What Would You Do?

We aren't of the same generation, Silverhawk, but I can really relate to your story. My grand parents passed on in the mid 1980s but they were some real salt-of-the-Earth type people. Not well educated but wise in the ways of the world and extremely hard working.

My step-Dad is 85 now and always invested in CDs. I tried a number of times to talk him into buying stocks or mutual funds but he would never go for it. Well, last spring he had a $100k CD come due and they offered him the amazing rate of 1.5% for 1-year. At that point he realized that CDs were simply not paying enough to invest in them until the interest rates perk up a bit. He made me a deal. If I would invest the money for him, we would split the profits. I would have done it for nothing but it meant a lot to him for this to be a partnership. I invested the money in 2 dividend paying mutual funds and 5 major US companies that have a strong dividend record. His account is up more than 12% since last June and he could not be happier. I fully realize that this is not money that can be invested in anything that isn't pretty conservative, so have protected the stocks with trailing stops that adjust upwards as the stocks rise. The mutual funds cannot use trailing stops, so I keep a close eye on their value and will sell if it looks as if a pull-back is occurring. Even if my step-Dad can't invest on his own, he knows that I can and have done it successfully for over 30 years. Best of all, he also knows that I will never put him in an inappropriate investment or churn the account to raise my fees. I am just glad that he has opened up to a larger investing world than CDs. They have their place but putting 100% of his money in them is really not a very good investing plan.

Oh, yeah... to keep this all on topic... no silver or gold for this fellow. Some juicy profits could be made there but the risk is WAY more than an 85 year old gentleman should be taking with his money, even if it is only 10% of his net investable worth.

My grand father made it all the way through the 8th grade, so perhaps that was a pretty decent education for them thar days? Lots of other folks had less than that because everyone in a family but the toddlers, infants, and really old folks had to work to support the family.



Well, that;s the thing about people. We all do pretty much what we HAVE to do. I mowed and trimmed lawns as a kid to earn spending money. Worked at that all summer long, with some afternoons off to play baseball or go fishing. Wife and I have lived in a very nice neighborhood since 1994 and not one single kid has ever come by to see if they could mow our lawn for a few bucks. Be glad to pay it to get the grass shorter and maybe some character built in a youngster. No luck so far, though.



Yes, it is good that he is seeing the light in terms of investing. Perhaps after some successful investing he will want to branch out even a little further with some PMs. He has plenty of silver but no gold, so maybe that would be an option.



Yeah, there IS a bit of that going on around here!

Yeah. About the only thing they are not protected from is laziness... and that path definitely leads to the dark side of life.

Never realized that's where forn collectors came from.