The Writer’s Coin

Nothing.

So far I have done nothing. I’m still impressed with how cool I’ve been throughout the whole thing, especially with all the unrealized losses I have. Granted, I’m young and only started investing a few years ago—so I’m not losing nearly as much as other people are—but it still doesn’t feel good. One of the things that has kept me so level headed is everyone else. When everyone else talks about the markets and how they’re doing and what to do and the panic surrounding the whole thing, I just want to get up and leave the room. I hate talking about things when everyone and their mother is yelling about it. I don’t know what it is, but I have an aversion to talk about whatever is the “it topic” of the moment.

When I was in school and there was a test, people would always walk into the class and start talking about the material. After studying for hours the day before, the last thing I wanted to hear was all of that regurgitated back to me minutes before the test. I hated it. That’s kind of how I feel about all this, even though that’s what I like to read/write about for this site. It’s kind of like when you really love a band that no one knows about and then they go mainstream and everyone knows about them. You kind of stop caring as much because they aren’t your little secret anymore.

Anyway, back to the lecture at hand—the markets. I haven’t done anything. I haven’t taken my money out of the market, I haven’t changed my allocation, I haven’t even bought anything new (except via my 401k). But that’s the one thing I’m looking into: buying more.

I invest exclusively in my Roth IRA, and since I’ve already contributed to the limit for this year, I have to wait until next year to put more money in. This might be a good thing, I don’t know. But I really am getting the itch to dump a good amount of money into the market right now. The inevitable recovery, no matter when it happens, will be a great boon to those that realize this.

But if I had some cash on hand and a little room in my Roth, I would probably buy some more huge chunks of my Vanguard Index funds (US large cap, mid cap, and international stocks) and then watch their REIT index fund like a hawk. I meant to put money in there for a long time though right now I’m glad I didn’t, it has tumbled pretty hard—now may be the right time.

But I have to be honest, there is a certain sense of freedom knowing I can’t do anything until Jan 1. I can plot out a million ideas and things, but I can’t put them into action until then (unless I were to invest in a taxed account). It’s kind of like the trick of waiting a few days before buying something big (like a Wii or an iPhone)—usually it’ll fade away and you’ll have saved your money. Usually.

Hopefully by Jan 1 I’ve burned through all the bad ideas and only the good ones will be left. Then I’ll pounce back into action.

Tags: 401(k), Investing, market, Roth IRA, Stocks, tanking