The Investment Move You Should Make Right Now

This morning I received a call from a client while I was driving to work. I was already proud of this particular client- they execute right away on the recommendations in their financial plan, and they accept my advice as expertise they don't have the time or patience to acquire on their own.

It was what they asked me to do today that moved them from I'm proud of you to You're simply awesome to work with.

They asked me to transfer extra money they'd been diligently saving at the bank to their investment account. Specifically, they said "since the market is down, instead of saving up more than I need to dollar cost average into my accounts, please transfer a lump sum into my account to take advantage of this decline".

This line of thinking should be applauded. Many investors are getting spooked by this year's -9% U.S. stock market decline, and may soon execute a dumb move and abandon their strategy (if they haven't already done so). On the other hand, this individual recognizes that a depressed market is an opportunity to buy more shares at discounted pricing. Buy low, sell high, right?

Investing more when the financial media is blowing up the issues in China and oil at less than $30/barrel is really, really hard. The same as you, I've watched my investments slide this year. If we invested more now, it would feel like buying losers, right? And who wants to invest in a loser...

The point of this post is not to say you should run out and empty your bank savings to invest in the stock market. It's a simple reminder we can all benefit from; right now you shouldn't be scared of the market, you need to take advantage of it.

#investorbehavior