Post: #26

I'd put a significant amount of that in index funds. Vanguard is great and easy to manage yourself.

Post: #27

OP, it's hard to say without knowing your plans and legal status when you get to Medellin - can you even buy property there as a foreigner? If so how much have you researched this possibility? As others mentioned, if you don't plan on living there you probably shouldn't buy, but real estate can be a solid investment if you get something you can rent out or partially rent out (roommate situation).

Since you're already an EU citizen did you consider Spain? It's relatively cheap for Western Europe and you can live & work there legally.

100k isn't exactly life changing money, but it can go far if you minimize your expenses. I think if you have $25k in the bank you can stay in Thailand long term, maybe get a job doing something basic and live cheap quite a while while banging bitches (and not all of them are prostitutes, BTW). All kinds of possibilities but at your age and that savings level you still have a lot of road ahead of you.

Post: #28

Geez, I read about bitcoin first on this forum before they talk about it on the news. (It was like $100 back then?)
Several years passed by, I thought it was too late to buy. If you bought it early this year, you could make 5 times.......

Post: #29

I think its difficult to give OP any specific recommendations without knowing more about his overall financial situation in regards to his risk profile or if he needs the money now.

Some general thoughts:

If you have an online business you could invest this money into improving your business or possibly acquiring another business in a similar market to your own as it would be in your field of competence.

Depending on your skill level you might be wise to invest in education/ training to learn new skills to help you earn more money or grow your business.

You could use the majority of the money and invest it in a low cost, broad market equity index fund with the goal of never touching it for the next 30 years. The benefits of this approach would be you would no longer have to ever worry about saving for retirement as the compounding of 100k over 30 years with dividends reinvested would create millions of dollars.

You could also depending on your risk profile be a contrarian investor and buy specific equities or into sectors of the economy which are in a bear market. The commodity market as a whole, and in particular precious metals and precious metals mining companies, are very unloved by investors right now. With this approach you are buying low with a limited possibility of it going lower and a lot of upside potential.
For further insight into this investing philiosophy check out The Dhando Investor.

Post: #30

(06-14-2017 08:14 PM)Australia Sucks Wrote:  due to the shitty economy in Brazil, in some of the smaller cities you could buy a small house/cottage walking distance to an amazing beach for that price.

Disclosure: I have not been to Brazil

Post: #31

https://youtu.be/NFTaiWInZ44?t=2m18s

My response to a huge a mount of answers, thanks guys.

(06-14-2017 02:13 PM)Repo Wrote:  Your current income and income after your move will likely have significant relevance to the answer you are seeking.

At the moment I could live in most EE, SEA or SA countries by working 1 month a year on my offshore oil and gas job and running my daygame and instagram coaching businesses.

So my income is flexible it is more if I work more, it is less if I work less.

(06-14-2017 02:13 PM)booshala Wrote:  Use it for additional funding to scale your business to the next step. I'm all about living on passive income if possible, but $100k isn't a big enough war chest to provide a livable stream of income.

Thanks for this. This is an idea I never had, to invest it in building a business. In my current blog and coaching business I can only see it being used to invest in advertisement, but in case of E-commerce business it could be invested in creating a product or even hiring people.

I did not look at this money as a retirement capital, but it is a beginning part of it.

(06-14-2017 02:25 PM)LouEvilSlugger Wrote:  Only invest in real estate if you see yourself living there.

Only invest in crypto if you understand what you're investing in.

This is the case, I travelled extensively and Medellin is one of the places where I see myself living in. I could travel around a bit more, before I made the decision, but keeping the money in a bank account and let it inflate and lose value does not seem like a good idea.

(06-14-2017 02:38 PM)Digimata Wrote:  Vinny, without a risk tolerance assessment and you telling us what you want in life it is very hard to make good suggestions.

If you want to move to Colombia to base a SA business out of, that response is very different than what you would get if you wanted to move there for just a few years and bang bitches then go back to EE.

Also, you need to give us a risk level you have a hard limit on that you can lose all that capital and still sleep at night(10, 20, 30% etc).

I already mentioned that my risk level is low, I would prefer less out of this money for less risk, this is why I was looking into RE.

As of my plans, well I am not really sure myself. I can see myself living in Colombia during European winters and living in EE during European summers.

(06-14-2017 02:51 PM)rottenapple Wrote:  Let's go to shittiest places in the world (Africa+Venezuela) and start investing for cheap with high risk and meanwhile also fuck high risk girls. We will either become rich and legendary by 35 or we write a book after our glorious attempt that failed but was still highly entertaining at 40 years old and become rich of of that with a small delay.

