30k to invest?? what to do..

TheRock

Alright All, First time poster in this forum.
A very general question I know, and probably hard to answer without knowing what I want to get from it, but here goes.

I have about 30k-35k to invest from a house sale a couple of years back. Its been sitting in my account now for about 18 months and I feel I should invest it somehow. Whats my best options??
Put it back into property? (If so where?)
Stock plan? (I'm not into playing stocks/shares, know little about them myself.)
Anything else??

I dont really have an immediate need for the money, and would like to build it into something. I'm not adverse to a bit of risk (like a gamble). Dont really have a pension plan:eek: .

Any help/advice appreciated...

Sonderval

Hey,

I think the first question I'd ask is what your appetite for risk is? Are you risk averse or do you mind putting some of this money on the line? This frequently ties in with your age too, as younger investors are more risk orientated. A good strategy, low risk investment portfolio would be to diversify your cash in various investment vehicles like Mutual Funds, Exchange Traded Funds, Stocks and bonds. The amount placed into each category is dependant upon your risk tolerance.

I know some of these you may not of heard of before, so I highly recommend googling them and seeing for yourself what they are all about.

As for investing in property, perhaps in some emerging market abroad, but I would be against investing in Ireland at the moment.

dewsbury

Skip Irish property.
Strong suspicion that we are at the early stage of a mini-crash.

Theory:

Irish property is forecast to rise 3-4%. This means that (with stamp duty) an investor would have to wait perhaps 4 to 5 years to break even.
This will lead the investors to fade away from the market.
They represent a huge percentage of buyers.
So therefore big drop in buyers = big drop in price.

..just an (very experienced) amateurs view..

Skip property generally - don't buy a house from a cowboy in the Red Cow hotel.
A friend of my wifes set up a company selling property in Bulgaria. ... all great to begin with ...then he announces he is getting out .... god knows what happened to the people who bought from him..

electrode

Hey,

I see you may want to avoid stocks and shares.But if you're looking for something that may be a little risky but looking very promising for the near (and distant) future-Uranium is the next big thing...

Nuclear energy is about to take off dramatically. Notably, England is expected to develop nuclear as a source of power soon and Europe will soon follow France's example. Prices have doubled in a year.

SXR and UrAsia just merged (creating world's second-largest uranium producer) so they are a good buy...

Some people seem to have conscience issues with this but its helping replace fossil fuels so in my opinion it's all good.

Just a thought,

e

pipraider

Equaly valid in a corollary is to say that Gold is rising vs gov't fiats currencies.
When investors get suspicious of CBs/governments and have low confidence in the "authorities", investors can push the fiat curriencies to lose value against gold or other tangible assets. History teaches us that "authorities" can also, at times, get really nasty and forcibly separate non-believers in "authority" from their physical assests, sometimes "with extreme predjudice".

All currencies have been falling against Gold..Euro is one of them too..And that is the trend now..If we pretend to be speculators following a trend, that is the trend we should be in now..

http://www.gold-eagle.com/gold_digest_05/stott062906.html

http://www.gold-eagle.com/gold_digest_05/stott062206.html

http://www.gold-eagle.com/gold_digest_05/stott051206.html

My opinion is that by year's end we will see $25 silver and $1,000 gold

www.amark.com

-d-

PDelux

But if you're looking for something that may be a little risky but looking very promising for the near (and distant) future-Uranium is the next big thing...

Nuclear energy is about to take off dramatically. Notably, England is expected to develop nuclear as a source of power soon and Europe will soon follow France's example. Prices have doubled in a year.

That is interesting to look at alright.
But the hot commodity right now is corn. Check out the charts. It is because of the push towards biofuels such as ethanol. Bush's energy policy is geared towards this and other countries including Ireland have set targets towards moving to biofuels. (see yesterdays Irish Times)

It looks like corn is being bid up by speculators like oil last year, but simply there is not enough supply for the demand, esp. in US. It is also volatile like oil because of weather conditions and unstability in countries where it is grown.

My interests in it are indirectly through shares i own in a fertilizer company which is benefitting from the increase in demand for corn and other crops.

hmmm

Like Sonderval said you'd need to figure out what your attitude to risk is. If you absolutely need to capital guaranteed, keep it in the bank.

For a normal punter, I'd say you should decide on maybe a Quinn Life allocation across a couple of funds and then dribble in 500 quid a month into this fund. That spreads your risk across multiple investment locations and also spreads your timing risk (if the market tanks tomorrow you're not fully invested).

dogball

use the money to acquire a mortgage to buy in the North of ireland
you will need to borrow up there so they can use the purchase property
as security
the BoI can arrange this for you
watch your investment grow

TheRock

Any advice of specific locations Dogball??
Sounds interesting,
I'm somewhat relunctant to buy a pure investment property aboard, purely due to lack of knowlegle of property law in those countries.

Kinetic^

Aye NI had the highest appreciation of any european country, I think Denmark were 2nd (if not 3rd).

hmmm

Kenny 5 wrote:

Aye NI had the highest appreciation of any european country, I think Denmark were 2nd (if not 3rd).

Is this supposed to be a good thing? Would you rather invest in something when it was expensive or when it was cheap?

Kinetic^

Just because you buy something cheap doesn't mean it's going to appreciate. NI has done well and there doesn't seem to be any sign of possible crash like here so it would be wise to look into it further.

krille

Might not be for everybody but have a look at this:

www.prolan-invest.com

Regards,
Krille

westside

i would look at quinnlife freeway funds. they preform fairly well and are reasonable on entry and exit fees. i havent put any money there yet but might do when the old ssia matures:) .
i would also stay away from property at the moment unless you want to sit on it for a while. The rental marktet is strong and rents are on the way up but i dont see much value around. yields are still very low. Stay away from foreign property...too much hassle. if you do look at stocks, seek professional advice and the way the markets are at the moment you might be better off in a high interest account from rabo or halifax. it probably would be a good idea to diversify in a number of asset classes.

Sony

Invest it in equities-Bank of Ireland Life have a product called smart funds-its a minimum 5k entry...obv theres no gaurantee with any investment but these have historically proven to do well over long periods of time-say 7years...the markets are currently volatile and look as though they will start to pick up shortly...great time to invest right now as you can aquire "units" at a lesser price due to the volatility and you should see a very good return on this when the markets start their recoverery process;)