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My advice is to not take advice from this board. Get the pros involved- attorney, investment advisors, tax planners, etc. Good luck and good for you.

United Country Real Estate.com

Buy an almond orchard someplace w a jacuzzi.

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I would echo reply No.1. You need to seek professional financial advice. But if you wish to read further, here is my opinionated advice- thus not to be considered "advice" per say.

It doesn't matter whether you have $10 or $10 million dollars. The game is still the same. The very very basic principle behind investing is how to invest in areas that have historically performed a certain way and can more likely give you a consistent return. In general, a broad investment in the stock market has returned around 7-8% per year over the long term. That doesn't like that much but when you consider the effects of compounding, it takes a surprisingly small amount of initial investment to get you to a million dollars in 30-40 years. The key is time. Real estate has not proven to be the best investment as it only tends to return an average of 3-4% per year- also over the long term.

Anyway, it sounds like you're in a situation where you can have some flexibility. If I were in a situation where I could just generically stuff 100-150k into general stocks you better bet I'd do it in a split-second. But ultimately you really need to seek some professional advice.

* Disclaimer: Not considered financial advice

blackhammer says

A conservative method I've started using is the Permanent Portfolio. There is a mutual fund (PRPFX) by that very same name but it is not quite the same allocation.

blackhammer: Interesting comment. Is the gold and silver in PRPFX physical or only ETF? I don't want paper commodities.

Another question I have is about investment firms. I like Fidelity, but they are private and it's hard to know what's up with them. E-Trade is a public company, but just about went under with bad mortgages.

Iron Ranger says

Living in a 2 bedroom apt with wife and 3 kids. It's pretty cramped.

Let's fix that situation first as it seems more urgent. It's a good chance to mingle and network with your new Apple colleagues and pick their brains about where they live and why. And on the side, tell us when Apple TV will roll out.

Traditionally, US Treasuries are the end game, where security is everything and interest doesn't really matter. But lately, US Treasuries don't look like a 100% sure store of value anymore.

If you just want to keep the value and don't care about growing it, I'd say diversify the hell out of it:

* Treasuries
* CD's
* extremely boring and stable dividend-paying stocks like utilities
* a little gold and silver, though that could easily crash
* a house if it's not terribly overvalued compared to renting the same thing (see http://patrick.net/housing/calculator.php)
* rental property with positive cash flow and outsourced management

Mutual funds usually underperform the stock market because of fees and churn.

I would definitely not get a mortgage. You can be your own mortgage funder now, so why pay anyone else a profit you can keep yourself? Cash flow is not an issue for you.

You won't save any money with the mortgage interest deduction. You'd pay $1 interest to save 30 cents on taxes. Don't spend the $1 on interest in the first place and you're way ahead.

langr says

My advice is to not take advice from this board. Get the pros involved- attorney, investment advisors, tax planners, etc. Good luck and good for you.

Thanks, very good advice. I need to make sure these guys are fee based and don't have incentives that go against my needs.

langr says

Get the pros involved- attorney, investment advisors, tax planners, etc.

Investment advisors are not necessarily a good idea. Their interests and your interests are different.

Investment advisors in particular take their 1% of your assets annually no matter how much they screw up. And they can take even more by getting kickbacks from putting your money into their friends' mutual funds, etc.

Iron Ranger says

blackhammer says

A conservative method I've started using is the Permanent Portfolio. There is a mutual fund (PRPFX) by that very same name but it is not quite the same allocation.

blackhammer: Interesting comment. Is the gold and silver in PRPFX physical or only ETF? I don't want paper commodities.

Another question I have is about investment firms. I like Fidelity, but they are private and it's hard to know what's up with them. E-Trade is a public company, but just about went under with bad mortgages.

I'm a Vanguard person myself, although the MF Global debacle is making me consider diversifying among different brokerages as well. Vanguard's interface is ugly and keeps me from overtrading.

PRPFX holds physical coins and bullion, but their prospectus states that they have the option use futures markets. I believe they even state they may issue dividends/gains in the form of coins/bullion as well. It has an expense ratio of 0.77% which I consider too high, but I've recommended it to family and friends who aren't the do-it-yourself types.

