You Magazine The Digital Magazine for a Better YOU | October 2017

Your Home – Halloween Tricks and Treats

With the scary festivities, and young trick-or-treaters, you may begin to realize there isn’t as much for you to do as there used to be when you were your kids age. Don’t be frightened, there are many activities you can still enjoy under your adult radar; and be careful, some are terrifyingly pleasant and fun!1. Go to the movies. In the dark of the theater, costumes are a non-issue, so you don’t have to feel lame and old. Halloween makes a great excuse to splurge on the theater’s king-size candies (or the stuff you scored on sale) – everyone is housing candy today! (And you don’t even have to see something spooky.)

2. Raid the nearest grocery store/pharmacy for candy. Chances are Halloween candy will already be on sale, so you can stock your candy stash for the year at a fraction of the typical price.

3. Go on a first date with another Halloween hater. Anywhere you go there will be A+ people-watching. It’s the ultimate antidote to awkwardness.

4. Take your little cousins trick-or-treating. You don’t even have to dress up; just bring your phone, and be the squad’s official photographer, and unofficial hero to your little cousins’ parents.

5. Go shopping. When you don’t dress up, you save all the money you would have spent on a Halloween costume. To reward yourself, hit the mall to put your savings toward something you’ll actually wear more than once. Stores often stock sweets for trick-or-treaters, and if you happen to be disguising yourself as someone who can really afford to splurge, that candy is as good as yours!

6. Stage a Christmas celebration. So it sounds a little off, but trust me, it will feel just right once you get down to it. Invite some friends over to screen a classic Christmas movie in their finest holiday PJs. Ask them each to bring a batch of their favorite holiday cookies, and serve hot chocolate for extra effect. (If anyone asks what you were for Halloween? The easy answer is “early.”)

Finances – When to Invest

When it comes to investing, a lot of things come to mind: Investing time, effort, etc. But when it comes to finances, we’re talking about finding the right time to invest in local businesses, franchises, and all of the above. In a short “how-to,” we’ll explain the action of when and how to invest!It’s not surprising that first-time investors often worry about the timing of their initial stock purchases. Getting started at the wrong point in the market’s ups and downs can leave you staring at big losses right off the bat. But take heart, whenever you first invest, time is on your side. Over the long haul, the compounding returns of a well-chosen investment will add up nicely, no matter what the market happens to be doing when you buy your first shares.

Don’t waste time: Rather than fretting about when you should make that first stock purchase, think instead about how long you’re planning to keep money in the market. Different investments offer varying degrees of risk and return, and each is best suited for a different investing time frame.

When will you need the money? The longer you have to amass your cash, the greater risk you can accept, since you’ll have more time to wait out periods of bad returns. If you need the money within the next five years, you’ll want to avoid individual stocks and stock-centric mutual funds. If you need the money within the next three years, you should also avoid bond mutual funds and real estate investment trusts (REITs), which can drop if interest rates increase. With those options eliminated, you have a few choices left: buying individual bonds or certificates of deposit (CDs) with durations of less than three years, putting your money in a money market fund, or using a savings account. Each vehicle generates income while guaranteeing the return of your principal. The sooner you need the money, the less you can afford to lose, right?

When to sell? Once you’ve decided what to buy, and when to buy it, you’ll next need to decide when to cash out. Since bonds essentially sell themselves when they mature, this question primarily applies to stocks or stock mutual funds. Selling stocks can present a more complex set of questions. Two major warning signs may suggest that it’s a good time to sell:

The business’s fundamentals change. Is a new competitor rendering its basic products obsolete? Is the company branching out into areas wildly unrelated to its core competencies, leaving you no longer able to understand the business? T

he stock becomes overvalued. Has the market bid the company’s shares up to unsupportable heights? Is the stock likely to crash on the slightest bad news? Does the risk of such a tumble outweigh any tax hit you’d take by selling now?

