Please, Do Your OWN Homework
I am writing today just to vent about a pet peeve of mine, two in fact. One of my pet peeves is when folks make uninformed declarations about any topic. I mean folks who take a position, an important position, with no qualified information, research or experimentation to back up their claim or position.
We see this all the time, especially when taking political positions. Someone takes the position that they don’t like or don’t care for the President (whomever the Prez happens to be at the time). When asked why they don’t like the President, the person lists so-called actions the President or his administration has taken. But many times the information they have is completely erroneous. What we find is that often times, the person had no idea what they were talking about and resorted to pulling so-called information out of the air.
The other pet peeve I have is when someone takes a position or makes a declaration based on very little information. This person, unlike the previous, has actually done some study. But that so-called study is so lacking thoroughness and depth, no rational person should or would ever draw any serious conclusion from it.
When it comes to investing both these approaches are not only bothersome to someone with my inclination for checking and cross-checking, it can be dangerous to the investor himself. Today I was perusing the CNBC website and noticed two articles about technical analysis. According to Investopedia, technical analysis is “A method of evaluating securities by analyzing statistics generated by market activity, such as past prices and volume. Technical analysts do not attempt to measure a security's intrinsic value, but instead use charts and other tools to identify patterns that can suggest future activity.” However, anyone who has ever seriously studied the record of technical analysis knows it is of little value.
But that’s not what caught my attention on the CNBC site. Notice the headlines of the two articles circled in red. Each gives a totally opposing outlook of the future and both credit technical analysis as the method used to make the conclusion. Now an amateur investor, who is confident (falsely) but who isn’t necessarily vigilant in his research, might read either article and take a stance on the market that’s really ill-informed. Thus dangerous to his portfolio.
Venting over.
But here’s an approach I think is sound when it comes to investing on your own:
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. One of the tidbits I found very interesting is that Stanley’s research revealed that most millionaires carry mortgages despite the ability to pay them off in full. I thought it’d be interesting to see, given recent years’ turmoil in the mortgage and real estate markets, if these numbers still held up.
and 
, somewhere between 50% and 60% of the millionaires surveyed hold mortgages on homes purchased 23 years prior. Additionally, the current outstanding mortgage on homes belonging to deca-millionaires (those with $10 million in or more in net worth) is equal to 7% of the home’s current value while the typical millionaire (50% have less than $2 million) has a mortgage balance of just under a third of the home’s market value. Thus, I assumed a mortgage of 15% of the home’s value for milionaires between $3.5 to $10 million and overall of 30% for those under $3.5 million. I used the IRS Personal Wealth Statistics from 2004 (
to arrive in the mail at any moment
The shares of coffee maven 
Financials are doing well even with news that would have normally sent the shares of companies in the sector on a downward spiral. 
Even comedian Bill Maher took notice. In his HBO show "Real Time", Maher says,
Traders sent shares of Expedia (
"
Value investors make a habit of relating price to value. They recognize that stock markets rise and fall. The prices of individual stocks likewise swing widely. The intrinsic value of a company lies somewhere in between. There are stocks priced about what the underlying business is really worth and stocks priced below that.
I had a thought about financial "rules-of-thumb". Most don't work. Those that work at all, work in only some situations. What they should call them is financial "Rules-of-DUMB". I can think of a few right off the top of my head. Like:
1. Buy as much house as you can afford.
Now this one is just ridiculous although so many people follow it. Buying a "lot of house" will only serve to make you house rich and cash poor. And usually, what you can afford is determined by some mortgage broker. In my view, that's the last guy you should be listening to. That's like the sheep asking the wolf for advice on how not to get eaten. (No knock against mortgage brokers. I'm just pointing out a conflict of interest there.)
Most of us would be better off buying an easily affordable house. Not "mortgage broker" affordable, but The Millionaire Mind affordable. According to the book's author Thomas Stanley, an easily affordable house is one in which you can afford on HALF your present income for the next FIVE years without disrupting your lifestyle. If this can't be achieved, then consider that you have a house that is not easily affordable.
2. Diversify.
I'll paraphrase Warren Buffett by saying diversification is for the know-nothing investor. The know-something investor should concentrate. Our intent with diversification is to lower our volatility. But what we don't consider is we are also lowering our potential return. If we study our investments a little more and understand them, we'd be better served by concentrating on those investments that offer the highest probability of success. Concentrate to get rich then diversify to stay rich OR stay concentrated to get richer.
