Who kept investing heavily through the great recession?

[mtheulen]

on paper i lost 375K BETWEEN SEPT 2008 AND APRIL 2009.Took a breath and invested all of my cash, maxed out my 401k in May 2009
I retired in Sept 2018 primarily because of my net gain from 2009-2018

[TDub]

Quote:

Originally Posted by mtheulen on paper i lost 375K BETWEEN SEPT 2008 AND APRIL 2009.Took a breath and invested all of my cash, maxed out my 401k in May 2009 I retired in Sept 2018 primarily because of my net gain from 2009-2018

That would be terrifying. Well done.

[devans0]

I tightened my belt, closed my eyes, and doubled down on every dollar that I could scrape together to contribute our 401Ks. Another member in this forum clued me to learn about Keynesian economics when I was a rank beginner in self directing my investments. That education helped me move somewhat adeptly in balancing foreign and domestic funds and later into commodities. We rode the recovery rocket ride well, increasing our investable money by 5X. It made retirement much easier.

Tariff wars are a wild card in investing currently. I'm out of the equity markets as much as I can until the Joker cards are finished being played. It may very well be a poor decision, being out of the market. But reading that there is an end, no not an end, yes there is a deal, yoyo-ing is not my idea of a rational market.

[morriss003]

I took all our money out of the market in early 2007. I put half back in November 2008 (too soon) and the other half in March 2009 (perfect).

[cooch96]

Quote:

Originally Posted by MikeD I bet this thread only has the good stories in it because it would be too painful for the people who lost money to write about it. Is that what's called selection bias? (Real question, as I never understood that term.)

Well, as I understand it, it depends on the intent of the OP and forum. If the intent is to get a randomized sample of the population, then yes, these stories won’t be very representative and will suffer selection bias.
If the intent is to gather round and pat ourselves on the back, or to give assurance to nervous nellies, then I think it’s something else. Something like, “case studies of success.”

[davidfin]

Was still 4 years from fire. Working and contributing every tax deferred $ possible. Company match likewise. All went into mutual funds for a mother of a dollar cost averaging. Hugely beneficial. It was all about ability to wait 5 or more years before tapping the funds. As it turned out,I shouldn’t have worried. The bull market following the Great Recession helped even more. Great timing and dumb luck clearly at play.

[KennyOwen]

I rode the wave down to the bottom while invested 100% in stocks. In September of 2006 I looked at DW and said we can mortgage the house and double down because this market is coming back, She agreed and we left the debt free life and put the money in TQQQ. It went down another 45% after that and I must say it was hard to take. But our motivation was that if we win this bet we retire early and if we lose we work a while longer. We won. By September of 2007 we were 38% ahead on the mortgage deal and cashed out. The rest of our investments we had tripled down in early 2007. . We quadrupled our net worth in under a year with a little help from our continued heavy savings and a good year with our side business. DW retired in 2011 after 25 years teaching school and I retired in 2017 after 25 years with the same company. Now we are loving life. Before the Trump/Clinton election we had enough to last us our lives so I pulled everything out of the market and we are still sitting and waiting for the market to correct.

[VanWinkle]

Quote:

Originally Posted by KennyOwen I rode the wave down to the bottom while invested 100% in stocks. In September of 2006 I looked at DW and said we can mortgage the house and double down because this market is coming back, She agreed and we left the debt free life and put the money in TQQQ. It went down another 45% after that and I must say it was hard to take. But our motivation was that if we win this bet we retire early and if we lose we work a while longer. We won. By September of 2007 we were 38% ahead on the mortgage deal and cashed out. The rest of our investments we had tripled down in early 2007. . We quadrupled our net worth in under a year with a little help from our continued heavy savings and a good year with our side business. DW retired in 2011 after 25 years teaching school and I retired in 2017 after 25 years with the same company. Now we are loving life. Before the Trump/Clinton election we had enough to last us our lives so I pulled everything out of the market and we are still sitting and waiting for the market to correct.

Sometimes you're just lucky, and sometimes you're not.
Here's hoping luck stays with you!

VW

p.s. If it is not luck, you should start your own investing service.

[mtheulen]

Quote:

Originally Posted by cooch96 Well, as I understand it, it depends on the intent of the OP and forum. If the intent is to get a randomized sample of the population, then yes, these stories won’t be very representative and will suffer selection bias. If the intent is to gather round and pat ourselves on the back, or to give assurance to nervous nellies, then I think it’s something else. Something like, “case studies of success.”

