VOO

MaximumBother7157

20M – Looking for Investment Advice Hey everyone! I’m 20 years old and currently live with my parents in Upstate NY. We don’t come from a lot financially, so I sometimes help parents with expenses if needed . For the most part, though, I’m able to save and invest what I make. Right now I have about $10,000 invested and another $2,000 in the bank. My portfolio is currently split roughly evenly between VOO, NVDA, and MSFT. I make around $3,000/month at my job while also taking college classes online. I can currently save/invest around $1,800/month. I have about two years of college left, I don’t pay because of financial aid and I have good grades so scholarship. I plan to live with my parents until I graduate. After that, I’ll move out and start paying more of my own expenses. Time horizon: I don’t need the investment money anytime soon. However, I’m planning on taking a solo trip or two next year, which could cost around $5,000 total. I really want to travel while I’m young, so I’m trying to balance investing with actually enjoying life. Risk tolerance: I’d say low to medium. I don’t want to take on a ton of unnecessary risk. I also have no major debt or car loans. I have an older car that I bought for about $3,000 two years ago and it’s still running fine. Given my situation, what would you guys prioritize? Should I keep building up my cash savings before investing more, or continue investing aggressively while I have relatively low expenses? And how would you structure the portfolio? Any advice is appreciated.

designthedays

Social security has an income cap...because it has a benefits cap. The answer to fixing the social security deficit should be to invest the social security funds in the stock market (VOO or VTI or something). 50-year long term average return = 10.9% vs. the 4.7% for treasury bonds (what social security funds are put in).

deadfishlog

If you’re worried about that switch to RSP from VOO or split the difference

musicandarts

You are asking the right questions. Here are few comments that may be helpful. Most Americans get wealthy by saving and investing. A two-income middle class family can grow their retirement fund to about $5 million by investing $20,000 per year. All they need to do is put the money in S&P 500 mutual funds or ETFs. You should check the wiki section of r/bogleheads. There is also a brief article by William Berstein titled "If you can" by William Bernstein that is worth reading (available on r/Bogleheads and on the internet). So, you may ask why do people trade a lot, especially here? In the math in the above paragraph, I used an annual return of 12% which matches the historical returns of US stock market in the last decade. However, if you trade stocks, options, etc, you may get returns as high as 20-100 times that amount. You may also lose all your money in these risky trades. Now let me briefly answer the questions you asked. 1. In theory, it is possible. In practice it is very hard. it is hard to figure out when the peak and troughs happens, except on hindsight. So, you end up selling when the stock has not reached the eventual highs, and buy when the stock has not dropped enough. 2. You say you lost money if you were hoping to make a quick buck. Long term investors in US stock market (eg ETFs like VOO or VTI) don't say that they lost money. When I was working, I contributed about 20% of my salary every month into VOO or VTI. The day-to-day fluctuations never mattered, as I was not selling and withdrawing from my 401k account. 3. Trading utilizes the daily fluctuations. See answer #1. If you buy and sell at the wrong time, you lose money. In spite of the wealth of information we have, it is near impossible to predict the short term fluctuations. For example, see how difficult it is to predict the increase or decrease in the stock price of SPCX tomorrow. Most of us will get it wrong. 4. This is what Jack Bogle and the Bogleheads advise (e.g. VOO). But buying continuously for thirty is not fun. This subreddit thrives on the thrill of the possibility of very large gains from risky trades. 5. No. Most people lose money by taking huge risks on a market that is largely unpredictable. The unpredictability increases when you are playing with individual stocks or options.

joel_2025

Sell all your VOO

TheNobleHeretic

Most of you guys should work on your gambling addiction and just VOO and chill tbh.

