Suggestions for Sharesies test

[BobbyMorocco]

Hey justakiwi, I absolutely applaud you for wanting to do something to try and build some wealth for your retirement. I also love that you ask questions and you're prepared to say "I don't know much, and I need some help."

I wish I could give you some crystal clear and basic answers for you to use that would help you, but honestly I can't do that, sorry. Somebody else might be able to that but I do not feel comfortable giving recommendations to someone in your position because quite simply I make plenty of mistakes too. Luckily for me I'm still pretty young so when I make these mistakes I do my best to learn from them so that I hopefully won't repeat them, and with time on my side I feel better knowing that I'll probably get a second chance. I've had some successes too and these have generally come about during times when I've had a clear approach to my investing. During those times I've been most successful I was also disciplined enough to follow my strategy. Lately as we're approaching what I believe to be the end of the cycle I've been finding things more difficult and because of this I've been trying different approaches with various success. I feel that the current environment right now is not very predictable and this combined with trying new things has led me to feeling a bit all over the place myself. I've thought so many times over the past few years that this bull market was going to roll over and die, but it just keeps on keeping on.... to my disbelief.

What I'm trying to say here is personally I do not feel the current environment is an easy one to invest, particularly for someone who is inexperienced and appears to be more of a buy and hold type investor. The current market in my opinion is better set up for traders who have the skills to enter and exit positions quickly, when the environment changes based on the decisions of those who run the world e.g. Politicians, Central Banks etc. In saying that this bull market could just carry on its merry way for another few years and if that happens the buy and hold strategy could work but I just don't know how it's all going to play out from here, no one really does. I know this is probably not what you want to hear but in my opinion this is just the way it is and I've come to accept it. There's a reason why this is now the longest and most hated bull market in history. The powers at be just keep kicking the can further and further down the road and nobody knows just how long that road is.

I hope that somebody who is more optimistic than I am can come in and give you some advice that may help. For now the best I can do is suggest for you to use the search function on the forum, if you haven't already. I've found over the years it's been very helpful for me. I've just typed in a term or a topic that I'm interested in and then scroll through the thread titles until I see the ones that will possibly contain the information I'm looking for. There is years and years of threads here and some people have contributed a tremendous amount of information. Personally I don't post much because I don't think the advice I can offer will assist much and I'd rather read what others have written and then go away and think about it. Then because there's so much information around on this site and others, as well as on the internet as a whole I really don't find the time to post. I always feel like I don't even have enough time to read let alone contribute myself. Anyway that's my advice. Go out and read on the subjects that interest you and then when you think you've worked out a clear strategy write it out along with some investment rules for you to follow and stick to them! Everyone has their own strategy that works for them and people are often fine tuning it as they go along but what works for me, probably won't work for you and it probably won't work for the next guy. It's quite a personalised thing that you have to work out and plan what you think is going to work best for you. I'm sure some people have shared their strategies, philosophies and rules on this site before. If you find the threads containing this info it might help you to get an idea of what might work for you. Then when you've got that sorted and feeling comfortable you have to take the risk and see how it goes. As you go along you will work out what worked and what didn't. Then you can tweak your strategy to hopefully get better returns. Like everything in life we generally aren't very good at something when we first begin but the more we learn and the more time we spend doing something generally the better we get. Investing is no different. The mistakes are often what help us the most.

I hope this post has at least helped you in some way and I'll have a think about some threads that I think could help you. When I find them I'll post a link to them here, so hopefully that will go some way to sending you off in the right direction. I mean you've already set yourself off in the right direction by joining this site and asking questions. There's lots to learn, as it's a never ending journey. I wish you all the best!