We might also die or catch aids, but everyone dies eventually and there will be a cure for aids in the next 10 years, so thats ok.

Venesuela is always on my mind, but I would wait just a bit more. I don't like your die young attitude though. We need to talk about it next time we meet

(06-14-2017 07:48 PM)Kona Wrote:  You'll have one dollar left,, unless you can talk them down:

http://www.boattrader.com/listing/2007-s...-102801593

That's a Seaswirl 3301. They don't get any better. Invest in your lifestyle.

And stay away from that bitcoin stuff. I talked to a financial guy who told me a million different ways it could fail.

Aloha!

This is another great idea that never popped into my mind. However I work in the sea so I avoid it when I am off the work. I know a guy who bought a Marina in South America, this could be a good investment, but I would need a bit more money.

@AustraliaSucks:
Investing in European stocks is another idea I never had, but something tells me to stay away from Europe and euro. The future does not seem bright. This is why I want to take my money to some country which is growing.

(06-14-2017 07:59 PM)Brodiaga Wrote:  How difficult it is for you to invest in stocks? Can you buy low Vanguard index funds such as VTSAX (US total stock market fund)? If not, what is the closest alternative? What is the expense ratio per year? VTSAX is 0.04%, for example. Any hidden fees, etc?

Many people in places like Eastern Europe and Asia prefer investing in real estate as opposed to stocks because investing in stocks is difficult, expensive and not popular among their peers.

How much interest can you get from a savings account in your home country? In the US, it's negligible at the moment, but there are countries where you can get pretty good returns.

I agree that buying an apartment only makes sense if you intend to live there long term. Even if you do, you need to research the local market and do a lot of due diligence.

If you intend to move to Medellin, perhaps you can put your money in savings accounts if you can get reasonably high rates. In the meantime, spend some time renting in Medellin, talking to expats and locals and looking for good deals. As soon as you find a great deal, take the money out (even if you lose some of the interest) and buy an apartment. If you decide not to buy an apartment, there is always an option to invest in stocks. If you like to gamble, you can buy crypto currencies too, just don't call it investing because it's not.

Putting money on savings account is not an option, rates are negligible not even covering for inflation.

Buying stocks is possible, but it is a complicated process with a lot of fees it also means a lot of studying for me before I am able to do this.

@Laner: Nice to see that investment payed off. I hope to replicate your success!

(06-14-2017 11:36 PM)SlickyBoy Wrote:  OP, it's hard to say without knowing your plans and legal status when you get to Medellin - can you even buy property there as a foreigner? If so how much have you researched this possibility? As others mentioned, if you don't plan on living there you probably shouldn't buy, but real estate can be a solid investment if you get something you can rent out or partially rent out (roommate situation).

Since you're already an EU citizen did you consider Spain? It's relatively cheap for Western Europe and you can live & work there legally.

100k isn't exactly life changing money, but it can go far if you minimize your expenses. I think if you have $25k in the bank you can stay in Thailand long term, maybe get a job doing something basic and live cheap quite a while while banging bitches (and not all of them are prostitutes, BTW). All kinds of possibilities but at your age and that savings level you still have a lot of road ahead of you.

I did think about Spain and Portugal, but as I said before I think it Europe is not the best place to invest and that there are bunch of trends that show the decline of europe in the long run. Another reason I would prefer Colombia over Spain is the fact that it is still a pussy paradise. And yes I would like to live in Colombia, and live in a property I buy at least half of every year.

I investigated a bit about buying property in Colombia and I know several people who went through this process.

(06-15-2017 12:08 AM)bacon Wrote:  I think its difficult to give OP any specific recommendations without knowing more about his overall financial situation in regards to his risk profile or if he needs the money now.

Some general thoughts:

If you have an online business you could invest this money into improving your business or possibly acquiring another business in a similar market to your own as it would be in your field of competence.

Depending on your skill level you might be wise to invest in education/ training to learn new skills to help you earn more money or grow your business.

You could use the majority of the money and invest it in a low cost, broad market equity index fund with the goal of never touching it for the next 30 years. The benefits of this approach would be you would no longer have to ever worry about saving for retirement as the compounding of 100k over 30 years with dividends reinvested would create millions of dollars.

You could also depending on your risk profile be a contrarian investor and buy specific equities or into sectors of the economy which are in a bear market. The commodity market as a whole, and in particular precious metals and precious metals mining companies, are very unloved by investors right now. With this approach you are buying low with a limited possibility of it going lower and a lot of upside potential.
For further insight into this investing philiosophy check out The Dhando Investor.

