Join Early Retirement Today
Reply
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
Old 05-24-2019, 04:27 PM   #41
Full time employment: Posting here.
 
Join Date: May 2009
Location: Ottawa and Fort Myers
Posts: 778
In the Ottawa Federal Government many colleagues had spouses at Nortel or JDU. Pre meeting buzz would include bragging about stock options, “I no longer need to work” stuff, stories of cleaners getting rich on options, and so on.

A year later it was stories of spouses getting laid off, mortgages on houses no longer affordable. I bought a jet ski off of a twenty something high techer laid off. A lot of retirements were ruined by over exposure to high tech.

Friend of mine in senior management at Intel had a big blow up with his boss just before the bubble burst, resigned and cashed out his options on the way out the door. Was sitting on a large pile of cash when things crashed.

Mid 2000s I was doing well with sub prime private lending, but drifted into riskier bridge loans where you could pocket 10k on a 100k note in a couple of weeks.

But, I was too trusting of a borrower who had the lawyer and broker in his pocket and found myself with a 2nd mortgage out of water on a slum, hungry for a 20k monthly first mortgage payment.

The process of digging myself out of that was life changing.
Kroeran is offline   Reply With Quote
Join the #1 Early Retirement and Financial Independence Forum Today - It's Totally Free!

Are you planning to be financially independent as early as possible so you can live life on your own terms? Discuss successful investing strategies, asset allocation models, tax strategies and other related topics in our online forum community. Our members range from young folks just starting their journey to financial independence, military retirees and even multimillionaires. No matter where you fit in you'll find that Early-Retirement.org is a great community to join. Best of all it's totally FREE!

You are currently viewing our boards as a guest so you have limited access to our community. Please take the time to register and you will gain a lot of great new features including; the ability to participate in discussions, network with our members, see fewer ads, upload photographs, create a retirement blog, send private messages and so much, much more!

Btc
Old 05-24-2019, 04:58 PM   #42
Recycles dryer sheets
 
Join Date: Jun 2008
Posts: 217
Btc

2200 percent, give or take, 2k experiment in crypto turned 2k into 36k in about a month
hotwired is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 05-24-2019, 05:59 PM   #43
Recycles dryer sheets
Sconie's Avatar
 
Join Date: Mar 2010
Location: Arizona
Posts: 79
Watching the events of 9/11/2001 unfold-----and listening to the tales of individuals attempting to contact their loved ones on cell phones convinced me that mobil phones were here to stay. As soon as the NYSE reopened, I bought Nokia; I sold the same shares a little over 3 months later-----a "double bagger" on my initial investment.
Sconie is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 05-24-2019, 06:59 PM   #44
Thinks s/he gets paid by the post
 
Join Date: Jul 2009
Posts: 1,605
Bought ROKU in December 18 while goofing off in Key West ... had been following the streaming technology for a year or so ... also bought MJ while sniffing the alleyways.

Should buy from Key West more often.
stephenson is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 05-25-2019, 06:56 AM   #45
Recycles dryer sheets
l2ridehd's Avatar
 
Join Date: Sep 2011
Location: PWC VA
Posts: 144
I have had three that really stand out for me anyway.

Back in 1982 or 83 I was playing a few stock options and made some and lost some, but bought some IBM options that were out a few months and turned out I had perfect timing. Turned a $5000 investment into $151,000. Never did anything else even close to that with options.

I used to flip a house once in a while, one every couple years. This was also in the 80's. Bought a lake front cottage in NH in June for $125,000, had to put about $10,000 into it, and sold it in September for $250,000. Got it cheap because it had a problem nobody wanted to tackle and also hit market timing going up for lake front property in that area. Always made a profit on my flips, but nothing close to this one.

Then just last year was in Las Vegas and played blackjack. Had a stake of about $2000 which I turned into $11,000 in about 6 hours. Unfortunately I lost about half of it back over the next several days. Still left town with around $7000 so for me a huge win. I keep getting so many offers of free stuff to come back. Free rooms, shows, meal credits. I think they want their money back.
l2ridehd is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 05-25-2019, 09:59 AM   #46
Give me a museum and I'll fill it. (Picasso)
Give me a forum ...
 
Join Date: Nov 2009
Posts: 6,681
Quote:
Originally Posted by braumeister View Post
I don't know about best, but the one I enjoyed the most was Enron.

