So permies; what would you invest in?

John Wolfram wrote:

Alder Burns wrote:Creative, cutting edge, and arguably beneficial companies (such as those that make solar panels and wind turbines, for instance) tend to be just as volatile, or moreso, than the general economy.  Recently I've discovered a couple of venues, Mosaic (which focuses on solar panel installations) and Lending Club (which does direct credit loans, cutting out most bank profits) which seem to offer yields much better than bank accounts or CD's, but without the stomach churning up and down of stocks.

One thing I don't like cutting edge investments is that since we are now 6/7 years out from the last meltdown we don't really know how these investments are going to handle the next crash/recession when it comes. I'm reminded of Warren Buffet's comment that "you only find out who is swimming naked when the tide goes out."

Well, it looks like we've now been through the crash/recession mentioned five years ago and Lending Club has ceased being a peer-to-peer lender while Mosaic also no longer seems to be offering small solar investments.

I'd invest in anything to do with old folks. Care, medicine, transportation.... In the 50's and 60's Hasbro and toy manufacturers had a field day with the baby boomers. They got older and everything started going up. Land and homes were the big sellers as well as cars. Now that the baby boomers are retiring and require regular medical attention there is a treasure trove of opportunity.
The baby boomers are retiring and dying off. The biggest transfer of wealth in human history is happening all around us. I would invest in old folks homes, medical equipment for the elderly and funeral homes. In about 20 years I'd sell out of that when the baby boomer era is drawing to a close.

Best investment strategy is to use your money now to build the society you want to live in tomorrow.

A Recession or an economic depression is not a thing that happens just to an individual or just to a family; it happens to a society. You cannot make your own estate or family "recession proof" unless you have made your community and your society "recession-proof."  It is like building a flood wall around just your house. IF everyone does that the water just tops them all eventually.

I guess what I mean to say is do not use you money with an eye towards *weathering* to next recession, but rather with an eye to forestalling it.

I think I'm in agreement with the majority of folks who have previously given their investment choices:

Land.
Seeds. Ideally, we'll be growing those heirloom seeds each season and not just stocking them away in a dark room.
Hand and Power Tools.
Get out of Debt.
Weapons/Ammo. This is a very personal choice and hot-button issue.


I'm also going to say:

How-To Books. If YouTube goes down or if I can't afford an internet bill, I'm gonna need hard copies of books to teach me repair/forage/medical/etc skills.
Small Homestead Animals. In my case, chickens, bees, and quail. My dog, although I'd classify her more as a pet, actually is a very good watchdog.
Clothes and Shoes for kids to grow into. Mending material for clothing repair.
Food I can't grow myself (wheat, rice, mammal meat, etc.)
Water Collection resources (water tanks, wells, water purification, etc.)
Tools for catching food we can't grow on our property ie: venison and fish.

Hubbie brought up an interesting point today that I thought I'd run by y'all: As the rich get richer and the poor get poorer, it seems like the rich are flaunting their 'stuff.' He thinks that finding high-end collectibles at a bargain price for resale might be a good source of revenue. He's not talking about the Tickle Me Elmo or beanie baby craze, but high end items like vintage glassware, silver sets, antiques, art, etc. If you can find something at 50% of its resale value, it might be a good investment for selling to the "rich folks." He's got a much better eye for these sorts of things than I do.

A previous poster mentioned that buying land might not be his first choice for investing, because land values rise and fall too. He mentioned that people's homes lost value in the 2008 crash. He is correct, but I'm going to respectfully disagree on one aspect of his point. I do still feel that a piece of land where your primary domain is located will always be a wise investment **as long as you are planning to remain there long term.** If you are not planning to sell your home, the drop in value during a recession is not a realized loss.

Everyone needs a place to live. A piece of property you own outright is always the preferred scenario, but if not...most of us are either renting or paying a mortgage. If I'm going to pay to live somewhere, I at least want my payments to be going toward my eventual outright ownership of that property. Of course, owning a home isn't right for everyone, and sometimes renting is the preferred living arrangement. But I wouldn't steer anyone away from pursuing a home, even in today's inflated market--as long as you find the right property in a price range you can afford, and you're willing to stay there long term. Use that land to your advantage by growing food/harvesting timber/catching water/making a cash flow on it.

As the cost of goods rise, people are required to pay more for their basic needs. The more basic needs you can provide for yourself through your land and/or skillset, the more money you'll have for other things.

I think, most has already been said is stuff one should get anyway,
like getting the equiment you need and plants you might want
and investing in earthworks on the farm/homestead.

Also i fell Mk Neal makes a very valid point about investing in the society you want to live in tomorrow.


Other than the already mentioned stuff i would get some cheap electronic components en mass ala the famous ESP8266
or some other microcontrollers/sensors. Sure they outdate, however i have seen the prices for some of those doubling over the years.
I have already shown up to many events with a bunch of these in my pockets and people were very eager to trade something for them.

