Investments

Is anyone here investment savy? I recently invested a small amount of money that I saved up into a fund called The Growth Fund of America. Our investment guy explained to me that this particular fund is great for beginners that are just starting out in the investment world. One of the things that attracted me to this fund is that it is a liquid account meaning that there are no huge penalties if you need the money somewhere down the line. You pay a small sales charge of 5.75% up front which isnt to awful.
So does anyone here have any experience with investing money? Please share your experiences.

Hi, to me that seems like a High fee. Informative websites & books: about.com, aol money, motley fools, morningstar, tdameriatrade, any large brokerage houses Godlman Sachs, Charles Schwab web site, costco's web site has a link to a low cost sharebuilder website, go to costco.com across the top it says shop, services, etc. go to service then click go to services for your home to sharebuiders on- line investing. Clarke Howard's website, lot of info on his site, yahoo money, your own bank or credit union website. I know that our credit union has free evening investment seminars. Moody's and Standard and Poors rate stocks and fund families, as does Morningstar.

Books, David Bach, The Dummies series has Investing type books (stocks for dummies), The Beardstowne Ladies, any books or article by Warren Buffet, watch CNBC, your home town library or online libraries have good resources, too, Oprah's website has recently had a series on credit/ budgeting which has good information with links to info. on planning for the future. Suzie Orman books, go to amazon.com and type in investing or finace and you'll see tons of books in this area. Money magazine, Inc. mag., Smart Money, Fourtune (spelling) newspapers, Wall Street Journal is interesting reading, Investors Business Daily. Funds can be no load upfront!! Anybody win any Borders gift cards? I go to Borders and sit down and read the European & other degisn magazines (spendy, aren't always available thru free magazine websites) and then go use a gift card in their little coffee area. Spend some time reading & gathering info.

Lots of investing shows WSJ, CNBC, FOX NEWS have investing/business geared shows on the weekend early in the morning. You can start a Roth IRA with as little as $25 dollars a month autowithdrawl. Read about the time value of money. Even teenagers with a part time job should consider opening a Roth IRA, if a young person puts away $2,000 a year for ten years and then leaves it in a ROTH IRA never making a withdrawl, but monitors their funds until their retirement age and they would be pretty happy at that time. CD's and money market funds are a good way for someone with a little money to start saving enough to open up a fund that has a minimum requirement of let's say $2,500 dollars. Pay your self first. Autowithdrawl into a IRA account either ROTH OR TRADIONIAL. Also, try to set up an emergency fund account. Women need to make sure that they have credit established in their own name from the time they are teenagers, they need to keep their credit history clean and they need to have skills to to support themselves and or their children, divorce happens and I know a few young widows, too.

Think about looking at the website that share codes, saving on shipping charages adds up over time, or money savings tips, shop at resale, thirft stores, garage sales, etc. (good resource for note cards, greeting cards, board games, furniture, clothes, blankets,etc) Doesn't OLS'er have a thread on tips for cutting costs? - maybe it's on the Club Mom site. I know that thru club mom you go thru their site to buy retail items and you get points I buy my gift certificates (cards) for target, tjmaxx, old navy, starbucks, Regis Hair Salon, Boreders, etc thru them I charage them and get pts. from them and my credit card company, (research this) same with Continenal Airlines (their shopping area)
I do carry a balance on my credit card, monthly, I know that this isn't perfered but it is sometimes the reality. The only credit card we have is a prime interest rate for life. Oh, look at bizrate.com your can compare different credit cards offers, to see if your getting the best one for you needs. If your a person who uses a credit card.
I hope this is helpful. I'm so happy for you to be saving for your future.

Jellenholder,

The American Funds are very good. I invested in the same fund you did, along with some others. The upfront cost is a bit on the high side, but the funds are very good.

Check out the Calamos funds. All are very good. Again, the upfront cost is on the high side, but the funds are excellent.

Check out the Royce closed end funds - RVT and RMT. These have been very very good to me.

Exchange traded funds (ETFs) are an excellent and low cost way to invest. SPY is a very good ETF.


Best of luck with your investments,

One of the main things to know about investing - that you are better off leaving the money stay put.

Most funds are liquid - you just withdraw your money.

5.75% upfront sounds extremely high. There are a lot of goods funds that you can invest in that charge much less.

But on the other hand, better than average funds do charge a large upfront fee.

Maybe a low cost index fund would suite you better. Vanguard has a nice low fee index fund.

Oakmark and Wasatsh offer some nice funds too.

The Motley Fool webstie www.fool.com had a ton of investing information.

Read the books by Peter Lynch and books about Warren Buffet.

Good luck!

Also know this, especially about mutual funds:

Past performance does not guarantee future results.

Do not waste time and fees jumping from one mutual fund to another chasing results. You lose money over time doing this.