After deciding how much of your portfolio should be in each asset class (stocks, bonds, commodities, etc.), the next asset allocation decision to make is how much of your portfolio should be invested in your own country’s stock market and how much should be invested abroad.
Weighting by market capitalization
A common sense starting point would be to weight each country’s stock market according to its current market capitalization. That is, do the same thing with countries that index funds do with companies: Weight them according to size.
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No thanks. I will stay home for lunch since I want to save money
It felt good hearing myself say those words and saving money always sound like a good idea. Yet, quite often, some of us feel bad doing it.
Most frugalist I know asked themselves at some point whether he/she is missing out by not participating (insert your own activity here). I feel like this question is impossible to answer because without actually going, how will I know whether or not it would be beneficial? If I have to ask myself, I will always go because I don’t want to analyze a problem I will never be able to solve.
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There’s one question that I’ve seen asked more times than any other over the last several months: “Should I keep investing in the market given how much it’s going down right now?”
To me, this question suggests a fundamental misunderstanding. The market isn’t “going down.” A more precise way to explain the situation is to say that the market “has gone down.”
Given that most of us don’t spend time on the trading floor of the NYSE or watching minute-by-minute price changes online, we don’t really know what the market is doing right now. In reality, all we know is what has already occurred. That is, we can only see the past.
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Last week, I saved $100 off my auto insurance policy. It’s really pretty easy and there’s probably nothing you don’t already know. All I did was take action. Call, comparison shop, and keep calling.
While I was looking through different options and telling my insurance agent again that his price was too high, I made a list of what could save us more money on auto insurance.
May you find more savings than I do by calling your agent today.
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People who know me sometimes wonder why I’m so frugal. They question why I don’t seem to eat out. They can’t understand why I rather watch a movie at home than go to the movie theaters and they certainly don’t feel that I’m actually enjoying life. They, like most people, are simply failing to look at my life from my point of view.
Frugal Living Isn’t Just About Cutting Down
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Once in a while, stumbling onto a piece of history bring back a flood of memories. While I was going through those boxes in storage labeled “university” last week trying to find my degree for the insurance company, I started reading through some of the notes I took during those four unbelievable years.
Education is Not Just for Academics
I have heard countless times that education is useless. That those classes we all took were on subjects that had no real world value. Some even called it a waste of time but for me, it was priceless.
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