I bought some in early 2000. My skeptical self got nervous about it and sold it later that year for about an 18% gain. Not a big sum, but I've always felt good about it, and even today I smile whenever I hear Enron mentioned.
Coincidentally, I once made a 18% return on some money invested for one year. It was $500 so I got nearly $600 back. The return was crucial because I moved to my new place in that year (leaving me without a lot of money for a while) and bought my dinette set which cost me just under $600.
__________________
Retired in late 2008 at age 45. Cashed in company stock, bought a lot of shares in a big bond fund and am living nicely off its dividends. IRA, SS, and a pension await me at age 60 and later. No kids, no debts.

"I want my money working for me instead of me working for my money!"
scrabbler1 is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 05-25-2019, 01:24 PM   #47
Full time employment: Posting here.
 
Join Date: May 2011
Posts: 873
Purchased a vacation condo in 2004 sold in 2010 triple what we paid for it. That was during the housing crises too. It was a very good investment.
kimcdougc is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 05-30-2019, 10:06 AM   #48
Dryer sheet aficionado
 
Join Date: Jun 2013
Location: Panama City
Posts: 35
I have a couple, presuming short-term means less than one year. Back when I first started investing in the late 80's, I was attracted by a little known small cap fund call Ultra, managed by 20th Century Investors (now American Century). After seeing a dip within a few months of buying, it bounced back to return over 100% within 12 months. Alas, this attracted a lot of attention -- and investment dollars to the fund -- and it's never been the same since. I still own it, but it's basically another large cap growth fund, and return does not vary much from the market overall.

In the early 2000's I bought Drugstore.com, following Peter Lynch's advice to invest in companies relevant to you for some reason. I purchased contact lenses and other health-related merchandise on the site, so I thought I would give it a try. The stock was very ho-hum for most of the year. One morning when I checked the price, it was up over 90%. Turns out Walgreens had made a buyout offer. I figured it was best to lock in my gains and sold within a day or two.
gabrewer is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 05-30-2019, 10:28 AM   #49
Thinks s/he gets paid by the post
bmcgonig's Avatar
 
Join Date: Aug 2009
Posts: 1,577
Back when I was a teenager in Ireland I used to go to the race course every now and then. One day I was walking there (too young no car) and got a lift from a stranger. He told me that this horse was running in the last race called Carlow Rose. Well he said that Carlow Rose was out to win this time. What do you mean " out to win"...as opposed to "out to lose" I said? Exactly, he said. Carlow Rose runs best at 7 furlongs he said, and the trainer runs him at all the other distances because he won't win there, and that's the form that everyone looks at. So indeed I got to the the races and looked at his form (racing history). Lost all his last 6 races badly but none at 7 furlongs. Anyway..I put a fiver on him and he won at 33/1. Lot of money for me at the time!!

True enough to form the next year I watched him and when he ran anything but 7 furlongs he lost. Then at the end of the season he ran 7 again he won. Again at 33/1. This time I had a few friends in on it and we all made money. I imagine the owners did too. The races weren't worth a lot of money and he could probably make more betting on his horse once or twice a year.

The next year he was bought by someone else, and ran nothing but 7 furlong races and won quite a few. This owner wanted to win I guess. Of course my golden goose was dead.

I was told beforehand that horse racing was crooked but now I was sure. Saved me a lot of money after that just wondering if my horses owners even wanted to win in the first place. Silly betting on them if I'm not even that convinced.
bmcgonig is offline   Reply With Quote
Reply


Currently Active Users Viewing This Thread: 1 (0 members and 1 guests)
 
Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off
Trackbacks are Off
Pingbacks are Off
Refbacks are Off


Similar Threads
Thread Thread Starter Forum Replies Last Post
Where can I put $$ for best short term return? calmloki FIRE and Money 14 06-08-2015 03:11 AM
Work dilema regarding Megacorp request to plan long term when I only have short term Al in Ohio FIRE and Money 32 07-05-2013 03:10 PM
Short term vs Long term Bonds bank5 Active Investing, Market Strategies & Alternative Assets 17 03-24-2009 03:40 PM
Short Term vs. Intermd Term Bonds TromboneAl FIRE and Money 35 07-21-2006 07:58 AM
Short-term Bond Return Spanky FIRE and Money 6 01-19-2006 08:56 AM

» Quick Links

 
All times are GMT -6. The time now is 06:24 AM.
 
Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.8 Beta 1
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.