Investment options for a rookie

Nice one, HH2! How much did you make?

Not much, Im better at giving advice sometimes than investing.

I’m not trying to offend here so please just take this as one mans opinion. I think the fact that you didn’t put your own money in Tesla says a lot about whether it counts as investment advice or not. I could quite easily go find a biotech company right now, tell people to buy it, and in 6 months it could triple or more. That doesn’t constitute investment advice because I would not have put money in it myself.

This is one of the biggest problems in the financial industry. They say things and give advice without the conviction of putting their own money in it, making it a virtually worthless prediction. Do you know how few financial advisors have their personal money in the same trades they have their clients in? It’s a very small percentage. They’ll put your money in something, or advise you to buy certain things, but wouldn’t touch it with their own money.

So the next time you hear somebody say hey, you should put your money in such and such. Ask them, would you put your own money there? Most of the time, the answer is no :unamused: Now just because somebody has their own money in it, that doesn’t mean it’s good advice. But at least they would have conviction in what they are saying right…

Yeah but Im not a professional advisor looking for commission, and the reasons I didn’t invest much are not relevant to your conclusion.
The proof of my advice here was in the result, not in my own circumstances. Of course everybody can get lucky on stock recommendations, but in this case I just outlined why I thought the stock was undervalued, mainly due to the short term ‘profit’ horizon of the analysts (as soon as tesla reported a minimal profit the stock doubles and triples yet they had flagged ahead of time that they were going to be profitable soon and the numbers supported that) and the shorts who thought they had a good thing in talking down the market without realizing electric car technology is actually getting mature enough now to compete. They simply did not know what they were talking about and if they did they were not being honest in order to try to short the stock.

Buy facebook at 20$ seems like a good deal!

Yeah in hindsight everything that goes up looks like a good deal.

I went to my bank trying to open a U.S trading account but unfortunately got rejected/advised not to. The reasons were:
1 - My capital is apparently not big enough
2 - My credit history is non-existent
3 - Not a U.S citizen (VERY high tax)

So right now I have my tiny investment (1/3) mixed in with my parents (2/3) in a property near keelung university.
We rent it out to 6 students, getting an income of about 35,000/month (5k/room), so thats 11k/month. I’m thinking that’s not a bad start right?
Plus, I worked in real estate before and can definitely increase the rental price for better accommodation amenities e.t.c

Well that would depend on how much you paid for it, right? If you’re able to turn a profit off of rentals in Taiwan’s absurd housing market, I’m impressed. But be wary that people are not willing to accept rent much higher than what you’re charging now, though it it does of course depend on amenities.

Since northern Taiwan is in the midst of an extended property bubble, I would say putting your money elsewhere may be a safer bet. But then again I don’t know all that much about investment and don’t have any capital myself. :smiley:

Yup, I think this will just be a stop gap. It’s going okay so far. But will definitely look at some more info/advice that this thread can bring up or whatever I come across. Thanks

Well interestingly Keelung also has big redevelopment plans as it has a great natural asset, it’s harbour and its pretty close to Taipei. Pity it rains there half the year! If I had some spare cash and inclination I would invest it one of Taiwan’s best kept secrets, Penghu. Penghu will jump onto the mainlanders radar from this year due to direct flights opening from China. That’s going to bring the good and bad to the islands, although it should help Magong’s redevelopment, which is sorely needed.

Anyone considering buying a home in Taiwan and renting it out as a source of income should consider all the facts first :no-no:

If the above chart isn’t clear to anyone, it means that on average across ALL of Taiwan, it takes 64 years of rent to pay off the price of a house. This is the biggest price-rent disparity in the world according to whatever organization did the research, and obviously things are even more ridiculous in Taipei.

Based on the price of another unit in my building that was up for sale, it will take my landlady 80 YEARS of collecting rent from me for the even pay off this mortgage. I have no idea why she thinks this was a good investment.

In my experience, I find people very rarely have any legitimate justification for the investments they make…

[quote=“Hokwongwei”]If the above chart isn’t clear to anyone, it means that on average across ALL of Taiwan, it takes 64 years of rent to pay off the price of a house. This is the biggest price-rent disparity in the world according to whatever organization did the research, and obviously things are even more ridiculous in Taipei.

Based on the price of another unit in my building that was up for sale, it will take my landlady 80 YEARS of collecting rent from me for the even pay off this mortgage. I have no idea why she thinks this was a good investment.[/quote]

Some of these ‘investments’ are legalized money laundering, aided and abetted by Taiwan’s very lenient property tax and gift tax system.

The main support are record low interest rates.

Plus they have this idea that property goes up in price every year, see how that works out.

In terms of renting to students that market is in danger due to massive drop off in university students in next 10 years, places near the best universities would be okay but many universities (technical colleges really) will have to close down.

The wife plays on the local stock market, using the Top 20 they show each day on TV. Not the HTC’ s but small IPO’s whom do well or got orders.
On one she gained 10% over 9 days, generating a nice 20k.
Another - a famous local hotel chain- is long investment as the occupancy for mainlanders and their spending determines revenue / earnings.

She is looking into some mineral commodity firms. One gave a net gain of 2000 NTD for a buy in the morning and sell just before closing.

It’s fun to play short term investments !

I purchased stock options in my local employer a few years back. The stocks went to TEN TIMES since then. Last years top performer on the over the counter market (it’s a drug company).

Of course I had sold them for a small LOSS on leaving the company.