A lot of good ideas.

Investing in career is a good idea, but I am trying to move away from conventional work in order to rest more and work less.

As of investing and not touching money for 30 years I don't like this option. I would prefer it to start getting some returns in the nearest future.

Thanks for the link I will have a read!

Post: #32

(06-15-2017 02:35 AM)Vinny Wrote:  I already mentioned that my risk level is low, I would prefer less out of this money for less risk, this is why I was looking into RE.
(...)
As of investing and not touching money for 30 years I don't like this option. I would prefer it to start getting some returns in the nearest future.

I am in a similar situation now, with 100k savings. The problem in whatever investment is that the higher the chances, the higher the risk. Sure you can invest in Bitcoin in the hopes of doubling your money within two months but you might as well lose most of your investment. Low yield german government bonds on the other hand bring you negative return on investment but risk of losing money near zero percent.

As for me, I bought shares for 50k (I'm stock picking). I get 2% dividends after tax, that's 1000$ per year. Nice to have but that's not real income. The other 50k I'm spending for travel.
Downside is that one day I'm out of money and need to work again.

Post: #33

Right now since you are unsure I would invest in ETF or Index Fund that are highly liquid while earning a return, which still bears risk but is one of the lowest in financial instruments. Up to you if you want to invest 100% in something you don't really know. Investing in the stock market or any market imo should be a one year research not just a parking bay for your cash. Its two options you can go LONG, which is investing into the market and not care about it in 10-30 years and earn dividends and capital gains or go short just for the liquidity and then take the money to invest in something later.

I would go with investing more into your business to earn extra income maybe 20% of your total. Use the 80% for emergency or something that is risk-free that earns a return beating inflation (most likely etf or index fund). You would really need $1m at least to get into real shit.

Post: #34

Treasury bills.
I read that some poorer EU countries like Poland have high discount rates for their treasury bills. Think +13% return on investment -risk free.

You could also decide to invest in yourself and learn to trade from someone offering a trading mentorship program online. Check out http://www.bijantrades.com

Post: #35

You could a Paul Singer and buy some Venezuelan debt, if Maduro defaults....just do what Singer did with Argentina.

Quote:Elliott Management is perhaps most notorious for its 15-year battle with the government of Argentina, whose bonds were owned by the hedge fund. When Argentine president Cristina Kirchner attempted to restructure the debt, Elliott—unlike most of the bonds’ owners—refused to accept a large loss on its investment. It successfully sued in US courts, and in pursuit of Argentine assets, convinced a court in Ghana to detain an Argentine naval training vessel, then docked outside Accra with a crew of 22o. After a change of its government, Argentina eventually settled and Singer’s fund received $2.4 billion, almost four times its initial investment. Kirchner, meanwhile, has been indicted for corruption.

Post: #36

I hear Georgian Banks offer pretty sweet returns.

"Georgia is amazing from a business standpoint. Normal people walking into banks off the street are getting 10-12% return on a 1 year CD in a bank with a $10,000 USD deposit. If you invest $50,000 USD you can basically write your own ticket for 15% on a CD. It is not unreasonable because the bank will loan that currency out again at 30% interest on a loan to a private person. And yes the banks are safe here, they are backed by the government and the US has their hands on the puppet strings of Georgia."

https://www.singledudetravel.com/2016/12...i-georgia/

Post: #37

(06-14-2017 02:00 PM)Vinny Wrote:  a) Buy an apartment in Medellin - because I would love to live there.
b) Invest money in stocks (pain in the ass process for a European)
c) Buy and hold bunch of cryptocurrency.
d) Mix of those 70%- a, 30% b and c.

I have been avoiding stocks for some time as I think they are overpriced. I'm waiting for the next crash before I buy. Personally I'd go for crypto. I started buying when it was about $60, but have missed out on this wave, while my friend has pushed 7 figures sitting at home while becoming an obese nerd. Right now I am holding a lot of the more promising smaller ones with good development teams:

LBRY credits, HumanIQ, Golos, maybe Lisk, Ubiq, Storjcoin, Synero, maybe Counterparty, maybe Swarn City, WeTrust, BitBay, Burst, Edgeless, Token Card, Shift.

