Friday, September 9, 2011

how to manage personal finances


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Years ago, we had our investments handled by a financial adviser at a bank, one which had held our finances for years. Because of this, we felt rather comfortable, even trusting about that...perhaps overly so. Our investments were on automatic hold and they did well for quite some time. Then some sudden and questionable fees were charged to our account, all done without notifying us first. Although we asked, no paperwork was ever produced to prove that we had been notified of this change. This motivated us to hire a lawyer and get legal advice. The result? Thanks to timely help, we got the lion's share of our money back, leading us to assume that perhaps the investment people felt it was fair to give it back to us. I have all the paperwork from that period and I occasionally revisit it when I feel shaky about managing our finances. We've done better than ever since getting involved in what I like to call DIY or Do it Yourself Investing. We still use financial experts but we they are consultants now and don't make decisions without checking with us first - and we always know the fees we are paying.

The lesson: since that one unfortunate experience, my husband and I manage our own stock portfolio. I want to be clear what I mean by that. We do our research, seek out professional financial advice and don't assume that we are experts. However, thus far, we have yet to charge ourselves thousands of dollars in fees a year, although we occasionally treat ourselves to a nice dinner out, if our portfolio is doing well.

We have met our long range and short term goals thus far and we haven't tossed thousands of dollars to someone in fees, especially someone who wasn't making any money for us. Perhaps you'd like to try your hand at managing your own stocks.

If so, you might be interested in some information I've learned while handing our stock portfolio and investments. For the purposes of this article, I am not going to try and suggest which stocks should be a part of your stock portfolio. I do not consider myself a certified financial planner or a stock expert. I'd strongly advise any new or even experienced investors to learn the basics of research and how to invest in stocks and continually seek out new information as the economy changes. However, I can note that we have used the tips here to build a profitable stock portfolio, one that could well provide us with the financial security to get through retirement.

Wondering about what goes into a stock or investment portfolio ? It contains a collection of investments, whether in individual stocks or mutual funds, that are owned by you (perhaps along with your spouse or other person).

Even if you decide that you don't want to manage your own stock portfolio, perhaps by reading this article you will at least know if someone else is doing a decent job at managing your money. If not, consider taking on the role yourself and yes...even try to manage your own stock portfolio. Please don't make the mistake we did and assume that any so-called expert is above reproach or human error or weakness!

Here are the steps we took to manage our own stock portfolio:

Step one: in order to manage a stock portfolio yourself, start with your own individual situation

That has to be a key step. Why? Because every situation is highly unique. Our stock portfolio is targeted for a couple with children, middle class, getting closer to retirement age. If you are young, single and just starting out, you have more time on your side to learn and make mistakes and possibly recoup your money. I don't happen to believe there is any investment or stock management plan that fits all people, no "one size fits all" investment strategy.

Your age, your job situation and your tolerance for risk can all affect the choices you make as you try to manage your own stock portfolio. Also, if you have any special needs, whether medical challenges or diseases - or you are simply trying to leave money for a handicapped child, of course you'll want to keep those variables in mind as you plan your stock portfolio. If you expect to get Social Security, you'll want to include that in your planning.

Bottom line: be honest with yourself and don't try to take huge risks if it will leave your stomach churning at night, tossing and turning with worry. Be clear about your own comfort level when it comes to investment risk, market volatility and your own lifestyle.

Step two: think about how your employment situation affects the way you might manage your stock portfolio

If you are self- employed, you may not have a company stock plan or the option of investing with a company match. If you are employed by a company, however, you might have that option. If you aren't familiar with the words company match, this basically means that every time you put a certain amount of money into investment plans, mutual funds, company stock or other investment vehicles approved by your company, your employer will match a percentage of your contributions (up to a set percentage or amount in many cases). As an example, let's say your company matches 10% of everything you contribute to an investment plan. That is like getting that 10% of your contributions free, an automatic bonus.

