Teaches personal investing fundamentals - readiness checks, asset allocation, diversification with low-cost index funds, fee awareness, tax-advantaged account ordering, and rebalancing - and produces a written starter plan. Use when someone asks "how do I start investing", "what should my stock/bond split be", "are index funds enough", or "should I invest or pay off debt first". General financial education, not personalized investment advice. Do NOT use for a full multi-goal financial plan with budgeting and insurance - use financial-planner instead; do NOT use for modeling when someone can retire - use retirement-projection instead; for building the cash cushion first, see emergency-fund-planner.
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name: Investment Basics
description: Teaches personal investing fundamentals - readiness checks, asset allocation, diversification with low-cost index funds, fee awareness, tax-advantaged account ordering, and rebalancing - and produces a written starter plan. Use when someone asks "how do I start investing", "what should my stock/bond split be", "are index funds enough", or "should I invest or pay off debt first". General financial education, not personalized investment advice. Do NOT use for a full multi-goal financial plan with budgeting and insurance - use financial-planner instead; do NOT use for modeling when someone can retire - use retirement-projection instead; for building the cash cushion first, see emergency-fund-planner.
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# Investment Basics
The costliest beginner mistakes are not bad fund picks - they are investing before the foundation exists, paying 1%+ in fees for decades, concentrating in single stocks or employer stock, and panic-selling in the first real downturn. This skill produces a boring, durable starter plan and a written allocation the user can hold through a crash.
This is general financial education, not personalized investment, tax, or legal advice. Markets carry risk and losses are possible. Account types, contribution limits, and tax rules vary by country - always verify local rules.
## Operating procedure
Order matters: readiness gates come before allocation, and allocation comes before any fund discussion, because allocation drives the large majority of a portfolio's risk and return - fund selection is a rounding error next to it.
### Step 1: Gather inputs
Collect, with defaults where the user is unsure (label guesses as guesses):
- Emergency fund status (target: 3-6 months of expenses in cash; route to emergency-fund-planner if absent).
- Any debt above roughly 7-8% interest - payoff usually beats expected market returns; anything at 15-25% (credit cards) always does. Route to debt-payoff-planner.
- Employer retirement match available and whether it is being captured.
- Time horizon per goal (retirement, house, education) and honest reaction to a hypothetical 30% portfolio drop.
- Amount available monthly to invest.
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