I have $7,000 to invest, where is the best place to do it?

Invested at least $2000 in your pantry. When you think about it, investing in goods should be the first thing anyone does. Especially as teh dollar continues to to feel pressure as someone else has put it thus meaning in 6 months those same dollars will be buy less then what it can today. It acts as an investment as well as a safe haven in case of a natural disaster or some other incident. Lets say that you eat 6 cans of tuna a week at a dollar each. So over the course of six months you are going to be consuming roughly 150 cans (rounding) costing you 150 dollars. If you buy those 150 cans all at once in bulk along with discounts, you can get each of them for 70 cents each. By buying them all at once considering you were going to eat that much over the same course of time you have saved around 45 dollars and have secured your goods in case of a disaster. Same goes with any can items, toilet paper, shampoo, etc. This adds up quickly and you are unlikely to find a better ROI then right there in your pantry. Also as noted earlier with the increased supply of money into the system and other countries backing out of the US currency we will see devaluation of the dollar so if you wait six months it will actually cost you more to by that can then today.

The rest can be placed in stocks or gold and silver if you feel up for it. Personally I feel like we will get a pull back on the stock market in the coming weeks which could be a good time to buy for the long haul. Try to look at companies with good business values which you can see being around in 20 years. Warren Buffet normally used this kind of approached called value investing but on a much bigger scale then you would be able to.

Money markets and savings accounts don't currently offer any interest rates on your dollars. That is why banks are recording record profits currently. THey are dealing with huge spreads to be making money with. They give you a couple percentage points "at most" and then turn around and give out your money at 5% or more. The spread between is their profit and lets just say you aren't seeing nearly the same returns that they are.

Saving is different than investing. Saving is safe - little risk (to lose your investment) and little reward. Safe investments will pay little more than the inflation rate. Currently, probably no more than 2%.If that is what you want look for a CD from an FDIC insured bank

All investing requires you to risk losing some or all of your money. Buying an individual stock is very risky - you put all your investment in one company and that company can fail and your investment can go to zero. If you buy more than one stock the risk is less that all of the stocks will go out of business. You won't be able to buy very many different stocks for $7000.

That is why mutual funds are so popular. The small investor can get the benefit of owning a very large number of stocks and have them professionally managed for a small fee. You could own stocks representing the entire US stock market and the stocks of the world market for a minimum investment of $3000 each. These investments can lose a lot of money ( 40% or so in 2008) but over time they have done better than savings. Still some risk but usually not the risk of going to zero that owning a single stock would have. If interested see Vanguard index funds Total Stock Market and Total International Stock Market.

Good luck

If you have debt, then use that money to pay it off.

If you have no debt:

but you don't have at least four months salary in the bank, then put that money in the bank.

If you have no debt and four months salary in the bank:

Then max out your 401k at work, whatever that difference is, that is the money you have left to invest.

If you have no debt, 4 moths salary in bank, maxed out your 401k, then:

Open a traditional and/or Roth IRA and make the full contribution on whatever mutual fund (or stock, or ETF) you tag to the IRA.

If you have all this taken care of, and you still have $7000 still in your hand, you should look into an investment with a better return (medium risk), because you already have a ton of conservative investments with relative low yields. So this means you may want to consider may buying individual stock/s.

In this case I would recommend finding a stable S&P 500 company to invest in - perhaps one with a decent dividend, like GE, Coca-Cola, Glaxo Smith Kline, Caterpillar (these aren't recommendations per se, just examples and a starting point.)

Good luck!

Gold a good investment

bet

Even in difficult times where all the other asset classes are under performing, gold has been able to maintain its sheen. Gold is one 'safe haven' where money is parked in difficult times.

hes right but why?...Buying gold is also a good hedge for your portfolio of stocks and properties. Also, one can expect gold to be a great investment bet in 2009 if the US dollar remains under pressure.

This is because historically there is an established negative correlation between the US dollar and gold. Since US economy is expected to remain under pressure, we can expect gold to have a sustained rally going forward

Gold is secure and likely to go up

Was only 285 per Oz 5 years ago or so

a roth IRA is also good

Real estate is also good but $7000 is not enough

I Suggest it not to lose it

The best investment is to invest in FX Funds Group if you would like to make 2% - 15% per month.

search for FX Funds Group or myfxfunds in google search engine for more information.

Wait till the market improves.

I would invest in gold, it's value normally goes up, and if it does fall it's for a short period of time and it's not for much.

I would say do research on banks and put it in a savings account.

I think you should invest your $7,000 in a cheese factory.