Financialstocks

Many first time investors think that they should invest all of their savings. This isnt necessarily true. To determine how much money you should invest, you must first determine how much you actually can afford to invest, and what your financial goals are.

First, lets take a look at how much money you can currently afford to invest. Do you have savings that you can use? If so, great! However, you dont want to cut yourself short when you tie your money up in an investment. What were your savings originally for?

It is important to keep three to six months of living expenses in a readily accessible savings account dont invest that money! Dont invest any money that you may need to lay your hands on in a hurry in the future.

So, begin by determining how much of your savings should remain in your savings account, and how much can be used for investments. Unless you have funds from another source, such as an inheritance that youve recently received, this will probably be all that you currently have to invest.

Next, determine how much you can add to your investments in the future. If you are employed, you will continue to receive an income, and you can plan to use a portion of that income to build your investment portfolio over time. Speak with a qualified financial planner to set up a budget and determine how much of your future income you will be able to invest.

With the help of a financial planner, you can be sure that you are not investing more than you should or less than you should in order to reach your investment goals.

For many types of investments, a certain initial investment amount will be required. Hopefully, youve done your research, and you have found an investment that will prove to be sound. If this is the case, you probably already know what the required initial investment is.

If the money that you have available for investments does not meet the required initial investment, you may have to look at other investments. Never borrow money to invest, and never use money that you have not set aside for investing!

Each individual has a risk tolerance that should not be ignored. Any good stock broker or financial planner knows this, and they should make the effort to help you determine what your risk tolerance is. Then, they should work with you to find investments that do not exceed your risk tolerance.

Determining ones risk tolerance involves several different things. First, you need to know how much money you have to invest, and what your investment and financial goals are.

For instance, if you plan to retire in ten years, and youve not saved a single penny towards that end, you need to have a high risk tolerance because you will need to do some aggressive risky investing in order to reach your financial goal.

On the other side of the coin, if you are in your early twenties and you want to start investing for your retirement, your risk tolerance will be low. You can afford to watch your money grow slowly over time.

Realize of course, that your need for a high risk tolerance or your need for a low risk tolerance really has no bearing on how you feel about risk. Again, there is a lot in determining your tolerance.

For instance, if you invested in the stock market and you watched the movement of that stock daily and saw that it was dropping slightly, what would you do?

Would you sell out or would you let your money ride? If you have a low tolerance for risk, you would want to sell out if you have a high tolerance, you would let your money ride and see what happens. This is not based on what your financial goals are. This tolerance is based on how you feel about your money!

Again, a good financial planner or stock broker should help you determine the level of risk that you are comfortable with, and help you choose your investments accordingly.

Your risk tolerance should be based on what your financial goals are and how you feel about the possibility of losing your money. Its all tied in together.