Valuable-Feature-751

Don’t quit bro. I’m in the same boat down 25K and every week I deposit 1K but mainly I lose my money from SPX0DTE. I’m trying to refine my strategy and I keep re-trying every week with the new $1000 because I know eventually my strategy be right and what’s the 25K I lost eventually I’ll make that back and more once I get my strategy right and my methods right. But current this year I’m down 10k last year 5k and year before 10k. All together since I started trading (only options I don’t wanna hear nothing about VOO till I build my money up) -25k. No big deal most importantly keep trying!

neonam11

One of my godson works for his dad. Makes good money. Lives at home. I encouraged him to put away some money for retirement., heck I’ll even show him how to invest. He flat out says no. I give all the siblings money for Xmas and their birthdays. I’m talking triple digits total. My instructions is that the money buy VOO in their investment account. This kid is so stubborn that he refuses to take the money because it’s too much hassle to open a brokerage account. Hopefully he will learn in the future that investing is worth it and not much a hassle. Who knows.

Misaiato

You’re 19, so I’d recommend SCHG 50%, VOT 20%, VBIK 10%, VIGI 20% And leave it alone for 10 years at least. Probably longer. You can rotate in your mid to late 30s towards the more traditional VOO at 70% keep SCHG at 20% and add SCHF at 10%

RedditLeagueAccount

Good job starting at 19! The question is how much you want to be involved. As u/[LCJonSnow](https://www.reddit.com/user/LCJonSnow/) said, sector stuff tends to under perform. So that volatility might not even be as profitable. You will have to micro manage those sectors to sell high and buy low to generate outstanding returns. Generally, people recommend 3 fund or 4 fund portfolios. This maximizes results while taking out micromanaging. Those 5% funds you have - They are fine if you are up for checking on these stocks every day/week. Generally, energy and rare earths do not outperform the market. You might have some random spikes but then it will either stabilize or drop. Even if they outperform 1 year, the next 5 years, voo will beat it. So, it is 100% okay to get those funds. Just be aware they need to be monitored. I know Exxon mobile is a popular pick. It is a good choice from that sector. Just check graphs. It wont beat most other fund types most of the time. I did the same thing with my account where I had a few gambles. I have a separate account just for playing with certain stock types. I don't put a lot of money in it. It is just learning/playing around money. As mentioned earlier, It requires constant observation. It is hard to avoid grabbing those few extra stocks to see what will happen. Just don't make it a large portion of the portfolio. I think 5% combined at most. I believe that ETF's are almost exclusively better than mutual funds in most scenarios but fidelity does have those zero expense ratio funds. I do agree that there should be zero bonds at your age. These are good. * VOO * QQQM * FSTA * FZILX Consider SPMO. Newer fund, similar to VOO but less holdings and a slightly different methodology. Slightly higher volatility but it has been out performing. If you think the stock market is going to crash, VTI is better than both VOO and SPMO. It will drop less and recover decently. VOO only started outperforming VTI significantly in recent years. Can VTI for now and change it later. This would be for if you think AI is a bubble right now or if you think the current Oil war will impact everything. You might want a 5% for a mix of gold and bitcoin (bitcoin does have etf's so you don't have to worry about owning BTC itself). Bitcoin seems kinda scammy but its in a down cycle. We will see if it recovers or finally dies. Gold is for if inflation destroys the USA Dollar. Might not matter at your age. I ignore gold myself but I know its on a lot of peoples recommendations to have a small position in it.

broifoundawalrus

I just finished my first internship (20 YO) and got my first taste of real money. I had around 7,000 that I wanted to put away. I put 2k in a hysa (3.3 APY) and I wanted to put 5k into the stock market. It was my first time ever investing. I decided I would just put it all in VOO and VOOG. I’ve refrained from investing before just cus I never felt like I fully understood it or it got too complicated. That’s why I decided on this simple strategy. Would anyone like to share their thoughts on this decision?

Cautious_Ticket_8943

Put what you have left in VOO and keep it there for ten years.

_Underscore_Unders

Look at the annualized return on VOO, then look at yearly inflation numbers since VOOs inception. VOO has far surpassed inflation in the long term. It surpassed inflation many times over in just the last year.