Stated my case a few post back.Here is what i witnessed with 2 co workers
2008 market tanks
2009 put all their money in stable value
2010-2016 watch the market go sky high all the while they are in stable value
both worked 5-8 years longer then they wanted

[pb4uski]

^^^^ Similar story with an uncle and family friend.... luckily at the time they were both retired and what they cashed out at was plenty for their needs in retirement so they are both doing well... it is just that their heirs will get less than if they stayed in the market.

Have another story of an uncle who is an astute investor who stayed the course and is a closet multi-millionaire... but to be honest he was probably already a closet multi-millionaire but is now just much more of a closet multi-millionaire.

[S103462]

We continued investing heavily through the great recession. We had planned for many years to early-retire in 2010 (both at 55 y/o). In preparation for that retirement date, three years prior (in 2007) we went to a more conservative allocation in our 401(k)s, but continued to fully dollar-cost-average. When the market corrected in 2008, our portfolios were minimally impacted. We then re-allocated to a slightly less conservative allocation, and continued max'ing out our 401(k) contributions up until our 2010 retirement. (Eight years out now, the market has performed very well up until recently. We're back to our conservative allocation.)

[Caskem]

I was putting 25% of my gross salary into my various investments for the last 20 years and while I hate seeing daily $30K swings up and down in my accounts I'm very happy I stayed the course.

[hausfrau]

We stayed invested throughout the recession. Fortunately for us, we were both employed and maxed out our retirements. Also, I had some cash in a savings account and decided to start DD's 529 plan in early 2009. That was some fortunate timing.

[PaddyMac]

We stayed the course and then some.

Our portfolio dropped from $900K at the end of Aug 2008 to $500K+ at the low, but we were buying a little each month.

On March 2009, when I saw Ali Velshi's reaction to the market hitting bottom, I rounded up all our spare cash and bought $10K of the S&P. It felt like the bottom, or close to it. Anything we saved in early 2009 pretty much doubled.

We were lucky to have our best years income wise in 2009-2010-2011, and we saved half our income those years. Looking back, it was a bonus that the market was on sale.

Now that we are in semi-retirement, a recession won't be much fun. We now have to sell a bit each year, and I wish we had sold earlier this year (too busy to notice!).

[palomalou]

We had automatic and increased it during the recession.

[FIREarly]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Beer-man What was your experience through recessions? Did you buy more? How did it work out for you gains wise? Any regrets?

Keep investing and enjoy the extra stocks you can buy at a lower price. Experience receiving more dividends and reinvesting them!!

[mickeyd]

The Great Recession did not slow me down. I was investing for the long -term and realized that I was purchasing cheaper shares of TSM. I recall buying TSM at less than $20/share. It is now between $65/$70/share.

[TEO]

Quote:

Originally Posted by KennyOwen I rode the wave down to the bottom while invested 100% in stocks. In September of 2006 I looked at DW and said we can mortgage the house and double down because this market is coming back, She agreed and we left the debt free life and put the money in TQQQ. It went down another 45% after that and I must say it was hard to take. But our motivation was that if we win this bet we retire early and if we lose we work a while longer. We won. By September of 2007 we were 38% ahead on the mortgage deal and cashed out. The rest of our investments we had tripled down in early 2007. . We quadrupled our net worth in under a year with a little help from our continued heavy savings and a good year with our side business. DW retired in 2011 after 25 years teaching school and I retired in 2017 after 25 years with the same company. Now we are loving life. Before the Trump/Clinton election we had enough to last us our lives so I pulled everything out of the market and we are still sitting and waiting for the market to correct.

Good story... but TQQQ was started Feb 2010.

Ill say it again... good STORY.

[canuck5]

I kept investing in 1987 .... thru Gulf War 1 and 2 ...... The Impeachment ..... got nervous around Y2K, but kept going .... the Tech Bubble .... 9/11 ...... when 2008 rolled around, I kept investing, but started to diversify adding fixed income. I'm pulling the trigger at the end of this year and will see what this thing called retirement, is all about. 62 years old.

[Jeffman52]

There came a time during that period, when I was reading an article that talked about "if you have years before your are retiring, now is the time to buy because you are buying on sale" So I increased my percent of income going in from 6% to 15%. (which felt painful at the time) Best move I ever made was to buy on-sale. My 401K results when the market was recovering was nothing short of astounding.

The difference between now and then is the number of years I have before retiring. But I still say buying on sale holds true. If you have time to wait on the market to recover AND you can increase your stock buying, then you can make some excellent gains on your investments. Its just a painful ride especially when it takes years for that true recovery to happen and a move to a Bull market.