3. Save 6 months living expenses for emergencies in cash.
What emergencies are we talking about that would require 6 months worth of expenses? I mean seriously. This is just one of those rules that I think goes too far. If we are properly insured with health, life, disability, home/renter's, auto and the like, most emergencies are taken care of. Most of us, if we were to loose our jobs, will be able to collect unemployment. And if we were to find ourselves in that situation and unemployment doesn't cover our expenses, we certainly wouldn't need that much money in cash (money market fund, savings, under mattress, etc.)!
For most people, having more than say $5,000 in cash is a waste. The rest of your "emergency" funds should be diverted to higher earning liquid assets like stocks. But what if the stock market goes down you ask? Well all I can say is that the stock market is more likely to go UP! In fact, the market goes up about 75% of the time. So it's much more prudent to put your money (your emergency money too) in stocks, though the rule-of-dumb says otherwise.
One of the characteristics Warren Buffett looks for in managers of the companies he owns (read: The Warren Buffet Way by Rob Hagstrom) is rationality. In essence, he's looking for managers that will allocate corporate funds to areas that make the most economic sense. An emotional approach to capital allocation would undoubtedly lead to decisions that would decrease shareholder wealth.
I find that very few financial decisions we make for ourselves are rational. Just the opposite in fact. Almost all of our decisions, especially as they relate to our personal finances, have some emotional component. For example, I'm acquainted with a few single 30-somethings that have recently become homeowners. In every case (except for one), these individuals moved out of a small and inexpensive apartment into a much larger and expensive home. A couple were actually moving out of a rent free situation (they were living with mom). Along the line, each one of them has said to me in one way or another, that they thought they were making a good economic decision. In other words what they were saying is that they thought they were being rational and that they'd be making themselves wealthier by buying a home.
It makes me giggle a little that any of them would actually say that they'd be economically better off. I mean, how much better off can you be economically going from paying next to nothing (small apt/living with mom) to paying a substantial something (buying an expensive home in a historically inflated real estate market). These folks are clearly making emotional economic decisions although they'd like to think otherwise. In no way can a situation in which substantial money is spent be better than a situation in which no money is spent. The only explanation is that judgment was clouded by emotion.
But I'll give these individuals the benefit of the doubt as we all have heard time and time again that homeownership is a sure way to wealth. We've heard it so much that we'll even abide by it when the choice of homeownership is the much more expensive choice for us. We dread doing the wrong things with our money (at least some of us). Our emotions take over and suspend our rational thought. Without rational thought, we wind up making the wrong decisions.
Even in situations when we know better, emotions play a big part in our decisions. As some of you (I'm positive not all of you) may be aware paying down a low interest rate mortgage early is not the best financial decision one can make. One would be far better off putting those extra mortgage payments to work in the stock market (or your own business) where one would probably receive a much higher rate of return. But clearly, this is not simply a financial decision. Emotions play a huge part in personal finance and carrying a mortgage is no exception.
I have a friend and with his and his wife's combined incomes, they will be able to pay off his existing mortgage in a very short time. And they will probably go ahead and do just that. My friend also understands that he'll be better off financially if he never accelerated his payments. When I asked him why he planned on paying the mortgage off early knowing what he knows he simply stated, "Cause debt don't feel good."
"Debt don't feel good" is not rational. It's emotional. In Thomas Stanley's book The Millionaire Mind, he profiled several millionaires and their treatment of their homes and mortgages. It was clear that most millionaires are "less" emotional when approaching their own personal finances. Which is why according to Stanley most millionaires (not all) carry mortgages to full term. When millionaires approach a financial decision, they choose the alternative that puts the odds of being wealthier in their favor. This is why they save instead of spend, buy stocks more than bonds (or real estate for that matter), lead low consumption lifestyles instead of ostentatious spend-thrift lifestyles, run their own business instead of working for "the man". I think most millionaires exhibit some form of economic rationality. Paying down a mortgage early or buying an expensive house isn't economically rational. But like my friend says, debt just don't feel good and neither does living with your mama. And maybe that's more important but it won't help your wallet.
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