Of course, the stock portfolio or investments could still go up and down in value. But the percentage contributed by your employer won't have been provided by you. It is bonus money, whether it goes up in value or not. It is like gambling with someone else's dollars. Can you still lose? Absolutely. But it might not sting quite as much, at least for that portion of money you didn't contribute yourself.

Bottom line: find out if you have a company match for any money you intend to manage in your stock portfolio. My personal preference is to have an automatic amount of money go into company plans that include a company match because of the free or bonus money that automatically gets added along with our contributions.

Step three: do your research as you begin to manage your own stock portfolio

While an extremely detailed tutorial on researching and picking the right stock mix is beyond the scope of this article, some basic questions can help you help yourself to make solid financial choices and up your chances of good investment returns. At the very least, find out how each stock has performed historically, the average rate of return, whether the stock is taxable or not, if it has kept pace or done better than the S & P 500 over the years and any information about annual dividends. Many online companies such as Fidelity, Morningstar and Vanguard have helpful tools to provide information about the benefits of investing.

Bottom line - start doing your research before you jump into stock portfolio management programs that you handle yourself.

Step four: if you feel afraid, shore up your courage by learning the benefits of starting early and compounding.

Although you can find similar models of this little exercise at many online sites, I've always found the one by Vanguard, located here: personal.vanguard.com/us/content/SiteWide/FlashPgs/SWFlshPwrOfCompContent.jsp to be extremely helpful. I've shown it to my children and their eyes always widen in surprise (as mine did, the first time I saw an example like this).

Basically, this nifty online program illustrates the advantages of saving and investing early. According to the information there, if one person starts saving money at age 25 and manages to save $2000 a year with an average return of 8% and then stops investing at age 35, that person could well outperform a person who starts investing at age 35 and continues to invest till he or she reaches age 65, putting that same $2000 into the account each year, getting the same 8% return. Who comes out ahead? According to the online model, the person who started at age 35 and stopped investing at age 35 would end up making over $314,000 - compared to the $244,000 plus that the other investor gets, even if that other investor saves for more years than the person who started earlier. Amazing!

Bottom line:
if investment vehicles and rates of return are equal, you may come out ahead if you learn how to manage your stock portfolio early in life. We've talked to our kids about the basics of saving and investing money since they were young. Always keep your own time frame in mind, knowing when you'll need the money.

Step five: if you decide to manage your own stock portfolio - diversify, diversify and....yes....remember to keep diversification high on your list of priorities.

If you have any hesitation about this, I'd suggest you simply walk out your front door and look at all the For Sale signs that may be lined up on all those lawns of the homes where people decided their one and only investment was going to be a home, maybe even an expensive home. During the housing boom, I couldn't go anywhere without hearing someone crow about the great investment he had in his or her home - and how he wanted to buy a second or third home with the "profit" (even though the home wasn't sold yet so it was imaginary profit) Some banks seems to buy into this mentality and let people take out huge amounts of equity on their homes. Then the housing market went bust in many areas and people couldn't unload those homes for anywhere near what they'd hoped. Based only on the comp or home comparison sheets I've collected in our area, some of those people sold for a loss compared to what the home initially cost them to purchase. Some were forced into foreclosure.

Bottom line: using the home analogy as an example of picking one stock - and only one stock - perhaps you can see how putting all your eggs into one stock or investment portfolio basket can be very risky. However, if you spread your risk between conservative, balanced and riskier stocks, you have a potential chance of having some of your investments offset the ones that don't perform well.

Step six: start to invest and manage your own stock portfolio.

Okay, this is the point where you might feel a sudden lurching of your heart. It certainly was the point where I did! However, I went back and looked at that chart about the benefits of investing early, making automatic payments into my stock portfolio and sticking with the plan. I knew one thing - if I didn't save a dime, I certainly couldn't expect any money to magically grow, compound or be there during retirement or whenever I wanted it. Being a bit of a perfectionist, I wanted to feel that I knew everything about the stock market before I jumped into it. But even the experts make mistakes. No one can predict the future perfectly (and if you know someone who can, I'd be very, very interested in talking to that person).