Low_Plastic363

You know what doesn't suck? Leaving it all in VOO and getting +15% without sweating a single buffoonish tweet.

SpiderWil

VOO would take 200 years or some ridiculous amount of time to generate enough cash to guard against inflation.

Various_Couple_764

Some people prefer no bonds others prefer dividends over bonds. many just go with growth It is mainly a mater of personal preference. One thing to keep in mind is that the more money you can get into the account the larger the account will be when you retire. But the roth limits you to 7.5K a year. One way to get more cash into the account The interest from bonds adds additional money to the 7.5K a year deposit. But the yield is low about 4%. I would use a dividend fund like QQQI 13% yield 100K invested in QQQI would add 13K pre year to tha account. Add in 7.5k yearly deposit and you now have 20.5K a year going into the account. If you reballance every couple of years to 50% QQQI and 50% VOO and reach 1 Million invested you would get 50K a year of income and 500K in growth.

Loose_Hornet4126

Lame. You could have just bought VOO and chilled instead of actively "trading" at this point

sbcpacker

I would open an account with Vanguard and set it to auto invest in VOO (which is a Vanguard ETF). Fidelity is not bad either.

Status-Put8162

Market right now is too volatile to take any advice from anyone other than government officials. Invest in well diversified EFTs. $VOO $VOOG $VTI $SCHD

Sharp-Direction-6894

Unless you've got a $3M portfolio that is VOO and chill, you belong here.

massageobsessed001

One thing I will say, though, is that if you don’t need the money you have in BTC, leave it untouched. Focus on VOO with your future paychecks.

shia84

yeah be flexible. If you have a stable job, do you really need to have a 6 month emergency fund? No need to sell VOO and pay 15% LTCG tax to fund a trip. Just take it from your sgov/cash fund, then when you come back from vacation start putting money back in. You have 300k enough to bear through any market downturn and survive.

Zestyclose_Panda_886

$300,000 in ETFs Just keep adding to SGOV, huh? *Don't be afraid to pay taxes on profits.* SGOV is a 4% return. VOO or JEPQ is 10%.

15pH

If you finally saved 5k for a 5k trip next year, I keep it in something safe like SGOV, because any loss means you can't take the trip you planned. If you are investing for a potential trip that isn't planned and trying to grow money, then total after-tax returns are all that matter. Everyone's tax situation is different so you need to do your own math (or ask AI), but generally LTCG (VOO) is the best tax treatment you can get, and unqualified dividends (JEPQ) is the worst.

MagazineTube

Something like VOO?

TheRealArmament

Why VOO? QQQ has better returns

NapNapNapNap

I’m putting my life savings in VOO on Monday. You’re welcome.

QuantGuru

If you are creating income portfolio then diversification is best, so have some in VOO / XEQT and QQQI, SPYI, JEPI, TSPY etc. If you are young and don’t need monthly income then just do index ETF.

rndname

That looks like VOO

TreGet234

Did you get rugged on crypto and space too? So many crazy traps this year. VOO and chill really was the move, or even VT and chill.

Alternative-Car8221

Btw if you had just put that money in VOO you would have over $200K now and a lot less stress. Just thought you should know the financial loss was greater than in your screenshot.