Theses are some more obscure ones:

https://coinmarketcap.com/assets/qwark/
https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/sequence/
https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/parkbyte/
https://coinmarketcap.com/assets/tokes/
https://coinmarketcap.com/assets/apx/
https://coinmarketcap.com/assets/safe-exchange-coin/
https://coinmarketcap.com/assets/incent/

Then there are new coins you can buy listed here:

https://cointelegraph.com/ico-calendar

Crypto is having a nice crash now:



If that RSI goes towards 30 on one week it will be a case of backing the truck up. I've been waiting for blood in the streets for some time. Although I think we could be having a big correction here, the interest in crypto is becoming more intense and we are starting to see the potential for a real crypto economy now, as opposed to people just holding. Most of crypto is essentially junk and the only reason people are buying is to sell to someone else at a later date for more. Virtually no one is using crypto as currency. It's a bubble, but one I think will keep going for years until a horrible dot-com style implosion.

----

Another thing I would recommend having a look at is lending out USD on Bitfinex:

https://support.bitfinex.com/hc/en-us/ar...n-Funding-

This is where you lend your dollars out for daily interest. There is a feature that you can use to auto-loan your money out at the market rate. If you were loaning out your $110,000 on there right now you'd be getting about $160 / day interest at the start of the month and $170 / day at the end of the month with compound interest.

Right now the interest rates are at pretty high levels. I don't know how that will last, but I've been using this for about two years as a way to offset my cash spending.

Inside the Bitfinex system, it's safe, as soon as the person you loan to can't possibly pay back the loan, they get liquidated and your money will be returned to you. However, if Bitfinex get hacked (again) who know how much money you will loose and how long it may take to get it back. But the guys who run it are very professional and transparent. They handled the last $37 million hack well and have been able to reimburse all those losses. But essentially any assets held on a crypto exchange are subject to disappearing with little chance of restitution.

That could always be a blessing in disguise though. I lost $18,000+ on the Mt. Gox hack, chances are I will end up getting a lot more USD value back in the end if BTC continues going up.

----

On stocks, on a long term basis I am looking at buying precious metal mining stocks. I failed to buy in Aug 2015 and they've gone up about 500-1000% since then.

Post: #38

How much does a pad in Colombia cost?

I though the acronym for owning a boat was Bring out another thousand.

I say stay away from stocks.

Bitcoin dropped $500 in one day last week, so I would stay away from that as well.

Post: #39

(06-15-2017 02:59 PM)rudebwoy Wrote:  How much does a pad in Colombia cost?

http://www.globalpropertyguide.com/Latin...ter-prices
http://www.globalpropertyguide.com/Europ...ter-prices

Post: #40

Buy a house / apartment near local tourist areas, make it nice and AirBNB it out for revenue stream purposes.

Post: #41

I live in a major part of the city. I live in 1 bed apt and I can charge $40 a night for a living room. So I can pull about $1000 a month.

To buy this kind of condo, it will cost about $250k at lowest. If you live there and let someone sleep in the living room, I guess you can cover the mortgage no problem.

If you rent out the whole thing, you can charge $80 a night but you will have to be a maid as well. (when you are there, they will leave just as it was. They even leave the blanket, towels folded. But when you are not there, god knows what they will do with their partner? )

(06-15-2017 04:23 PM)Putin Closes Wrote:  Buy a house / apartment near local tourist areas, make it nice and AirBNB it out for revenue stream purposes.

Post: #42

It's a dilemma I was faced with in my 20s. I chose not to invest and regret it. I'd have quadrupled my portfolio in ten years. I think you should invest the majority.

It's easy to find ways to spend money if you have it. Lock it up then force yourself to be frugal and creative.

Post: #43

Real estate. You shouldgo into debt and leverage the 100k into 500k buying a building. Make it that if the interest rate goes up your able to pay it. Fed is raiising rates. Forget about stocks they are overvalued by any metric. There's 50/50 bitcoins are tulips.

Post: #44

One thing I have thought about buying is grains, which have had a really bad time for the last 8-9 years. Here is an ETF:

http://www.nasdaq.com/symbol/jjg/stock-c...lldown=off

Seems like a pretty good long-term bet and it did well in the 07-08 crash, so maybe also a good hedge against everything else.

Post: #45

Troller I suspect that for the O.P. with his main source of income being seasonal contract work, it would not be easy for him to get a bank loan of any significance even if he wished to.

Post: #46

Buy 5 used bobcat skidsteers, and rent them out for 250 a day. Take the other 50k and save it for repairs.

It's a good way to make 2-3k a week.

Post: #47

Vinny,

Been thinking about your post for a couple of days.