This is only a very personal opinion but I'd aim for a more conservative mix of stocks and/or mutual funds as retirement gets closer (10 years or less) and be willing to take more chances if I was in my 20s or even early 30s. However, you have to know your own comfort level and objectives. For short-term goals and investing, I would stick with money market funds, Treasury Bills and highly rated conservative investments. The downside of this is that your rate of return may be low. The plus is that your risk of losing money can be lower. You sacrifice high returns for safety. Also, we put a certain percentage of our investments on automatic pilot and try not to let our emotions change our course. Recessions comes and go but historical long-term profits and returns are just that - the expected return you can get if you don't veer off course. Is it guaranteed? No. But it is possible and that possibility is good enough for me. Maybe it is for you as well.

Bottom line: don't be your own worst enemy when it comes to a stock portfolio and do it yourself investing. Start investing as early as possible and stick to your plan, through good times and bad. Focus on your goals and the time frame you have to reach them. As a general rule, use conservative or historically safer investments as you get closer to needing the money. You can take some risks if you have more time to make it up. If you wonder about that, go back and look at the model for the advantages of saving early and sticking with it. Imagine being financially secure and keep focused on that goal.

Step seven: stay on top of economic developments and read about how events affect the economy - and possibly your stock portfolio

When stores start to close and go into bankruptcy proceedings, that is obviously going to have an impact on stocks and your portfolio. Starbucks and Sharper Image stores in our area have closed, reflecting some national trends. Those kind of events can affect stock prices. Clearly, you'll want to keep an eye out for events like that. Tweak your portfolio to meet the changing returns based on economic news and minimize your risk.

Bottom line: stay informed about how economic news and developments in the economy can affect your investment or stock portfolio.

Step eight: consider using your eyes, ears and best instincts to make some investment choices and find some good stocks early.

Years ago, there was a company called The Body Shop. I was hearing a lot of buzz about it. However, at the time it hadn't even opened any stores in the United States. In spite of protests by a financial adviser, I put some money into the company's stock. When the stock got to the point where my investment had made more than 100% , I decided to sell. By that time, The Body Shop was everywhere, including many of our local malls. I invested in it because people were interested in products that were natural and I liked the products, based on some a friend had given me. Yes, it was a gut instinct move but it paid off. Do I do that often? Absolutely not. But I firmly believe you can learn plenty by taking money you can afford to lose and investing it. You may have to ride out some highs and lows before you see profits (I did) but the payoff can be worth it.

Bottom line: if you have extra money that you can afford to lose, be willing to take some chances. Think of it as tuition in an investment program and an opportunity to up your learning curve. If you lose the money, try to minimize the time you spend obsessing about it and move on.

Final step: learn the basic vocabulary you need to help manage your stock portfolio.

Key terms include words like 401K Plan, After-tax income, asset allocation (how much you put into each type of stock or mutual fund plan), large-cap stocks, mid-cap stocks and municipal bonds. Know if your returns are figured in pre-tax dollars or not, learn about your net worth and your chances of meeting your goals based on historical returns (keeping in mind that past returns are not a guarantee of future returns). If you want to know more key terms, you can look at sites like Vanguard, The Motley Fool and various online sites. I am not recommending any specific ones as being "the best" because I am a firm believer in doing your own reading and research and coming to your own conclusions. The tips in this article will hopefully serve as food for thought as you start to manage your own stock portfolio. They've worked well for us. We like the results we've gotten.

I've actually come to see the process of managing our stock portfolio as fun and exciting and it has boosted my confidence in understanding the stock market. Hopefully, you'll find more confident about being able to manage your own stock portfolio. If not, you may be able to ask some very knowledgeable questions of anyone you hire to help you do it.


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