PashasMom

Okay OP. I have been thinking about how to offer you some options for strong diversification while still having VOO be one of your two funds. First off -- why diversification? Diversification is never about getting the best possible returns. Only people with the best luck in the world or a crystal ball are going to get the best possible returns. But if you diversify, you will never get the worst possible returns. If you had been investing from, say, 2000 - 2009 and had been all in on the S&P 500, your portfolio would have been toast. You would have really suffered. But if you had some small companies, some international, and some bonds, you would have been just fine. Diversification means whatever asset class is doing well, you own it. But it also means whatever is doing poorly, you own it. So if you are diversified, there is always going to be one part of your portfolio that makes you sad and angry. You have to be okay with that. So how to diversify just using two funds, with one of them being VOO? I would add either a global equity fund or a global equity + bonds fund. I can already here people screaming about overlap and how you should either pick just VOO or just a global fund and having two funds is ridiculous because VOO is already in the global fund. That's true. But if you want to overemphasize large US companies but still be diversified, you can do that with VOO + a global fund. There are lots of options for global funds. For equities, the most popular by far is VT, but I like SPGM a bit better as it screens out some of the less profitable companies. If you want global + bonds, then I really like AOA. It has 20% bonds. Both AOA and SPGM have outperformed VOO since 2025: [https://www.portfoliovisualizer.com/fund-performance?s=y&sl=1SyceDv5zs9w4a8pVntub8](https://www.portfoliovisualizer.com/fund-performance?s=y&sl=1SyceDv5zs9w4a8pVntub8) You can see that AOA is less volatile, with less severe drawdowns, than either fund. I really like AOA, I invest in it pretty heavily myself. However, VOO did outperform for the ten years or so prior to 2025. There have been cycles of outperformance between US and international funds for decades. No one knows what will happen in the near term or long term, but it's pretty safe to say that there will continue to be shifts and cycles. So, if you are up for all equity, consider 50/50 VOO and SPGM (or VT). If you are up for having a portfolio with 10% bonds to smooth the ride a bit, consider 50/50 VOO and AOA. Both options would give you exposure to the entire US market (with a strong lean to large companies) and the entire global stock market (with a strong home country bias). AOA would add 10% in diverse bond holdings, likely resulting in a bit lower gains, but also lower volatility.

WordsHappenedHere

You are doing way too much here. Just Hold SPY VOO XLK. Way too much individual stock risk for me.

_Stylite

You took losses this year while SPY and VOO made all time highs. Just buy them and move on with your life

riisenshadow92

JEPQ and drip into VOO

PashasMom

Affording to put 40% of your IRA in bonds is probably not where you are, financially, if this is your only retirement income. If you already have a solid pension, sure. Otherwise, I wouldn't choose 40% in bonds especially since your risk tolerance is moderate to high. Do you have a solid cash emergency fund in a HYSA? If not, you want to work on that as well. Aim for maybe 18 months of expenses in a HYSA or money market fund by the time you retire. This can be your safety and stability. If you don't want all the volatility that goes with 100% equity, I would do no more than 20% in bonds (preferably 10%). Short term TIPS are great for stabilizing a portfolio while adding some value along the way. Here's a comparison showing VOO + 40%, 20%, and 10% short term TIPS: [https://www.portfoliovisualizer.com/backtest-portfolio?s=y&sl=65E14U5G2zSvZDQBqEYhkp](https://www.portfoliovisualizer.com/backtest-portfolio?s=y&sl=65E14U5G2zSvZDQBqEYhkp) Personally I would want to diversify into more than just large US companies. While large US companies have done great over the past fifteen years, there is no guarantee they will outperform in the next fifteen or thirty years. International funds have outperformed since early 2025. Small cap value funds also can add a lot to your eventual ending balance -- but they can also be extremely volatile, underperforming for years, making things look terrible, only to absolutely shoot up on the occasional year. You have to be extremely patient with them and not mind the ups and downs. If you think you might be interested in using something like international funds or small cap value funds, let me know and I can do some backtested portfolios for you. But if you aren't comfortable with international funds or with the crazy ride of small cap value, that is fine and you should stick with what you are comfortable with.

Private_Jet

It's not for everyone. Most people should just index and chill. Imagine $75k invested in VOO from 3 years ago. You'd have over $150k by now.