Here are some general thoughts on investing that I have learned over the years and then a couple of specific questions. I understand that you want some cash flow and not waiting 30 years. I am sharing this with everyone. I understand your situation is also different than other guys (your work/talents)

1) Sell a perfectly good asset only after considerable thought
2) Time is your friend when it comes to investing
3) Investments are like children, you care for them when you are younger. They take care of you when you are older - I know a lot of guys might not want to hear that
4) Play now, work later. Work now, play later - whatever you do last, you do longest
5) Desperation/fear are terrible motivators for investment decisions. Sometimes, we so want to get on the with the fun or to the stop the pain we make choices where we ignore warning signs/common sense - there are guys that pop on the forum just desperate to escape
6) Stating the obvious - cash flow is usually a function of invested capital and yields. The only way to drive up your cash flow is to invest more or to find better yielding (but probably riskier) investments.
7) Don't invest in stuff you don't understand - You are 100% responsible for your investments - Blaming someone else won't (generally) get your money back
8) Don't overly complicate a deal or your life with investments. Sometimes, maybe that extra 2% seems great but it is such a fucking headache or so complicated it really isn't worth it in the long run.

Specifically about your current asset.

1) Why are you selling?
2) Are you renting it now? What is your CF?
3) I assume you have friends/family where this asset is located?
4) Can you get a mortgage on it?
5) What is the outlook for this city? Positive?
6) Is it in a prime location?

I'll wait for the answers, but I am hinting at why not borrow a portion of the equity but don't overdo it. Like 50K keep LTV at or below 50%. Use that too buy your other apartment. You hear so many stories from people who say "if only I didn't sell that place 30 years ago - it is worth so much now." So be clear your alternatives are better. But it shouldn't be all financial factors, maybe it isn't worth the headache.

If your mortgage rates a reasonable, you should be able to debt cover and draw some income from it.

Many people have made money in RE by just waiting it out. Borrowing allows you to avoid paying taxes that you would pay if you did an outright sale.

I have often posted that for people trying to escape working for the man, you need to acquire capital. The speed at which this occurs depends on your risk taking comfort and your skills.

I mention this, because you could take your capital and buy a fixer. We have met (only reason why I am going into this much detail) and you seem like a smart and capable person. Learning to rehab a property is not the most difficult thing. In every city, there are opportunities to create value through rehab (except maybe the major cities in the US where every fucker seems to be chasing these deals). It is something I would recommend to someone only if they did the prep work, bought at the right price and had a handle on rehab costs. But in some ways you know you made money at the beginning. There isn't reliance on others to drive up your stocks, etc.

If you can get a handle on the value after rehab it is simple math.

Market price post rehab
-Purchase price
-rehab costs
-----------------------
Equity created

Avoid major rehabs that require structural modifications, etc. Stick to cosmetic deals for your first one. Fix a bedroom first, move in, rehab while living there and gradually do the place. If you don't want to do that because girls might not like it, then just live elsewhere.

Having said all that, real estate is not that easy. I have had my share of pain. But...

This strategy would allow you to:
1) Keep a good asset and avoid taxes and ride appreciation (some assumptions in here)
2) Invest the free cash flow after debt servicing into stocks, etc. Like dollar cost averaging into mutual funds
3) Spend the cash flow (I wouldn't spend it all - read the Richest Man in Babylon)
4) Acquire real estate where you like (assuming you can buy a place for 50K) - the key to buying real estate is location and price. Once you acquired it and you are living there, you don't look at it as harshly in terms of ROI. You rehab at your pace. And you have a roof over your head.
5) Don't over lever your initial asset. Just because you can borrow more doesn't mean you should.

Just my two cents.

Post: #48

(06-15-2017 02:34 PM)gework Wrote:  Another thing I would recommend having a look at is lending out USD on Bitfinex:

https://support.bitfinex.com/hc/en-us/ar...n-Funding-

This is where you lend your dollars out for daily interest. There is a feature that you can use to auto-loan your money out at the market rate. If you were loaning out your $110,000 on there right now you'd be getting about $160 / day interest at the start of the month and $170 / day at the end of the month with compound interest.

Right now the interest rates are at pretty high levels. I don't know how that will last, but I've been using this for about two years as a way to offset my cash spending.

Inside the Bitfinex system, it's safe, as soon as the person you loan to can't possibly pay back the loan, they get liquidated and your money will be returned to you. However, if Bitfinex get hacked (again) who know how much money you will loose and how long it may take to get it back. But the guys who run it are very professional and transparent. They handled the last $37 million hack well and have been able to reimburse all those losses. But essentially any assets held on a crypto exchange are subject to disappearing with little chance of restitution.