Don’t listen to the noise. The media pays meticulous attention to Wall Street – but it tends to focus entirely on one particular index, assuming that it reflects the entire market. Index goes up? The market is bullish! Index goes down? Here comes the bear market! Index yo-yos back and forth? Now the market is “volatile!”

Review, review, review. Of course, you can’t just load your portfolio with a few stocks – however well-chosen – and then forget all about them. Like houseplants, investments need regular care and attention to flourish. Unless you’ve parked your money in government bonds with their guaranteed rates of return, you need to check on your investments regularly to make sure they’re beating the market – and doing so more substantially and less expensively than other similar options. This article is for information, illustrative and entertainment purposes only and does not purport to show actual results. It is not, and should not be regarded as investment advice or as a recommendation regarding any particular investment action.

Personal Interest – Spontaneous Fun

As time goes by, routine habits may tend to get old, or under-stimulating. When it comes to your own personal enjoyment, having fun in your life is a necessity. So if the ways you have fun are more of a routine now, here’s a list of fun things you can do – almost spontaneously`!Play Hard. Do it because it’s good for the soul – yours and everyone else’s. Releasing endorphins is the number one way to say bye-bye to that edgy attitude that’s been shadowing you all week. Set the happy hormones free with some outside playtime together. Go for a round of Frisbee golf, start a game of badminton, grab the dogs and go for a hike, try rowing if you have a river in your community, toss the basketball around (even if it’s a quick game of H-O-R-S-E) or cruise the neighborhood on your bike delivering garden goodies to your neighbors.

Feed Your Fun. While you’re at it, keep the silly factor in play by making up nicknames for each other, singing songs and stopping for impromptu rounds of Pickle. Playing hard requires sustenance, but try to keep the menu playful too. Go for interactive fare like shabu-shabu, the Japanese style of cooking your own meal at the table, or a kid favorite like a ’70s-style taco bar. Dream up nibbles that are matchy-matchy with your activity. Nature hike equals a healthy picnic (replace the processed stuff with a spread of homemade healthy treats from your organic produce section). Rowing? Dig into some fish and chips. Badminton is believed to have started in ancient Greece, so pick up some spanakopita and baklava while you’re out and about, and whip up a crunchy Greek salad.

Keep Learning. It’s not all performance art, you can play with fine art too. Try taking drawing classes together, and if you’re both feeling spicy, make it romantic by inviting your honey to pose for you at home! Acknowledging a secret passion feels playful even when the subject sounds dull. History buff? Ramp up your museum visits with a friend who’s also a history fiend, and make it a standing date to see a new exhibition each month. Still stuck? Keep it simple and heighten an existing playdate, like a knitting klatch. In between slip stitches, sample new music like a DJ protege or shake cocktails like a mixologist in training.

Become a Know-It-All. Lastly, become an expert – even if it’s a chocolate expert! That’s right: Seek out exciting new tastes together, infused with relaxing lemon balm, made with chili, rosemary and lavender – some cities even have chocolate tours. This is not permission to indulge a sweet tooth, people, it’s all about exploring something you love with someone you love or even like-like! Here’s a short list of bonus activities you can try as well!

1. A potluck dinner party. Host a dinner party and ask everyone to bring a dish to share. If you are not comfortable with cooking, maybe try and learn how to cook a new dish together with your friends.

2. Host a spa day. Give each other manicures. Try out new hairstyles. Make some facial masks or exfoliates using natural, at-home ingredients. Then drink mimosas.

3. Movie marathon. Log into Netflix and watch every episode of “Orange Is the New Black.” Or do an ’80s movie marathon, watching “Pretty in Pink,” “The Breakfast Club” and all of our old favorites. Don’t have a Netflix membership? Get the free trial just for the marathon!

Thank you and have a great month!

Richard Woodward
Team Manager, NMLS ID 217454
Office: (214) 945-1066 Fax: (214) 945-1061 Cell: (972) 814-3587
Service First Mortgage, NMLS ID 166487
6800 Weiskopf Ave, Suite 200 McKinney, TX 75070

Closing On Time And As Agreed!