VaIentineX

i lost so much sleep this year only to earn same as if i had VOO and chill

xTheatreTechie

You're going to want to open a Robinhood account, Robin hood gives you a free 1% bonus for everything you throw into your Roth IRA. Which sounds like the account you want to open. From there you set your Roth it's to automatically draw the 10 dollars a week/month whatever you're comfortable with.  You're probably going to want to set it to invest in VOO. which is the USA sp500 mirror. Its nearly identical in terms of the sp500 but 1/3 the cost. "WAIT WHAT COST?" All ETFs will charge you like a percentage of whatever you invest so that they manage your fund. It's pennies. I believe it's 0.03%, so not even 3 percent, a percent of a percent.  Let it do its thing, when you go to retire you get that amount tax free. 

helpifell

If I was starting right now with that strat I would choose Charles Schwab and do SWPPX. It has like some ever so slight advantage over trading VOO. With slight tradeoffs like I don’t think you can trade your investments instantly

SecondSt4ge

Bro stop. Just buy VOO and don’t look at it

I_pop_Jardiance

Half and half lol or do 75% VOO and 25% gambling/options...

Plastic_Ninja_9014

META, NVDA, PLTR, VOO-Oh dear 😑

Pristine-Medicine987

Should I quit options and just VOO and chill for the next 20 years? Genuinely

arthriticpug

buying an (M)ES future is basically buying voo on leverage except and gains (or losses) are immediately added to your account cash balance (they’re mark to market). gains also have the advantage of being taxed as 60/40 long/short term cap gains regardless how long you hold it. 1 MES is about equal to buying 40k VOO and 1 ES is like 400k. the carry cost is similar to buying stock on margin at 3% interest. however you pay nothing upfront and only pnl is reflected in your account. (they do count against your account’s margin though) if the index is flat, the price will slowly decay—that’s your interest/carry cost. you can also buy YM for the dow, NQ for QQQ or RTY for russell 2000 (IWM). i’m treating them as if i actually bought that much stock as that’s how the pricing moves. e.g. if VOO moves 1% you’d get +/- $400 (MES) or $4000 (ES). you don’t get any dividends but that’s reflected in reduced carry costs. the contracts expire so you’ll have to roll them ever 3 months if you stick to the front contracts.

9554503312

Assuming 10 percent average investment returns and saving 15 percent of gross, the math is n = s \* 0.15 \* (1.1\^(t+1) - 1) / 0.1 Where n is net worth s is annual salary t is number of years \> What average income does your Net Worth trajectory imply? s = n / ( 0.15 \* (1.1\^(t+1) - 1) / 0.1 ) \> Assume you start investing when you started working. What gross salary does your NW imply vs. what your actual salary was? (less taxes, less expenses, w/ dividend reinvestments). For simplicity assume flat salary. Same. s = n / ( 0.15 \* (1.1\^(t+1) - 1) / 0.1 ) \> What Net Worth does your actual income trajectory imply? n = s \* 0.15 \* (1.1\^(t+1) - 1) / 0.1 \> If you took your actual salary and just invested it into VOO (again less taxes, less expenses, w/ dividend reinvestment) how do you compare? Min at retirement implies $200K annual salary. Most of my career was well below that. By 2005, income finally heated and stayed hot to through 2021 when I retired. However, \* I saved at least a third of my income most of my career \* I panic sold a lot until the 2018 crash and have rode out each crash since then

No-Grass-1852

Yeah no, no. Fidelity account is mostly VOO, and big tech stocks. These current options I have I'm just betting on earnings so we'll see. Other than that I might just repeat the Fidelity strategy on Robinhood & just play closer to earnings.

glizzler

I'm done playing these fuckin games. I'm going to VOO and chill.

Cool1998

Should’ve just VOO and chilled Or bought 2 bitcoin and chilled

No_Machine3805

Positions in ETFs like VOO and VTI are considered generally "safe". The next level is S&P500 individual stocks, and then everyone else. Options is professional gambling.