That could always be a blessing in disguise though. I lost $18,000+ on the Mt. Gox hack, chances are I will end up getting a lot more USD value back in the end if BTC continues going up.

----

On stocks, on a long term basis I am looking at buying precious metal mining stocks. I failed to buy in Aug 2015 and they've gone up about 500-1000% since then.

I took a glance at this and you can use your USD for margin funding, but it also lets you fund with BTC and ETH. Is that correct? So my ETH that I am hodling for the long term can make me even more money on the side margin funding??

Post: #49

(06-16-2017 06:27 PM)white22 Wrote:  I took a glance at this and you can use your USD for margin funding, but it also lets you fund with BTC and ETH. Is that correct? So my ETH that I am hodling for the long term can make me even more money on the side margin funding??

Yes, but funding for ETH and BTC is not that great and there is the risk of them being held on an exchange that has been hacked twice.

A good place to get a quick look at the funding rates is:

https://bfxdata.com/ (scroll to bottom 6 boxes)

Right now the ETH and BTC lending rates are only 30% and 10% of lending out USD. So if you had $100,000 worth of BTC loaned out and you loan out all your interest payments (minus 15% fee) you'd only get a little over $300 per month at current rates. That's 3.6% / year. Not worth the risk in my opinion. Thought the rate was about 8X higher a little time ago. Assuming it was like that all year that would be about 28% annual return. I've not paid much attention to the ETH and BTC loaning rate, but I think the average is about 0.03 / daily or say $1,000 / month; 10% over the year on $100K of BTC. Better rates for ETH at the moment. Your ETH, LTC, BTC loan interest is paid in those currencies.

I'd only use it for USD and there's still a considerable risk with that. I think over 2016 I got an an overall interest return of about 19%. It's nice if you are living somewhere pretty backwater. In 2015 I was living in Serbia and making about $40 / day on USD swaps and spending about $4 on rent and food. For living in anywhere like Colombia, Ukraine, Serbia, Thailand you can fund a decent lifestyle from having a decent 5 figure sum on there.

You can use this site to make some calculations: http://compoundaily.com/

OKCoin.cn (not .com) does/did offer(s) margin funding and the rates were always quite a bit higher there. But I don't know what the deal is with that now China has interfered with the exchanges.

Post: #50

Diversifying is good - establishing several growth/income investments with different investment types.

Even if you only do it with a small percentage of your proceeds ( 10% or so), setting up mutual funds for a long term nest egg has always been an almost certain way to accumulate wealth over time.

Dollar cost averaging in stock based mutual funds is an elementary idea but, as fundamental as it is, many don't do it:

Ideally, you'd want to open an IRA account ( or your country's equivalent of that). IRA's offer tax-deferred growth (or tax-free if it's a ROTH IRA in the USA)

Fund the IRA with an initial deposit.

Then, link your IRA to your checking/bank account so that money will draft into it and invest automatically, on a regular basis. This is key as it sets up your investment plan on auto-pilot, where you don't even have to think about writing a check each month. It just happens automatically.

I do mine monthly.

A good figure is to have a total of 10% of your income per year draft directly into your IRA (read long term retirement plan)

Some good ideas here have already been mentioned as far as the actual investments, within your IRA. I like any mutual funds that invest in growth-oriented stocks. Index funds are a good choice.

When one sets up a long term, automatic pilot, monthly investment program like this, especially at your young age, you really don't need to worry about corrections in the market/bear markets. In fact, market corrections are your friend.

This is because, since you're investing just a bit, each month over a long period of time (presumably 20 years or more...in the US 'retirement age' is considered 62) then your automatic investment plan will be buying fewer shares when the market is high and many more fund shares when the market is low.

This is the main benefit of this long term strategy, i.e., dollar cost averaging.

Investing 10% or so long term is just enough, where most people really won't miss it and it won't effect your lifestyle much if at all, yet it reaps huge benefits in the future, especially if started at a young age. Do this, and you'll be ahead, retirement-nest egg wise, of 90% of people your age in 20+ years.

There's never been a 20 year period of time in history when the market hasn't made money. In fact, I don't think there's been close to a 10 year period of time when this hasn't happened.

It's kind of a 'sure thing' on the side. Meanwhile, you can take the rest of your investment money and do other wealth building projects, like real estate, business ventures, etc.