When do you buy funds?

remorseless

jimjames wrote: »

If you sell what would you do with the money?

hold it as a balance in my account :rotfl:
I do like to see the balance!!!!! Sad I know, it's a mental shift!

puk999

remorseless wrote: »

that's something else I can't (yet) get my head around... how long do you keep these funds?
In FX holding a position few days is already too long!

Did you see this from bowlhead99's earlier reply?

bowlhead99 wrote: »

The way you decide the time to buy or sell depends on what drove you to use that particular fund in the first place. A hunch? Then maybe just sell it when the wind changes and the next shiny fund takes your fancy. The recognition that you should have some exposure to Chinese tech manufacturing companies because in 30 years time you will be buying a lot of spare parts for your hover-zimmer-frame? Maybe hold the fund until retirement.

Of course, funds don't always grow over time. The trick is to not mind when they fall, or have a good balance of assets so that if some fall, others rise or don't fall so much - so you can rebalance your holdings and buy more of the cheap ones. Another option is to be constantly wondering whether the fund will rise or fall in the next week and buy or sell accordingly. But because you have such a broad spectrum of assets, the individual ups and downs don't matter so much and most of your returns just come from general growth over time. Instead of perhaps doubling one day and halving the next and trying to time all that perfectly.

Linton

remorseless wrote: »

that's something else I can't (yet) get my head around... how long do you keep these funds?
In FX holding a position few days is already too long!

Say I have invested £100 on a fund and it's performing well, etc - should I keep it for 30 years if I don't need the money?

Hold forever until you need the money, the fund is no longer doing the job you bought it for, or you change your strategy making the fund redundant.

I still hold some funds I bought in 2002. One for example has increased in value 6-fold - average of 15%/year. Another has averaged 14%/year for the same time period. Why sell? The thing to beware of is selling when the price falls. One of those funds fell by nearly 50% during the crash but I held on and was duly rewarded when values recovered. Selling would have been disastrous.

remorseless

puk999 wrote: »

Did you see this from bowlhead99's earlier reply?

I did - but it is hard to get my head around! I get the hunch and the Chinese manufacturer examples... but still because it is a very long term planning, I need to get used to it

remorseless

Linton wrote: »

I still hold some funds I bought in 2002.

Thanks that helps understanding timeframes! This may sound a stupid question, do fund close or cease to exist after a long time?

Thrugelmir

remorseless wrote: »

In FX holding a position few days is already too long!

I first bought Graphite Enterprise when it first launched and floated in 1981. Still have a holding today.

Traded in and out of BP since 1987.

Eco_Miser

remorseless wrote: »

Thanks that helps understanding timeframes! This may sound a stupid question, do fund close or cease to exist after a long time?

No, but they may close, or merge into another fund, or otherwise restructure, if the manager and shareholders think that would be better than continuing.

There are also some collective investment vehicles designed from the beginning to be wound up at a specified time. I'm just mentioning them for completeness.

Kendall80

Certain funds I invest monthly on a regular date. Others, I like to invest in manually when they've experienced 2/3 days of -ve values.


However, my main focus throughout is adhering to my allocations.


It seems to be serving me well as i'm 5.4% up so far for 2015 (not annualised). I'm sure we're due a correction shortly during which i'll pump some more into those funds that generally exhibit a greater recovery. Judged by previous dips ie Oct and Dec 2014.

bowlhead99

Kendall80 wrote: »

Certain funds I invest monthly on a regular date. Others, I like to invest in manually when they've experienced 2/3 days of -ve values.

However, my main focus throughout is adhering to my allocations.

It seems to be serving me well as i'm 5.4% up so far for 2015 (not annualised). I'm sure we're due a correction shortly during which i'll pump some more into those funds that generally exhibit a greater recovery. Judged by previous dips ie Oct and Dec 2014.

The FTSE100 was 6940 yesterday vs 6566 at year end. So, 5.7% year to date, plus dividends on top, for holding that index which accounts for four fifths of the UK market capitalisation.

Most people would not be all in that one index so would not expect the same returns, but it does put them into context - you're right, the return is more from the broad equity markets serving you well than from any special technique of timing purchases from a fund's two to three day history.