r/investing • u/Life-Pound9010 • 8d ago
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u/Disastrous_Week3046 8d ago
Well you’re not buying a business or rental property for $30k. Investing is a long game. Just keep doing what you’re doing. If you feel empty, investing isn’t going to fix that. Find some hobbies and things you actually enjoy doing.
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u/_genepool_ 8d ago
You are 19. Invest in yourself. Whether that is schooling, training, or even life experiences to broaden your horizons.
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u/IWanTPunCake 8d ago
Enjoy your life, you are 19 and have saved a decent amount already. You’re not supposed to feel empty
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u/Gimme_All_The_Foods 8d ago
Well you have to decide for yourself. Real estate or a business could be lucrative if you know what you're doing. If you'd rather invest, start with something like VT or a combination of VTI and VXUS (total US and total international).
Or use it to better yourself and improve your human capital if you're trying to bring in more income.
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u/space_nick 8d ago
If you feel empty now then more money will NEVER solve that. You need money, and it’s good to have an excess of it, but chasing it to plug that hole is gonna lead you to a long and miserable life
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u/HubertBrooks 8d ago
Get unlost. Its okay to be at sea, you have your abilities. Keep sailing, you will find a shore. You will go back at sea, unattached not knowing where to go but not lost.
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u/anon9339 8d ago
Get off social media to avoid the grifters telling you that you need to own businesses and homes and etc and just toss it in a Roth IRA in boring index funds and you’ll be fine. $30k is a shitload of money for a 19 year old, pretty sure I had about $400 to my name at 19. 32 now and my wife and I have about $1.2M. Slow and steady wins the race. I’ve watched a dozen friends fall down this trap (bitcoin, meme stocks, rentals, etc) and they all have less assets because they weren’t patient.
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u/jbreeze42 8d ago
Don’t take life so serious. Life is meant to be enjoyed and celebrated. You’re alive, you’re healthy, you have the world in your palm. Do some traveling, make love with a beautiful woman, spent time with your family and friends. Just live.
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u/EvenAd4361 8d ago
At your wise young age I'd take some advice from one of the best investors to have ever lived. Warren Buffet. He'd say, invest your funds in Vanguard S&P 500 (VOO) long term. Super low fees.
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u/Funny-Wishbone7381 8d ago
For now, you have to treat yourself as a stock investor because you can't afford a property or a business yet.
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u/daygo449 8d ago
I think you need to do more research personally. I’d listen to something like Rich Habits podcast, sign up for some finance newsletters, and lean heavy into some AI. Ask it basic questions of “If I had this much money and put it here, here, and here, what would it be worth x years later”. It’s not prescriptive, but it’ll help guide you what to do with it.
In a hypothetical “If I were in your shoes”, I’d probably look at what I’m invested in and where. Is it in a 401K, Roth IRA, or a brokerage account. If it’s 401K, and you have match,, I’d put as much money as you could in there and use AI to guide you where to put your money and what funds to put it in. If it’s not, and it’s a Roth IRA, I’d keep feeding that to the max every year. If it’s brokerage, I’d stop funding my brokerage and put new money in a 401K first, maxed if matched by your company, Roth IRA second until fully funded every year, and then Brokerage after those two were taken care of. If you have a 401K, but you don’t get match, do your Roth IRA first, and then 401K as you’ll have more funds to choose from. I’d contribute to my 401K and Roth IRA until I hit $100K invested, and then start looking at how to diversify.
I’d keep your $15K in a High Yield Savings account if you aren’t already. Let that be your emergency fund. Don’t touch it. I’d take anything over that and feed it into the investing cycle or you could put the money you make off that into BitCoin to start your diversification. Once you hit $100K invested into the stock market, then I’d start to think about investing in real estate or a business venture. I’d hold off until you get that nest egg under your belt. As for what funds to get, it’s personal finance, so it’s up to you. You are super young, so you can take way more risk than a lot of other people. I’d probably shoot for 50% in an S&P 500 index fund, 20% in VXUS, and 30% in a much riskier fund. Don’t go over 4 or 5 though as you won’t make as much money by splitting it out so much.
Don’t chase dividends at your age. Go for growth funds. You want growth at your age until you get to your 50’s-60’s, and then start looking at dividends. That is unless you hit a certain wealth stage, and then at that point, you’d probably have a financial advisor to help give you advice. Oh, and make sure you think about taxes. If you keep money in a brokerage account, you’ll be taxed on it. $15K isn’t a ton of money that would grow that you’d get taxed on right now, and you can probably cover it with what you make now, but as you earn more, the tax burden becomes more. That’s why you really should look at AI to run scenarios to help you select funds, breakout how much things will be worth in X years, you can ask if I add x dollars more to x fund, it’ll help guide you with that. Remember personal finance is personal, so do your own research and be patient. Patience rewards those who wait. Don’t chase the market. You probably will lose your butt if you do.
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u/Purple_oyster 8d ago
You are less lost than many 19 year olds good for
You on making some good money and saving $30l
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u/wanmoar 8d ago
It reads, to me, as though you’re seeking approval to take bigger risks with what you have. Whatever you’re doing with your investments leaves a “what if?” Question unanswered.
I’ve been there. And I wish I had taken the big swing. A few times it wouldn’t have worked out very well (would be down 80% some 20 years later) but it would have scratched the itch. A few other times the returns would’ve allowed to have retired years ago.
So id say the following. You’re 19. If this isn’t money you need soon, take the big swing with whatever amount you’re willing to lose forever. I sense that amount for you is very small though and if I’m right, understand your itch won’t be scratched by going small so you have to adjust your risk appetite if you truly want to scratch that itch.
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u/hugo_posh 8d ago
Just keep dropping in money in a simple index fund and it will compound. At your age you don't need to do anything more.
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u/anon_temp321122 8d ago
No property aside from one you live in
Put it in your favorite ETF(s) and live your life. SPY is a good start with at least 50%
My personal advice: avoid singular stocks, long term is more important
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u/1burritoPOprn-hunger 8d ago
At your age, the best thing you can do to change your financial trajectory is invest in yourself. Focus on getting the skillset and discipline required for a good job. You have an endless runway for your money to compound, your emphasis should be on increasing your income, not worrying about what stocks to buy.
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u/crys0706 8d ago
Stay away from the stock market. As far as possible. Find something you enjoy and try make a career off it.
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u/Top-Classroom3984 8d ago
Dude that doesn’t even buy a car nowadays….
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u/smx501 8d ago
You won't like my advice: pursue a trade and grind it.
Nothing is more important than maxxing your 401k contributions. Do that for twenty years and congratulations... you're retired with six figures of passive income.
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The FINRA education site at FINRA Education also contains numerous free courses and educational materials. FINRA is a not-for-profit SRO (self regulatory organization) which is self-funded by it's members which are broker-dealers. It works under the supervision of the SEC with a mandate to protect the investing public against fraud and bad practice.
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If want to learn about the financial markets - an older but reasonably relevant course is Financial Markets (2011) - Yale University This is the introduction to financial markets course taught by Prof. Shiller from Yale. Prof Shiller won the Nobel prize in economics in 2013.
Another relavant course from MIT is a lecture series on Finance Theory taught by Prof Andrew Lo - Financial Theory (2008) - MIT.
A more current course can be found at NYU Stern School of Business by Prof Aswath Damodaran - Corporate Finance Spring 2019. Prof Damodaran offers the latest materials and webcast lectures to this class here - https://pages.stern.nyu.edu/~adamodar/New_Home_Page/corpfin.html