My mom picked up some investment tips back in the 1970s and 1980s listening to a radio show called, "What's Your Problem?" hosted by Dr. Bernard Meltzer here in NY on WOR. He offered advice on anything and everything, not limited to financial things. She began dabbling in tax-free bond mutual funds and passed that advice to me in 1990 when I finally had enough extra money to invest after recovering from buying my current co-op apartment. [Another good piece of advice passed along to me from Dr. Meltzer via my mom: Buy the worst apartment in the best building.]
I soon branched out into other mutual funds including mixed-asset and stock mutual funds just in time for the late 1990s boom.
I was already LBYM and saving a lot and investing a lot, both in my company's 401k and outside it. I hated debt, having paid off my student loans 2 years after graduating and paying cash for my car (and always paid my CC in full). Interest rates were much higher back in the 1980s and deducting personal interest on your income taxes got phased out with the 1986 tax reform act. I paid off the mortgage in 9 years.
My mom passed away in 1995, so she never got to see the big result of her carefully planted seeds of advice.
I settled on a comfortable 55/45 AA in my 401k once I began investing more in stocks in the 1990s. I didn't have as strict an AA in the taxable side.
I picked up bits of advice over the years, but nothing huge like what I learned in my more formative years of the 1980s and early 1990s.
