Originally Posted by Led Zep

T.D.,

Personally, I would absolutely pay it off. Once you do it is 100% yours! It is only transportation, so if it is reliable then pay it off and plan on keeping it for a long, long time. Take the equivalent of your ex-car payment and save it in an interest-bearing account. When the time comes to replace the car, then take some of that money (notice I said some) and pay cash for your next one. You'll never have a car payment again. Also, it's much easier to negotiate a price when you are a cash buyer.

Originally Posted by ToiletDuck

Thing is I pay about 6.5% on the car meanwhile I'm at about 608%, as of this morning, on investments in my savings. If I paid the rest of the $12k off on the vehicle that would be $12k less that I have to invest with. Today I purchased 450 shares of Bank of America at $27.40 and picked up a few OCT. Call options for [email protected]. I purchased a thousand of those(so $2860+fees). Last I checked they were trading around $3.30(were at $4 earlier) so even if I sold now they'd pull15% or $3300(of course before fees). After the trade fees plus the $1 per contract I purchased that would be roughly $400 which is already more than my car payment. I haven't checked what the new rates are at but with the feds down at 2%, still eyeballing 1.75% or less I don't care what you read, I could possibly refinance it with my same credit union for another 5yrs from current date at the lower rate. By doing this I can pay the same payment I currently am, pay lower in interest, and pay the car off quicker because more of the payment amount would be going towards the principal of the car. IE if you pay $300 now, refinance to $250 but still pay $300 that's an extra $50 going to the princ. each time thus paying it off faster.

The real pain here is that I don't make much as an FO. Because of this I've used investing as more of a money maker than a value builder. Like I said I've manage to rival my FO pay with it. I've probably cashed about 1/3rd out to help with the QOL I'm use to then put the rest aside. Once I upgrade, if ever, I won't actually need the money as much then I can build a half decent portfolio with %'s spread across multiple funds and let them grow instead of this buying and selling I do all the time. I'm actually thinking about changing brokers since I'm paying $9.99 per trade + $1 per contract. I figure I've given them about $25k or so in transaction fees this year lol. Would be nice if I could have kept some of that.


***EDIT*** While sharebuilder has been an easy way to get the ball rolling I've been reading reviews and it appears tradeking.com is the best online brokerage. I'm going to move my assets over that way. $4.95 a trade and $.65per contract is a lot better than the 9.95 and 1.0 I pay at sharebuilder.

Originally Posted by Led Zep

I guess that could work too.

There are a couple of ways to look at it. First, from my perspective is to attain a goal of not owing anyone any money. That is more from a personal peace stance.

The second way is the approach you have taken. It appears that you have done and continue to do well in trades and investments (btw, congrats - good job!). While you have a car payment, it sounds like your investing has afforded you enough cash on the asset side of your balance sheet to more than offset it. In other words, your car is paid for. If you had to, you could pay it off in a hurry if you needed too.

Originally Posted by ToiletDuck

I could pay it off. Yesterday I was on the front side of the shorts and today I cashed in on my Calls when things bumbed from the Feds pumping more cash into the system as well as the ban on naked short selling. Ended up doing well. As of right now I'm out and have to wait the three days for the funds to settle so can transfer over TradeKing. After having setup an account with them I highly recommend the place. Decent money market yield on funds, cheap trades, VERY community oriented, and well organized. Many tools available for those that need them. TradeKing is miles ahead of sharebuilder and if it wasn't for the incredible customer service I get with TDameritrade I'd shift that account too. I also use one or two of TDs programs. If you're looking for place to start a new account I highly recommend TK. I've used TD, E*trade(horribly slow posting orders so flux in price can kill you), Zecco(don't even get me started), and sharebuilder and TK looks to be a great product.

Originally Posted by beechbum

I guess I'll chime in. You make it sound as if you don't have any money now. It is hard to invest when you don't have anything to invest. With that being said, you need to take some part of each paycheck and invest it in your 401k (if there is a company match) or a Roth IRA (considering your income is low). Diversify. Invest consistently through good markets and bad markets. Take emotion out of your decisions and don't follow the news reports about what is the next hot stock or that you should sell all your equities and buy gold. As you get pay raises, add to your investments. Invest for the long term. Never buy a complete position at a single time. Invest over a period of time. Accept the fact that you will never buy anything at its lowest point, and you will never sell anything at it highest point.

If you can't afford to invest, you are living outside of your means. If you feel that you are living within your means, but still can't afford to invest, that is just the way the cookie crumbles sometimes. Hopefully soon you can afford to invest.

In todays economy, prices are low and a good time to start investing. Will the market continue to fall...probably; but who knows how much. Will it recover? Absolutly! Once again, be patient, stick with quality investments (don't speculate, or try to pick the next hot stock) and invest for the long term, not what you think is going to happen tomorrow or next month.

It helps if you set goals for what you want to accomplish with your investments. Is it retirement? If so, what do you want to do with your retirement? Figure out how much it will cost to accomplish what you want in retirement in todays dollars and then you can get an idea of how much you need to retire with. Then you can get an estimate of how much you need to set back each month. The more you can invest early, the more you will have at retirement because it will compound. Compounding is an amazing concept, and it works well. It has made a lot of people rich! Think of it this way, if you worked your Jr. and Sr. year in high school, invested $100 per week for those 2 years, you would end up a millionaire before turning 65 without ever investing another dollar. That is based on an average return of 7% per year which should be easily achieved with disciplined investing. You can find calculators online that you can determine the "cost of waiting" to start investing at different ages. It will open your eyes.

Hope this helps some.

Originally Posted by Adobo

Thanks for the slap in the face! lol.