ZookeepergamePlane68

With the extra $, start with 50% for savings, like a Money Market (Fidelity, SPAXX is at 3.31%) its like a HYSA but better, IMO. Then open a Roth IRA (its free and will be tax free after your 59.5 age) put 25% into VOO, 15% into QQQM, 5% QTUM ETF, and 5% into whatever stock your need to scratch that gambling itch. Once you get your savings to 3-6 months expenses, whatever your comfortable with, increase VOO, this should be your core. At your age I would do VOO at 50%, QQQM to 30%, QTUM ETF 10%, and the last 10% at whatever stock or ETF, I like NASA ETF. Also, use AI, Claude is your best friend when it comes to this stuff, remember you get out what you put in, better info you feed it the better it gives!

shine_bright247

Agree with above. Stop trying to gamble. Find good etfs and put money in those every month. Or just VOO and chill for now

adamsbridge

This is great advice. The only thing I'd add is to consider VT instead of the VOO. While VOO can provide outsized returns, I personally sleep better knowing that I'm exposed to the entire world's market with VT. 

schoolruler

You need to put it into the S&P 500 ETF like SPY or VOO until you know what you are doing.

Dragonsven

I started late investing. Never doubt the power of compounding. These ideas are in order of importance, I dont know your income to refine it. 1) You have a three months buffer in a savings account. 2) You invest enough in 401k for max employer match. 3) You maximize HSA if available 4) max Roth IRA (if above income limit, backdoor) 5) Invest in children 529 6) Max out 401k contribution Individual investing fits somewhere within those priorities, just put what you can afford in VOO and wait. Let compounding work for you. This is the least risk-averse way to invest; when you have kids you should be risk off.

AhsokaFan0

Good news: you can literally type any ticker into your brokerage account and hit buy market order, and you’ll be better off than buying short dated options. But even though virtually any combination of 1-4 letters will work better than what you’ve been doing, I’d try the classics. VT, VTI, VOO.

KaptainCankles

I was in your shoes, very recently, and I am 37 so I have a few more years on you. My wife and I contribute to VOO/QQQM mainly and a little into SMH/TSLA. We plan to do this for the next 25-30 years and we are confident we will be fine by the time we retire.

jvaritek33c

VOO and chill dont overthink it

PhiladelphiaManeto

For the average American, if they water down their gasoline and eat from local food pantries, but throw some money into VOO it all works out, right?

AlmostAsianJim

I'm finally break even for the year and reshuffled my port to be equal weighted cash, $VOO, and $GOOGL. I'm too tired and stupid for this market otherwise.

IamInternationalBig

At your age, this is just a learning lesson. At 21yo, you should just be putting your money into VOO until you become an adult.  Options should not be anyone’s primary investment vehicle. I hate how young people make these mistakes because they follow along with the rest of the wsb morons without understanding this sub is gambling. 

spilledonwhite

I used to hate on SCHD but it is kicking the shit out of VOO this year and VOO is pretty unstoppable to start with. I hold 3% SCHD so I'm not completely in the cuck chair. Thought about full-porting just to make it crash because it is pissing me off.

Eazy12345678

buy and hold. stocks go up and down dont like volatility buy VOO or FXAIX

milkplantation

What I sense from you post is impatience and envy, both of which will crush you in investing. As the greatest investor of all time has stated, *"The stock market is a device for transferring money from the impatient to the patient."* Pay off your debt first as whatever interest you're paying on that will eat into your profit. Then build up 6 months of living expenses and put it in a HISA or purchase SGOV ETF (US short term treasuries). Don't touch that money unless it's an emergency. Then begin investing the $200 a month 90% ($180) in VOO and 10% ($20) in SGOV. In the event there is a correction of 10% or more, sell your SGOV and buy more VOO. If you want to diversify beyond just US holdings, buy 60% VOO and 40% VXUS or 100% VT. That's it. The hard part is being consistent, not tinkering, becoming impatient, or envious. It's simple but it's not easy.

