Investing

Lending Club has been sweeping the investment world – and the borrowing universe – at the same time. And why not? Who wouldn’t be interested in a financial facility that enables investors to earn more than the going rate on their money, while borrowers pay less? Lending Club is an online peer-to-peer (P2P) lending platform that takes the banker out of banking. Investors lend money directly to borrowers through the site, enabling both to benefit from the rate of interest that’s established for each loan. And just as important, the entire transaction happens online, eliminating the need for sometimes embarrassing face-to-face meetings that are common with bank loans. It’s a win-win as both investor and borrower benefit from the Lending Club

There are a lot of tools out there to track your investments. One of my favorites is Personal Capital. It offers a free online financial dashboard that automatically tracks your investments and your spending. Today I have another option for you–a free spreadsheet that tracks your investments and tells you when it’s time to rebalance your portfolio. I have to give a BIG thank you to a reader named Dan. He built this spreadsheet and shared it with me weeks ago. With his permission, I’ve created a copy and am sharing it with you today. Thanks, Dan! The Spreadsheet To start, you can see the spreadsheet by clicking here. It is build in Google Sheets. When you go to the spreadsheet, you’ll see

Several friends have recently contacted me about their retirement accounts. They are planning to retire and want to rollover their 401k to an IRA. So far, so good. While they managed their 401k for decades, however, they are uncomfortable managing the rollover IRA. The combination of a lot of money to manage and the consequences if they get it wrong makes them squeamish about investing on their own during their golden years. So they wanted my view on the cost of hiring an investment advisor. The costs ranged from 1.5{7dabfd103aa443fce219eea47f0f346a11a54ce587a1a0cbb74f06b9f7a304ca} to 2.0{7dabfd103aa443fce219eea47f0f346a11a54ce587a1a0cbb74f06b9f7a304ca} of assets under management (called AUM in the business). Are these costs a big deal? No. They are freaking huge deal. Investment fees are always, always, always a big deal, but that’s never more true

After the stock market closed on Friday, my portfolio was at an all-time high. That was likely also the case for a lot of investors living in the United States who are similar to me: earning income, investing in the stock market with a buy-and-hold strategy for the future, and leaving money invested during the stickier economic times. Continuing to invest in the stock market throughout the recent recession was an essential part of long-term success with investing. Not all investors had this luxury, as the recession hit hard. Many workers lost their job and their income at the same time investing in the stock market was crucial for eventually receiving those promised long-term average returns. According to a new survey, more

Best Buy, the big box retailer that most shoppers have abandoned sometime in the last decade and a half in favor of Amazon.com, announced better-than-expected earnings for the last three months of 2014, which includes the all-important holiday season. The announcement sent the financial media into a frenzy, as many had all but dismissed Best Buy, even after positive results from the third quarter of 2014. To exemplify Best Buy’s performance and overall sentiment at that time, the Motley Fool presented this five-year chart, comparing Best Buy’s stock price changes over that particular time to the performance of the S&P 500, a popular benchmark for stocks. Here we have a stock that returned -10.9{7dabfd103aa443fce219eea47f0f346a11a54ce587a1a0cbb74f06b9f7a304ca} while the rest of the stock market returned

Over the years, I haven’t been too kind to the best-selling author, Robert Kiyosaki. He’s certainly built a successful empire, and a large community people respect him for his business acumen, his willingness to try or to appear to try to help others, and his advice. However, I’ve always found his advice thin at best and dangerous at worst. I received his latest book, Second Chance: For Your Money, Your Life, and Our World, and before opening the book to the first page, I decided to give Kiyosaki his own second chance — and read the book with an open mind. His publisher probably didn’t read my previous commentary before offering to send me a copy for review. I read the entire