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As small investors look for ways to ensure a good return on their money, land sales are increasing in popularity. Profits, whilst not guaranteed, are often better than those from the stock market, for several reasons:
Less risk, more profit
Whilst some investors have a significant investment in the stock market, often with a comprehensive, well-managed portfolio, for most smaller investors, their experience of the market is limited to one or two companies and they are therefore more open to stock market fluctuations and risks. Company share prices can be affected by many external factors, often beyond the companys control and, unless you are watching the market carefully day by day, you usually have to hold onto your shares for many years in order to turn a good profit.
By contrast, if you select the right land, or take the advice of a reliable land agent, you can realise potentially fantastic profits in a much shorter space of time. This is because the land thats normally made available to smaller investors has been carefully chosen. Big land investors buy and then bank land that they think will be ear-marked for development in the future, and then either hold onto it, or parcel it up and sell it to private investors, who reap the benefits if planning permission is granted at a later date.
No maintenance required
Once youve bought your piece of land, you own it outright and can sell it whenever you choose. You dont need to maintain it as you would a property and you dont need to follow its fortunes day in, day out, to find out whether youre making any money. If you need to raise money, you can sell your land quickly, whereas if your shares are at a low price, you wont be able to make enough cash.
The best of both worlds
If you have thought of investing in land, but dont want to get out of the stock market completely, then just broaden your portfolio by reducing your shareholdings and investing in land as well. You get the best of both worlds, and the chance to make a very health profit if you choose the land wisely.
Penny Stocks can be a great investment, but you have to know what to look for, or sometimes more accurately, what to look out for. Buying Penny Stocks based on a recent email you received, or what you heard from someone you barely know, is not usually a good idea. Penny Stocks have historically been a source of wealth for many investors, but conversely have been the source of countless lost small fortunes. Determining what is good advice, mixed with all the hype, can sometimes be a very difficult process. You don’t have to be a stock market guru or brilliant investor to make a killing with Penny Stocks, but you do have to be willing to do your homework, and use a great deal of common sense to stay alive when you are swimming with the sharks in what can be dangerous waters.
There are many great small companies in existence today, struggling to stay afloat, that are tomorrow’s rising stars. Without the capital to grow and expand very few of our current generation of conglomerates would be more than a forgotten flash in the pan. Selling shares of a company can inject the needed capital into a niche business that may take it into the next level. However not all, if not most, of these tiny corporations will be around for very long. This creates an interesting situation for us, the investor or speculator. While the company in question may not be worth much today, what might that company be worth tomorrow? Hence the term speculation, which is the lifeblood of any Penny Stock trader.
Unfortunately, within this world there are a few unseemly characters, who seek to part you from your hard earned pounds. And, they will go to nearly whatever means is necessary to achieve their goal. PR firms, or Investor Awareness firms, are sometime hired to promote a small corporation’s stock in hopes of raising the share price. This in itself is not necessarily a sign of ill intent. Many times a small company may be very good at what it does, but for whatever reason finds itself unable to generate enough press interest in their successes to generate buying activity of their stock shares. However, this is occasionally done with the sole purpose of raising prices rapidly in an attempt to make quick profits on a very hollow company, one that has no real market or solid foundation. Hence the phrase, pump and dump. Pump and dump in a nutshell means, exaggeratedly “pumping” up the company in question with the primary intent of “dumping” their shares once the share prices begin to rise.
What can you do to protect yourself from being caught up in a pump and dump scenario? Most importantly you must use your own due diligence to wade through the hype. Ask yourself a few basic questions about the company in question. Are they making money? Are they creating new products? Are these new products going to be valuable in the future? The rules for trading Penny Stocks aren’t much different from those of trading large cap stocks. However, the risks can be much larger, but the rewards can be as well.
If you aren’t willing to do at least a bit of homework, investing in any stock is not a good idea. Never rely entirely on anyone’s advice, especially when dealing with Penny Stocks. But, if you take the time to research your investments, investing in Penny Stocks can be a very financially rewarding experience.
If you are looking are thinking that Penny Stocks are a Get Rich Quick Scheme, Im sorry to disappoint you. Although great fortunes can be made from penny stocks, people can also lose everything they invest in Penny Stocks. The most important investment you can make at the start of your investment career is to invest in education.
Why Education and not stock?
Diving head first into the stock market is a great way of losing your money which is why we dont recommend it. The best thing to do is to read, read and read some more before investing. One of the best places to get free information on penny stocks and trading methods is from the internet.
Forums, websites, news sites and eBooks are a great way to improve your penny stock investment education. There are some great books that you can borrow from libraries or purchase cheaply from shops.
When reading on the internet, please be cautious of stock recommendations and strategies and methods. Stock recommendations and opinions from internet forums can be biased and cannot be fully trusted without doing your own research. Similarly, eBooks with strategies which promise great returns usually do not work as suggested. The reason for this is, even if the strategy worked well for the author, there is no guarantee that it will work for everyone else because everyone is different although you may learn something that you did not already know.
Google News has a business section which is group for free up-to-date information on stocks. Yahoo Finance also has good news section and also provides free charts and company information.
No matter who you get advice from, whether its from a financial consultant or friend, you should always carry out your own additional research. You should make decisions based on facts rather than opinions.
When you feel confident enough you can try some test trades. You can either keep a record of your trades on paper or you can use a stocks simulator website where you invest with fake money. There is a website called Champion Investor (ChampInvest.com) which is great for this purpose as it also calculates profits and losses automatically. Also, if you the top performer of the month, you will be rewarded with 1000.
Using a stock simulator means that you will not lose your hard-earned cash if you make a bad investment. Instead, you will learn not to do it again without losing your money.
If you are consistently able to make a profit with your test trades then you can move onto the real thing. Keep your investment strategy exactly as it was when you were making profitable test trades, but instead of using fake money, you will be using your own money through a stock broker.
So, to summarise – if you are looking to get started in penny stocks, please do not dive in head first without investing your education first.