Broke35

quien te dijo jajaja? investigaste algo? sinceramente solo compra VOO y holdeala

Immediate-Run-7085

If you have $200 left every month and already have a savings account with about 6 months of living expenses then just put the $200 in VOO monthly

WayFormer2073

VOO or FXAIX, get a job, automate so part of your paychecks go into your brokerage, automate buying of VOO or FXAIX

Begavond

You are suppose to buy SPYM or VOO and look for another job.

DoinIt4DaShorteez

Moderate to high risk tolerance, just put it all in VOO. You're not retiring in 10 years on a starting point of $16,000 unless you have a shitload of other money or something else you haven't mentioned. So there isn't any basis to tell you to do anything other than put it all in VOO which complies with moderate to high risk.

jactuscackal

Buy VOO and wait 30 years

Betterjake

Really good plan! 1. Buy Bitcoin at the top 2. Sell Bitcoin slowly at the bottom to buy VOO at the top

dpatel211

Remember, when SPY freezes a dump is imminent. Just look at VOO.

SteakEater137

Why didnt you just buy relatively safe ETFs like VOO or SCHD Chalk it up as a learning experience, maybe you would have lost even more in the future if you never learned your gambling lesson

Prior-Ambassador-749

Moving from 100% BTC to 100% S&P 500 isn't a strategy—it’s classical performance chasing driven by recency bias. Going "all-in" on any single asset class, whether crypto at a cycle plateau or equities near historical valuation highs, ignores fundamental portfolio construction principles. If you look at risk-adjusted return metrics (like the Sharpe or Sortino ratio) over full market cycles, a small, capped allocation to uncorrelated assets (e.g., 2%–5%) backtests remarkably well alongside a core broad-market index. The magic isn't in holding 100% of the winner of the last 6 months; it's in systemic rebalancing when asset correlations diverge. I actually built a portfolio backtester and Monte Carlo simulator for a quant terminal project I'm developing (QuantForgeTerminal), and running a 100% rotation at current equity valuations shows significant draw-down risk if we see a multiple contraction in tech/AI. Instead of panic-selling or total liquidation, why not establish a target asset allocation (e.g., 90% VOO / 10% alternative assets) and rebalance on a fixed schedule? Let math dictate your trades, not emotion.

marcvv

Crypto is over. Better off indexing in VOO and QQQ for next 10,20,30 years or whatever your timeline. Unless you need capital losses or want to lose to stocks then go with crypto

bam2350

IMO, you should be no more than 10% bonds. Just keep jammin' your biweekly into VOO, VTI, or similar. Use SGOV or HYM for bonds -- one is treasuries the other corp bonds paying strong dividends

SomePolack

Invest regularly in SPY or VOO for 30 years 

elgrandorado

Yup. I'm down 8% vs the market on my personal port, but my retirement is sitting in VOO, VT, and Emerging Markets.

No-Math-5868

My portfolio, not including 529 money or home equity is fairly large, to the point where it is over 60X my annual expenses and over 22X my annual income which is pretty high to begin with. So it's not difficult task to build out a 10 year TIPS ladder which would be about 16% of my current portfolio. However, I need to average 3.4% assuming no more contributions until the first date I would even consider retiring to get the so called number I was looking for, which would bring that TIPS ladder to about 12% of my portfolio. I know I didn't answer your question yet, but I figured I would provide some background. I've been investing since my mother introduced me to IRAs (before there were Roth IRAs) when I 16, had working papers and she matched what I put into a CD up to the then limit of 2K (I put in 1K and she put in 1K). I've been a disciplined investor for decades... never panicked or changing my investing strategy. Up until about 2-3 years ago, I as 98.5%+ in equities with the rest in short term cash. I've been slowly transitioning to some fixed income to where I'm at 10% of which 25% of that is my TIPS ladder. My goal is to ultimately get to 20% fixed income. My equity portion is probably around 90% VOO, with a little bit of QQQ, ACN stock since I used to work there, and few other play ETFs like VXUS. I invested in VOO for over 30 years before VOO even existed as and ETF and there was a just a mutual fund. I've been auto investing twice a week the entire time never stopping. When I got pay raises, or other things, I increased the amounts (this was in addition to retirement accounts and 529 accounts). I guess you can say, I was FIRE before the caveman and VOO and chill before VOO was born.

