Free gasoline for the rest of your life!



Never take investment advice from a pastor*... except this one time!

Best investment decision I ever made: I put a chunk of my IRA money in energy stocks (Vanguard Energy Fund). Now when gas prices go up, my fund goes up - more than enough to cover the cost of ALL my gasoline. Of course the fund goes down if gas goes down so there is a risk here: If, over the long haul, gas prices go down more than they go up, I'll lose money. That's the kind of risk I can live with. And during those times when my investment does go down- at least I'm paying less at the pump. I may be losing money, but what other investment gives you that kind of offset? The best part about this of course is the psychological benefit: If you fret every time gas prices go up, this investment will buy you a lot of peace of mind. I'd recommend a fund rather than a stock since any one stock can go bad on you. And be sure, as always, to choose a fund with low fees such as Vanguard's energy ETF, symbol "VDE". Hey look, gas is up a nickel today! Whoo Hoo!

*In 2000 I was convinced that telecomm was the future and invested 12K in 3 telecom stocks (including WorldCom) which today are worth a combined $500. With that caveat in mind, my other hot tip for you is this: I bought Apple stock last year because I believe that in ten years Apple's share of the computer market will go from today's 3% to something closer to 90%. But most of my retirement money (both in the past and today) is in safer investments such as value-oriented mutual funds.

Update: In the three days since I posted this my fund has lost 10% of its value. If I was Pat Robertson I would have seen it coming.

Posted: Wed - January 3, 2007 at 10:46 AM          

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