An advantage to bonds is you're actually funding some endeavor somewhere.

There is a reason its called Real Property, there is only so much and its REAL.

... And this is the problem with commercial RE. Most of it is heavily leveraged and you have to keep it rented or things unravel fairly quickly. Residential RE also has pitfalls like covid, where Sacramento said "sure, you can ignore your monthly rent as long as you wish. We won't allow the landlord to evict you."

We have owned both and were very fortunate to keep things rented through thick and thin. If rioters came along and burned it down or a homeless camp popped up in front of our commercial property it may have wiped us out. I sleep like a baby through significant stock market moves but genuine risk in RE gives me heartburn.

I'm all about diversification via low cost equity index funds. And I'd specifically look at funds that have dropped since all of the tariff stuff popped up.

I diversify between large cap/small cap, growth/value, and Domestic/International.

I have one account that is currently showing the following for "year to date"
fund ------------------------ change in value
Intl large cap index fund -- +13.7%
Intl small cap index fund -- +9.5%
emerging market index fund - +5.6%
Dom large cap value index fund - +3.8%
S&P 500 index fund ----------- - 4.7%
Dom Small cap index fund --- - 10.7%

"You have $250k, you don't anticipate needing the capital for 10+ years, where would you invest it?"

SWPPX.

Which is probably the right answer if you have a Schwab account. (it's an S&P 500 index mutual fund)

Or if you have Fidelity then you'd want to use FXAIX

Or if you have Vanguard then you'd want to use VOO or VFIAX

etc...

I wouldn't put any money into stocks right now, unless you plan to babysit it everyday.

With the data centers coming in all over, electricity is crucial. Coal plants coming back. Coal stock, Nextera, Southern Company.
You will see utilities selling bonds to pay for the 500 KV lines to serve the data centers.
Coke Consolidated splitting 10 to 1.

Nope, don't babysit. Fire and forget! At least, if you do index funds. Index funds aren't likely to disappear. Seems unlikely for someone like Apple, Home Depot, etc... to go completely under, but I'm sure that's what the Enron folks thought too. Hence the diversification of a fund that contains stock for hundred of companies.

Buying individual stocks probably gives you the opportunity for larger gains, but also more risk.

Index funds reduce the possible gain, but also greatly reduce the risk. Don't sell if it's down and you haven't lost any money. And by diversifying across multiple classes, you increase the gain and further reduce the risk (based on historic performance).

Do you really think coal is gaining ground? I've been out of energy for a long time, but at the time, the company that I worked for had no coal, and maybe just a handful of oil burning peaker plants (and they only had those due to acquisition).

Ol' Coots shouldn't waste time on such stuff imo... unless yer not into discussing Pies and Rolls on an obcsure corner of Al's 'net with 30 other coots. Yer time is running out!

Bitcoins :)

One year CD's. Small percentage, like 4%. No risk. Easy to cash out. $200,000 in 2 CDs.
Take the $50,000 and get a 996 Turbo.

Stop working two years earlier right now and buy a motorhome

^^ This is the purview of day traders or highly active investors, not index fund investors with a long timeline of over 5 years. Big market moves are essentially driven by one of two things. Irrational exuberance, or irrational fear. We have seen examples of both over the last few weeks.

By investing in index funds you have chosen to ride the tide regardless of daily headlines because you know that the market always goes up over time. Always. It is passive investing, meaning index funds and chill. Daily headlines, market uncertainty, rising interest rates, are just noise and have almost no effect on a long term rising tide greater than 5 years. It requires a stoic determination to ignore headlines and just-keep-swimming, because you know the tide will rise again. If you get out during a volatile down market, you will almost certainly miss the rebound.

Does index fund investing work if you stay in? A long term study was done and found that index funds beat 85% of actively traded funds over a 10 year period. There will always be a few active investors who outperform index funds. Were they really smart or just really lucky? And at what risk? Index fund investing is not for everyone and especially if you emotionally tie your portfolio to sensational daily news stories.

https://themultiplier.substack.com/p/the-great-investment-debate-index

I've made far more money by actively trading than buy the usual "buy and hold."

That said, stocks are also near an all-time high and I tend not to be interested in buying near a high.

Values are so far from making sense on the basis of fundamentals the only real upside pressure comes from the "it will always go up mentality." Will it continue forever? Why?

Lots of moving parts in the geopolitical world right now. I'd argue there are better bets than stock.

As for all of the real estate suggestions, $250k isn't enough, that's not a market I'd want to be in in the next 10 years and my family history of real estate investment suggests other things can do far better.

Just my opinion. He likely will disregard it anyway.

That's a much better version of what I was trying to say.

Not to mention the cost difference between index funds and actively managed funds which are likely at least an order of magnitude different.

Cajun and Steve ain't wrong...
JR ain't wrong ...

I built equity on low cost funds, etc. and even when "I" decided to DIY at 40 with individual stocks ... I did fantastic... I knew tech and was lucky ;). When I left my corp gig in '08 ... BRK was my largest holding and everything was down 40% ... give or take ... BRK underperformed "my way" ... So I sold it and realized all my losses and continued on down the line .... no regerts.

I'll be 65 soon ... not interested in equities any more ... my lo$$ ... and happy in corporate bonds now.... 7% doesn't exactly suck ... not in my "new world" ... James Bond :)

I'll always read JYL's perspective amongst others with great interest ... thanks John!

edited: ^^^ LOL... I am an idiot... JYL isn't here :D

Wrong thread ;)

I’ve been testing out AI routing for professional day traders, and it’s wild how it reorders trade execution priorities based on real-time signal strength and volatility windows. It doesn’t pick trades for you but helps with timing and routing routes across multiple venues. For me, it shaved down slippage noticeably during early-hour scalps and news spikes. Not a silver bullet, but it’s another tool that can tilt the odds your way.

That is what prompted this whole thread. Normally if we have this much cash around we would pick up a rental house, but the market does not feel soft enough right now. We watched a bidding war over a falling down shack this past weekend. Stocks are a huge question mark. We have been keeping a money ball in high yield saving and CDs as good rates pop up. But the money ball is starting to get pretty hefty, I want to find it a good home for a decade.

I have absolutely floated the idea of buying a collector car with the wife, she is having none of it.

If you had invested 250k in gold 2 days ago at the original posting your investment would have appreciated by 22,680 dollars as i speak. And is sure to go up from here