When Gold is mentioned i always ask what do you want to do with it?
Sure its shiny, but other than that?
I would rather invest into Molybdenum and Tungsten, maybe even Lithium,
as those have very specific properties that cannot be replaced by other materials easily.

EDit: Oh and copper! Definetly copper!

I'm going with water rights family compound land and education in sustainable sciences.I.e. perma culture , self sufficiency, medicine,animal husbandry, food preservation, wildfood location...Etc.

I mostly invest in food.  I don't mean commodities I mean real food.

I buy what is on sale and only what we will eat. I am not a bulk food buyer.

I have been investing in food since 1995.  I have never been caught in that prepper foodstuff as that is not for me.

I have made some bad investments because I bought things dear hubby liked at the time that I don't eat and then his tastes changed.

We still have these foods and if the time comes they will get eaten.

Right now is the best time to invest in food since there have been some cyber-attacks on the food industry and food prices are going up.

Seeds would be another good investment, but only seeds for food that will be eaten.  Those prepper seed packages are usually mostly 1000s of seed for lettuce.  Store your seeds correctly and safely.  I have seeds in the freezer, in the refrigerator, and in my seed-saving envelopes.

Knowledge

I have found formal degrees to be valuable.  Informal sources can be valuable as well. That said, If I was starting out, I would head up to Montana and gather all the knowledge I could through the offerings through Paul.  I suspect a few weeks or months invested there would save me a few years of frustration.

As with all knowledge gained, be certain if your sources.  I am amazed that people with a handful of years of experience are pushing themselves off as experts.  My experience has been to run far and fast from those calling themselves experts.I have found that the most knowledgeable people don’t brag.

Land is good.  I suspect I would stop at 25 acres ... not that I have ever owned 25 acres.  It just seems to be the max I could effectively make use of.

I have done well with stocks, but I stopped.  I came to the conclusion it was gambling.   Yes, there are solid arguments to the contrary.  Part of my decision is my age. I am at a time in my life where protection from loss is more important than gain.

Companies that are using and developing distributed ledger/blockchain tech.  

A few classic investments like stocks, cd's, but with inflation set to rise due to COVID I want my money to grow faster than inflation and still be "liquid' so for me it's Cryto currency.

I'm not a "trader"  I'm a HODL ( I hold on for the long term)- meaning I find projects I like and invest in those long term. I personally believe distributed ledger tech is and will continue to change the world, on the scale that the internet changed communication. so my monetary investments are focused here.

On the holistic front, I invest in educating myself, and in my health.  Staying happy and healthy is my goal, and I make plans, decisions, and choices around those principles.

That said - the people around you on a regular basis contribute and shape your success- so I'm glad I've found Permies!

Heard of a pepper who had invested a lot in silver, but got himself in a difficult situation somewhere far away, and lost quite a few pounds, in body weight. You can't eat silver and gold.

Hi!

Until now, I invested in funds with different philosophies, some more conservative, others riskier. Also I have an emergency account and some debt. I could have no debt, but I opted to keep my capital working and have some debt that, if I needed to, I could cancel in a minute. And if not, I pay it month by month. Also I have some money in some small business.

Next part of the plan was to invest in some real assets that I could directly control, being farmland my first choice. At this moment I am trying to decide

1) Wich structure might be the best for it. I do invest in funds not as an individual but as a business, but if I am to invest in properties directly , I might create an SL (spanish for LLC) just for this

2)I dont know wich % of my portfolio might be better for it. I think Ray Dalio invested 15% in assets in his "all weather portfolio", so who knows if this is a good amount.

Funds, most of them passive, are my bet for quiet times. Land and skills , my bet for volatility

Investment strategies are often based upon age vs risk.   Early on I took the view that my retirement  investments were different from my home investments and all were different from my general investments into stocks.

I'm invested in Nouveau Monde Graphite (NOU.V on Vancouver Venture exchange and NMG on NYSE).  They are a graphite miner in Quebec that plans to extract and  purify the graphite then sphericalize it into battery grade anode material for EV and electrical storage.  They are aiming to do everything with clean hydro-electricity which is abundant in Quebec vs the very dirty fossil fuel based synthetic graphite from China.  Graphite accounts for about 47% of lithium ion batteries. There is going to be a massive global shortage of graphite by 2025.  I am kinda all in of NOU. I feel really good about my investment not only from a personal finance situation but because I honestly feel that I am helping to build the world I want to see.  

I am hoping that NOU will make me somewhat rich actually.  My dream is  using some of the proceeds  to buy a local , conventional farm that has been abused and degraded by chemical fertilizers, pesticides, fungicides, herbicides, mono-cultures and annual tillage and turn it into a permaculture demonstration farm a la Joel Salatin, Greg Judy, and Gabe Brown.

Not financial advice by the way, but I encourage everyone to invest in companies that will get us off oil and gas.  I believe we are in a super-cycle like we have not seen since the start of the oil age.  There is vast amounts of money to be made, and will be made.  In my view it would be better if some at least would be made by permaculturalists who can then direct some of their profits to other pressing needs like food security, desertification, and biodiversity to name a few.