Great post as always. I have an amateurish question I wonder if you will entertain and if not some other users may chime in with opinions. If I have a mortgage, credit cards, two incomes (me/wife=Nurses) and own more than a couple pounds of silver, food, water, coinage, cash $, and roughly $2,000 in crypto, and say I have income of $3200 net after all bills are paid per month what is the starting amount I should put into the stock/bond market before fees/transaction costs/taxes make it a poor decision. Asking because I have made trades in the past good and bad and seen profits eaten up by fees etc. What should I put in to avoid these small but annoying reductions in profit? Thanks for any advice.
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Here is my comment/advice. You do not mention how much experience you have, so I am going to try flying blind. First, if you don't have much experience, the truth is that getting it is going to cost you money. The least painful loss is to lose Monopoly money. You can "play trade" with play cash on a few different websites. This is the best, yet most often ignored advice out there. Second, my advice on the minimum cash to start with is $5,000 minimum. This way, you can invest part in stocks and keep some cash set back for bargain days like today (the market had a ~300 point drop).
Whatever starting amount you decide is right, you can test out your decision with paper money to see just how right you are without wasting your hard earned cash. If it turns out you are wrong on the initial amount, no harm done. Adjust your amount and try again.
Great advice. Reminds me of High School Accounting class when we picked stocks with $5,000 in fake money and tracked it throughout the semester. But there was no eTrade back then haha. All I know is I came out ahead buying Viacom, RIM and Amazon. Those were the days... Thanks fkr the reply and time spent doing so. UPVOTE & FOLLOWED!