Investing

This second response from me is going to give some examples and my personal feelings. Personally, I like a large amount of control and a large amount of involvement. I want a large return on my money in the short term. I like to minimize my risk, but am willing to take chances if I feel they have a good likelyhood of paying off. I am more than willing to pay someone else some money if it makes me more money or the same amount with less time needed. I want the money pretty easily accessible. My goal for investing is to retire rich. I would like to retire rich in 10 years or less, preferably about 5 years from now. So what does this all mean. It means that I needed and was willing to spend a large amount of time researching how to make money in investing before actually doing any. Now, I do not actually invest money as much as trade money. Personally, I utilize buying and selling stock options as a way to leverage my money and make a large return in a short time frame with as little risk as possible. As an example, in most of my trades, for every $1 that I risk for a given month, I expect to make at least $.25, this month, or I don't make the trade. That's me. SOme of my chances pay off and I get at least a quarter. Others don't and I lose some or part of the dollar. I am ok with that level of risk. I consider it far riskier to plop my money in a stock and hope it goes up. I would still have the risk of being completely or significantly wiped out, but not have the realistic posibility of doubling my money in a matter of months. So what's best for you? If you do not want a lot of involvement, are investing for the short to mid term, want as little risk as possible, even at the price of gain, and want your money to be very accessible, then the best place is probably in an on-line savings/money market account. These accounts get moderate fixed rates of return, somewhere in the 5-6% range, currently. They are FDIC insured, therefore VERY LOW risk. If you still want low involvment, are investing for the mid-long term, want low risk, but not at the price of expected gain, and inesting to retire in the semi-distant future, I would think that investing in mutual funds would likely be right for you. Find a broker that will have very low fees for doing what you want to do. If you want a lot more involvement, a lot of control, lower risk, and don't need the money to be accessable at all, I would recommend investing in Real Estate. If you want your money to be moderately accessible, want relatively low to moderate involvement, and some more control, then individual stocks are probably right for you. If you want high involvement and very high gains, with somewhat higher risk, high control, and relatively accessible, then option strategies is what you should be looking into. There are lots of possibilities. Good luck in determining what you want out of your investing. Feel free to ask more questions. I am not a lisenced financial advisor and do not know your situation. As such, none of my ideas on this post should be construed as an individual recommendation for you or an endorsement of an individual product.