Investing Basics
We cover the mechanics of investing: what the accounts do, what the products are, and what the evidence says about costs and diversification. We do not recommend specific securities and we do not sell anything.
8 guides in Investing
Browse every guide →- Investing
401(k) Explained: How the Whole Thing Actually Works
A 401(k) is a retirement account attached to a job, shaped by decisions your employer made before you arrived. Here is the full mechanical guide, with 2026 figures and worked numbers.
- Investing
Asset Allocation Explained: How to Split Stocks, Bonds and Cash
The stock/bond split does more to shape your results than any fund you pick. Here is how allocation works mechanically, how to choose a mix you can hold, and how to maintain it.
- Investing
Dollar Cost Averaging Explained, Including the Part Most Guides Skip
Dollar cost averaging is two different strategies sharing one name. Here is the arithmetic behind each, the evidence on lump sums, and the honest case for spreading purchases anyway.
- Investing
Expense Ratios and Investment Fees: The Real Cost Over 30 Years
Investment fees never arrive as a bill, which is why they go unexamined for decades. Here is every layer of cost, how each one is charged, and what the arithmetic looks like over a working lifetime.
- Investing
How to Start Investing With $100
At a $100 balance, returns are irrelevant and habits are everything. Here is the order of operations, why flat fees hurt small accounts most, and what $50 a month actually becomes.
- Investing
Index Funds vs ETFs: Two Wrappers Around the Same Idea
Index mutual funds and ETFs can hold identical securities and track identical benchmarks. The differences are structural, small, and matter mainly in taxable accounts.
- Investing
Roth vs Traditional IRA: How to Actually Decide
One question in an elaborate costume: skip the tax now or skip it later. Here is the arithmetic, the 2026 thresholds, and the edge cases that decide it in practice.
- Investing
What Is Compound Interest, and Why Time Does the Heavy Lifting
Compound interest is arithmetic, not magic. This guide works through the formula variable by variable, shows the numbers year by year, and explains why real portfolios never trace a smooth curve.