Guides To Self Improvement

If you are like me, you have enough to do everyday and following the stock market just doesn’t fit into that schedule. Having a basic understanding of investments can provide you with a nice retirement fund or mutual find account. Below, I will outline the two funds which have provided me with an 11% average return over the last 7 years.

In the year 2000, just before the infamous dot com burst, I opened a 401k through the company I worked for at the time. I head read only a handful of books on investing, but one pattern began to emerge as I read them. One was that small businesses grew faster than big businesses and that about 75% of Americans were employed by small businesses. The other was the track record of the S&P 500 index and how over any 20 year period it had not declined. Great, because long term investment, was the bulk of my investment plan.

Armed with this knowledge, I opted to invest 50% of my 401k in the T Rowe Price 500 index fund and the Russell 2000 index fund.

Since then, the only time I have spent with this investment, is when I look at my statements every quarter. Other than that, it’s running on autopilot and since inception and has increased an average of about $10k a year. And should be well past $ 1 million by the time I retire, not bad for a few hours work.