Best way to save?

[bloodinbloodout]

Hey guys..

I just graduated college and now have a pretty good job in sales (was offered a pharma sales position in Chicago but I declined cause I'd like to stay close to home) Anyway, I am looking to eventually get into real estate investment.

To all the financial gurus, what is the best way to put some of my money away so that i can't actually get to it until I want to use it for the business venture. I was thinking of putting about 2-300 from every paycheck away. I would also like to put it into something with some sort of short term growth. I am very new to all of this and completely an idiot when it comes to finance stuff. (Pre-law, marketing major) so please can you give me some advice.

 

[bran987]

what do you mean... so you can't "get to it".. you can set up automatic draft on your checking account to do $300 auto invested in a certain fund every 2 weeks...

 

[mfpd]

you can "get to" all of your savings vehicles. You have to have the discipline to not do it. Anything you think you may be saving for less than a 5 yr horizon, I would put into an ING direct account. The time frame is too short for equity investing.

Any funds you have for long term investing, placing them in a tax sheltered device (IRA, Roth IRA, 401k) will make it harder to get to until you are 59½. Otherwise, you can put in a regular brokerage account, but you will have to pay taxes on capital gains / dividends yearly.

 

[Razorguns]

real-estate based mutual funds, or stocks are the only things i can think of for "short-term" growth.

Don't worry too much about the growth. Save up the cash and start focusing on the RE development/properties you will like to invest in once you figure it all out. Your main growth will come from there. Especially if you do "buy and flips".