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I’ve maxed my 401k the whole time since I was employed. That’s an easy one. Since you’re young, I’d put that 401k into a small cap stock fund. You can’t take the money out until you’re 59, so you have plenty of time for that fund to grow and sustain any normal downturns. You’re making great money for your age, so congrats. I’ve made more money in real estate than advertising. I’m in California too, and have bought homes and rented them out. Someone is paying for most of that mortgage for you, while the value of the rental hone increases. I’ve made my biggest mistakes by not buying cheap fixer homes in fringe areas that are now worth so much more. For instance, I worked at Chiat and lived in Venice and the abbot Kinney area was a dump. I could have bought fixer houses in that area for 300k. Now I’m sure those homes are worth a couple million. If I were 34 again making 200k... I would try my hardest to get into a fixer house in a fringe area. A neighborhood that hasn’t quite turned yet. Another strategy is to buy the worst fixer in the best neighborhood. Move in, fix it up over time, and it will rise quickly to the level of the expensive homes around it. I have a friend who bought a house on the canals in Venice for 400K when that area was a dump. Now it’s worth about 3mil. So, my advice would be buy real estate. Either rentals (house or duplex) or buy a fixer you live in and improve. Or invest your money in the market every month. There’s a book called “Rich dad poor dad” that has some great financial advise. Also, spending a lot of money on cars is a complete waste of your income. Lots of people in LA get caught up in spending way too much on cars:)
As far as outside of real estate, I’ve used three general stock strategies that have worked well for me over the years:
1) swing trading commodities
2) buying into trends I hear from clients at the office, or trends I see happening in my community.
3) Buying stock in “Good companies temporarily in trouble.”
Swing trading commodities is a fairly easy, non-sexy way to make money. For instance oil. If you look up LPI, it’s an oil stock that rises and falls with oil prices. It floats up and down from “generally” 8 to 11 dollars a share, I keep buying and selling it over and over. It usually hits peaks and valleys over a few months time. The last go around, I bought 100k worth at 8... and sold it at 10.5. And made around 23k. It’s back down in the mid 8s again so I’ll probably buy again next week. You get the idea. Oil, metals, livestock..
Try it with a thousand bucks. And don’t freak out if it goes a little lower than what you paid for it. It will rise back up.
Trends.
In our industry, we can learn a lot from our clients about where they see their industries heading. Before everyone else does. That’s a good way to get in early on a stock or industry fund. I ignored so many great tips from clients over the years! I was at Chiat when steve jobs came back and clow told us to “sell your motorcycle and buy some Apple stock, jobs is going to roll out a bunch of great products.” The stock was at 14 and I didn’t buy any!
I worked on Netflix 15 years ago when they only mailed out movies! They told us they invented a new way to steam the movies while watching, so no waiting to down load or mailing them out. (And they said blockbuster was going to go out of business because of it.) Yep. I didn’t buy the stock back then. Could have made a fortune on that one.
Or maybe 10 years ago you noticed your wife and EVERYONE started wearing these lulu lemon yoga pants. I missed that one too.
“Good companies temporarily in trouble.”
There are a lot of great companies who stumble and recover. Facebook just plummeted to 150 on the data breach news, now it’s back to 190. Toyota had a recall. The stock plunged and a year later fully recovered. Target had a security breach and the stock dropped 20%. I bought on all those dips because they’re all good companies simply experiencing a temporary drop. It’s one of Warren Buffett’s strategies. Go back and look at all those companies stock prices when they ran into trouble. They all recovered and it’s great way to buy into a temporary low price.
Think of the market as being “overly dramatic.”
I learned this while working on schwab. The client said the market and stocks basically “overreact” to events and news. This creates constant buying opportunities at temporary low prices. It’s actually pretty fun once you get comfortable trading. Start small and get a feel for it. Then go with bigger bets as you get more comfortable. Good luck.
Sure. Give me a topic and I’ll do my best.
CCO the fairy godmother/father we all need 🙏🏼🙌🏿👏🏾
Copywriter 1.. I love that your friend was able to make so much trading options! He’s braver than I am:) As a 55 year old, here’s what I wish I did more of in my 20s-30s... buy real estate. Anything. A shit box fixer rental.. or tiny single family you buy, live in and fix up. Do it. It will help create wealth for you as the years go by. As a rental or s place you live in, Also, direct deposit 10% of your salary into an S&P 500 ETF. At 10%,you’ll double your money in 7 years. Cars and uber eats are a waste of money. Buy the book “rich dad, poor dad.”
Insurance: Go with the higher deductible for any insurance you need. You’ll rarely make a claim. And your monthly will be lower with a higher deductible. Think of insurance as something you need for a “disastrous” event. You roll the car. The house burns down. The guy cleaning your gutters falls, breaks his neck and sues you for the amount your home is worth. That’s why you need insurance. Not to pay for the scratch a shopping cart made in your door. Pay for that out of pocket. I’m just trying to help you guys learn from my mistakes!!!! Young people have time on their side... but they don’t realize it😬
i wanna learn. what tips do you have? shall we chat?
I have a few questions to help give you some advise: are you married? Do you have kids? How old are you? If you’d like to go private with the conversation, email me at askthecco@gmail.
I’d like to help others avoid the mistakes I’ve made:)
i’m married, no kids yet, 34, LA. $200k/year with about $130k saved and another $65k in 401k
Also in LA, early 30s, married with 1 baby - any advice for those that struggle with buying real estate due a small down payment (8-10%) compared to all cash buyers that are eating up inventory?
I’m curious if you Feel like the current real estate bubble will pop again?
Were you married?
how do you handle investments? or making more money than your salary?
i max out my 401k, but don’t own a home. i can save a good amount every pay cycle, and make good money, but feel like i just have not nearly enough.
How much do you save vs invest? And what do you use to invest? I have 2 kids, no mortgage and want to make the most of my savable and disposable income.
thanks @OP, i understand the real estate thing. that’s always the dream (buy cheap in an area that’s gonna blow up). did you buy houses while renting what you lived in?
could you expand on the non-real-estate investment side of your notes?
maybe some other spending tips? (agree on the car thing)
A buddy of mine learned how to trade options and has made over 800k this year alone. So I’m gunna follow in his footsteps and go with learn to trade yourself
This is probably my favorite thread on this whole damn app. Thank you, OP. 🙏🏼
Man I love this thread. I currently live in BedStuy Brooklyn. I own a condo here but in hindsight I wish I stretched to buy a townhouse. Lower property taxes and with a two family I could have had one family help pay down the mortgage. Now I have a son who’s 3 and need to start thinking about schools. In NYC it’s a mind cluster fuck. I’ve saved up some cash and thinning whether it makes sense to try and buy a second property such as a townhouse in Bedstuy. Renovate and rent them out. Problems is I don’t know if I want to live in the area. There aren’t great schools. What do I do? The other option is to buy the place renovate it all and rent it out then move to a better area and rent. Both moves would really require a large investment. Makes me nervous. Another option is to not buy anything and rent out our current condo. Rent into a better area with good schools and put our money in the stock market. Probably better to manage the stocks myself. As currently I have a financial advisor to manage it but it’s on a growth strategy. I would really love your advice