Stock market

[Silound]

Originally Posted by hammondc

Thanks. OK, howabout I rephrase that to 'park' it somewhere that I can get better than the very minimal return I have at the bank in a Money Market? I have no problem leaving it, but would like to be able to get to it if the SHTF

If a situation arose where the SHTF on a large scale (national crisis, global crisis), you wouldn't be able to get your money out in time without taking a beating, or even worse case, it would be worthless once you got it out. Personally, I feel that if cash money is rendered worthless for some reason, then it's pointless to care about any other investments anyway


If a more personal crisis arose and you needed money **today**, you would need cash or cash-equivalent money funds to be able to withdraw them immediately. Any other sort of investment trade will take at least a day to process and deliver funds. It's just how brokerages work: to get the best prices and values, they consolidate by grouping large numbers of the same investment together for larger trades.


Many large investment brokerages offer short term loan services against your portfolio though, so you could initiate a sale immediately, and they could set up a cash advance against that sale for a flat fee or percentage of interest. Usually this is a pretty high interest rate, but it's compounded daily, so you only eat 3-6 days of interest build-up. Since they know you have the liquidity to back it when the trade goes through, it's a very low risk loan for the brokerage to make, and they get to make a dime off of you. I had to do this once and only got hit for ~$50 on a substantial sale.


I would speak with a couple CFAs from different brokerages and see what kinds of options they offer. Every company has different means and methods, but what you're asking about is not uncommon in the realm of investments, especially for retired persons.