I’m not sure if it’s the best time, but I do know it’s not the worst.  I had my eyes on a lot of stocks in recents months, and I’ve decided to start buying.  Not sure when the market will bottom, but I know I’m not at the top.

My personal picks:  BYD, VLO, UNH, WFMI, S, SBUX, NKE, AIG, and even WM.

I wouldn’t invest a lot in WM, but a little…just for the potential upside benefit.

Are you investing right now?

I was reading something a while back, maybe it was Kiplinger’s, maybe it was a website, I dunno, but I had these 2 links book marked in my drafts folder.  I thought it’s a couple neat ways to “invest,” so I thought I’d share.

The first is kiva.org, where you can support entrepeneur’s all over the world, generally in places where starting your own business would be a little harder without some extra help.  I’m a little skeptical, but it seems like a good idea.

The second is donorschoose.org, where you can find schools in lower income areas that need funds for a particular project.

Some pretty neat ideas in my opinion.

I’m not nearly allocated in the stock market as I should be…but this current bull market is amazing.  Reminds me of the 90’s all over again.  Are you getting in now?  I think I’ve learned my lesson once, but what’s driving the market?  I don’t know.

I’ll admit there have been many periods during the recent months where I’ve felt like getting more into stocks, but I keep telling myself to wait. I hope I’m doing the right thing.

Hope you are all making tons of money out there!  If not, don’t worry, the markets will dip, and there will be another opportunity to invest.  Has this market treated you well?

Foreclosures are climbing.  Homes sales are slumping.  Consumer confidence crumbles. Media is printing nothing but bleak news…then again, how often is news happy news?

Lo and behold: Dow hits record high!
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I’ve been considering Everbank.com, thanks to Frugal @ My 1st Million at 33.  It’s also because of a comment I received from Matt, asking if I’m worried about the value of the US dollar, and to that I replied:

Matt, Most of my cash is in savings and CDs. Yes, I do have worries. It’s something I’ve been considering…I’m not quite sure what to do though to combat any possible severe decline in US dollar values. Do you have any recommendations? I may post about this later.

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I just posted a few minutes ago about my iPod, well I’ve decided to place my money in a couple of CDs…

• 6month @ 5.05%, $5,000
• 12month @ 5.15%, $5,000

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Thanks to Jonathan over at MyMoneyBlog.com, I’ve decided to open up an account at TD Ameritrade.  If you didn’t know, I’ve started my Christmas shopping, this Nano maybe one of my gifts.  Before you jump on me for being a cheap *ss, hey a 2GB Nano iPod is nothing to sneeze at!  I want to keep it for myself infact.

I’ll be posting up ways I’m saving on Christmas shopping in a few weeks.

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About 4 months ago, I was thinking about reallocation my assets, shifting most of my cash into stocks and bonds.

In most cases, when I do something, you should probably do the exact opposite.  Does it hold true this time?  Luckily, thanks for blogging, I recorded my potential reallocation, and I can compare…What if?  What if I had reallocated…where would my portfolio be positioned today?

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Yup, finally did it.  I’ve shifted my retirement 401k from a very conservative to aggressive allocation.

My previous allocation
20% - Money Market
45% - Bonds (Stable Value 20%, Total Bond Market 5%, TIPS 20%)
20% - Total Stock Market Index
10% - Total International Stock Market Index

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On thinking about laddering in the near future, I realized that ladders can be broken down even further.  Consider, often a cd ladder is composed of a 3, 6, 9, 12 month certificates.  That’s great, every 3 months, you’ll have the ability to reinvest in a certificate or do something else, but what if you had an emergency?  Suddenly, you’d have to break a certificate and eat an early withdrawal penalty, typically 3 months.  Well, instead of opening 1 3 month CD, why not open 2 of each?  Read the rest of this entry »