The newer ideal permanent portfolio is an equal allocation of 25% Stocks/30-yr Treasuries/Physical Gold/Cash - totally unbiased toward any economic condition or prediction. I beat the PRPFX expense ratio using VTI, TLT, GLD. (I know I know, it's not physical)

Investment advisors are not necessarily a good idea. Their interests and your interests are different.

Investment advisors in particular take their 1% of your assets annually no matter how much they screw up. And they can take even more by getting kickback from putting your money into their friends' mutual funds, etc.

Financial advisers make money giving advice. That's like saying you shouldn't trust lawyers because they charge money to provide legal advice and services. How are financial advisers or any other finance professional different? There are good and bad ones- just like in any other profession. My mother in law and parents use advisers and have done quite well doing so. They have gotten some very good advice in the process. Remember- someone that gets paid to manage investments for others typically has it in their own interests to have those investments do well.

As far as companies like Fidelity and so on, well there's nothing wrong with Fidelity. I've used them for years. Them and a few others like Edward Jones and so on.

Mutual funds usually underperform the stock market because of fees and churn.

Depends. Most of what I've got invested is in mutual funds and all of the except one are performing at market average or higher. One is currently 13% YOY. Mutual funds can be as risky/conservative/diversified/specialized as any other form of investment. The fees I get charged are extremely minuscule. So its not really accurate to make a blanket statement that they "usually" underperform.

* Disclaimer: Not considered financial advice.

Talk to Vanguard or T.Rowe Price. If you open a money market account with some dough in it they'll make financial plans for you for free. The guys at Vanguard are as capable as anyone working anywhere in the business.
Money is invested for several goals of either 1. capital appreciation 2. income 3. capital preservation.
Unless you work again, you want to have some of your money provide 2. income. This means a bond fund. Dodge&Cox, T.Rowe Price, Vanguard have good plain vanilla bond funds of various kinds. I personally like Vanguard but all three companies are good.
The reason for some 1. capital appreciation (e.g. stocks) is as a way to beat inflation. Some good stock mutual funds are available at T.Rowe Price, Vanguard, Fidelity, etc.
Remember, the fee based planner is going to perform the same service for you as a planner at T.Rowe Price or Vanguard but for a lot more money.
An example of one fund that is conservative is at T.Rowe Price, called Capital Appreciation. It actually has bonds and stocks in it.
You can read in the prospectus or even the summary of the fund what it is trying to do. This is illuminating.
E.g. A stock fund that is a growth focus: "The objective of the fund is capital appreciation"
E.G. A Hybrid, or balanced fund: "The objective of the fund is capital appreciation, capital preservation, and income."
A bond fund I own at Vanguard is Total Bond Market Index. This is going to provide you with a yield of only 2.5% I think.
Another I own is Vanguard High Yield Municipal Bond. The yield is a little higher.
If I were in your shoes I would set aside at least 33% into something that can appreciate some capital, e.g. a stock mutual fund or a hybrid/balanced mutual fund.
Look at a prospectus for T.Rowe Price Capital Appreciation. Look at Fidelity Contrafund, then read one for Vanguard Dividend Growth fund.
Your enemy is inflation. Sitting on cash is not such a great strategy.

By all means avoid those who want to charge you a 1% "wrap" fee to "manage" things for you. This is an absurd fee if you consider what is done to earn it.
My father is an MD, and he inherited a bunch of bank stock, Wachovia.
He asked me questions but kept to himself what he had/makes, etc. I said "call up Vanguard.They do financial planning for a small fee ($1000?) or it's FREE if you have a money market account with them with $100K in it."
My father went to some jerk at Ameriprise financial planners.
The "rule of thumb" is not to have a lot of your financial net worth in ONE stock. Vanguard, Price, or I would have told my father "sell Wachovia and buy a mutual fund." This is the correct answer.
BUT, those planners will say to you what YOU want to hear because the correct answer to them is the one that makes you like them. They want you to like them and put all your money in their hands so they get that 1% of your financial net worth paying them forever.
What happened? My father said he "lost" $600K.
Of course he never blamed the Ameriprise person who was an idiot. He blamed it on "the market".
I briefly worked in this business, but it was a mistake for me to try to fit into the whole salesman nonsense. When I called Vanguard with a very complex question, I was amazed at the abilities of the people I spoke with.