dpatel211

The way VOO's chart moves by the second is insane lmao

PeteyPab305

You don't understand the reason for buying VOO, It's not meant to be "life changing" It's meant to not keep your chips on the table while not losing value to inflation. Also not everyone trades options or has time to research and DD individual stocks. He got lucky Some of the "puts" are now going in the opposite direction. He shorted CRWV right around earnings. That's not a complicated short.

chrispy_pv

Life is about diversifying and taking risks. You can either gamble it away at the casino or park it somewhere where it will grow slowly. Basic bs is up to employer match on 401k, roth ira limit, hsa if you have, then individual brokerage. It's not so straight forward, but VOO was just one example, theres plenty of ETFs you can dump it in too. But again, this is reddit and it is not my money so its all unsolicited advice lol

leaning_on_a_wheel

Probably worse than 100% VOO

hftrobo9285

Diversify with VOO calls

I_work_too_much

I'm 50% VOO 50% HTZ 50% cash so I might have you beat on retardation.

EnginrA

VOO

Plaguesofman

Portfolio is now 90% VOO fellas (I'm regarded), what do I gamble the last 10% on?

slavicslothe

Keep your time horizon in mind. Im not worried if VOO drops 20% for some reason because I dont need the money for a long time and have around 10 years of cash in an hysa and enough dividend stocks to cover monthly bills. I keep 80% of my money invested and the other 20% can cover me long enough that I dont have to sell low basically. If you have an income still then you are good, right? Just keep buying and you'll get discounts when the stock drops.

BuzzerWhirr

My financial advisor friend gave me this advice for free fifteen years ago: "Buy as much VOO as you can and never look at the price."

coopermug

My biggest single day drop was $101k. During the past few months, some days I saw my account went up& down $40k-$60k per day. It does impact my mental health so I started trimming risky stocks and gradually buy VOO. Seeing it shoots up tens of thousands of dollars a day is extremely exciting. But bad days it can plunge the same amount if not more. If you can't cope with your portfolio's volatility, you have too many risky stocks.

Own-Event-5500

Go VOO/AVUV 80/20 Or VOO/AVUV/VXUS 70/20/10

Midwest-Midbest

Do you want stability and modest returns? VOO and chill. Do you want a 99% chance of losing it all and having your wife fuck the mailman? YOLO it all into Wendy’s puts. 1% chance at wealth

etfmylife

VOO and chill

573banking702

Until you get cancer in 10yrs and the cure VOO account gets fucked by americas healthcare system.

HauHauHauHauHauHau

Lol what… alot of u retards think putting $1000 into VOO is life changing

SpicyElixer

100% VTI/VOO Munger said: “Diversification is for the know-nothing investor.” We are all are all the investor he was talking about about. Most of us are chasing gains. A few of us will barely beat the S&P 500 with way more stress and way more work, but the vast majority of us will underperform the market over the long-term. Maybe if you get a degree in finance and accounting you can try, but even then you’ll probably fail. You’re young enough that time in the market is all that matters. Let the magic of compounding numbers work for you.

chrispy_pv

Cool now put that shit in VOO and forget lol. Pull out of the casino!

SpicyElixer

So according to my mouth, it’ll make up about 0.06% of SPY/VOO. Or $60 (about half a share) of a 100k SP500 portfolio.

BentoMan

I think you are right. Just take that money and buy calls, make easy 50% and then feel better buying VOO

BentoMan

I have big cash I want to get in VOO but psychologically buying at ATH is something I can’t get over.