Investing is just one aspect of personal finance. People often seem to have the itch to try their hand at investing before they get the rest of their act together. This is a big mistake. For this reason, it`s a good idea for "new investors" to hit the library and read maybe three different overall guides to personal finance - three for different perspectives, and because common themes will emerge (repetition implies authority?). Personal finance issues include making a budget, sticking to a budget, saving money towards major purchases or retirement, managing debt appropriately, insuring your property, etc. Appropriate books that focus on personal finance include the following (the links point to Amazon.com): * Andrew Tobias Advertisement Click Here The Only Investment Guide You`ll Ever Need * Eric Tyson Personal Finance for Dummies (4th edn.) Another great resource for learning about investing, insurance, stocks, etc. is the Wall Street Journal`s Section C front page. Beginners should make a special effort to get the Friday edition of the WSJ because a column named "Getting Going" usually appears on that day and discusses issues in, well, getting going on investments. If you don`t want to spend the dollar or so for the WSJ, try your local library.

There are several reasons to choose a full-service broker over a discount or web broker. People use a full-service broker because they may not want to do their own research, because they are only interested in long-term investing, because they like to hear the broker`s investment ideas, etc. But another important reason is that not everybody likes to trade. I may want retirement planning services from my broker. I may want to buy 3 or 4 mutual funds and have my broker worry about them. If my broker is a financial planner, perhaps I want tax or estate advice on certain investment options. Maybe I`m saving for my newborn child`s education but I have no idea or desire to work out a plan to make sure the money is there when she or he needs it. A huge reason to stick with a full-service broker is access to initial public offerings (IPOs). These are generally reserved for the very best clients, where best is defined as "someone who generates lots of Advertisement Click Here revenue," so someone who trades just a few times a year doesn`t have a chance. But if you can afford to trade frequently at the full-service commission rates, you may be favored with access to some great IPOs.

I`m no expert, but there`s a simple rule that you should use to evaluate all advice that is offered to you, especially advice for which someone who doesn`t know you is asking significant sums of money. Ask yourself why the person is selling or giving it to you. If it sounds like a sure ticket to riches, then why is the person wasting their time on YOU when they could be out there making piles of dough? Of course I`m offering advice here in this article, so let`s turn the tables on me right now. What`s in it for me? Well, if you`re reading this article from my web site, look up at the top of the page. If you have images turned on, you`ll see a banner ad. I get a tiny payment each time a person loads one of my pages with an ad. So my motivation is to provide informative articles in order to lure visitors to the site. Of course if you`re reading this from the plain-text version of the FAQ, you won`t see any ads, but please do stop by the site sometime! ;-)