invest…

I've recently started learning about the benefits of passive investing in index funds. I learned a lot from this blog. Maybe you'll find it helpful too: https://jlcollinsnh.com/stock-series/

Note: the author also has a freely-available blog post series that summarize most of the material. http://jlcollinsnh.com/stock-series/

To get a taste of what this book is about, you can also check out his blog at http://jlcollinsnh.com/stock-series/

Europeans are much less likely to be retail investors, I'll buy. But there's very little stopping Europeans from buying Vanguard funds or ETFs, so this is a cultural phenomenon, not because of any legal barriers. http://jlcollinsnh.com/2014/01/27/stocks-part-xxi-investing-with-vangu…