Plan, Invest, Live…#6 Too much of one stock? A case study… A client recently came to me with their investments, and unfortunately too much of it was in one stock. Yikes! I asked and was granted permission to share the story so that others could learn from this. Obviously, I’ll leave out the names for privacy. There are two lessons we’ll get to from this situation. Here’s a quick definition that you should get to know. The phrase is “concentrated position”, and it has nothing to do with juice! When someone has a stock that dominates the portfolio risk and return, we call this a “concentrated position” in the financial planning industry. This means the portfolio is not much of a portfolio. The “portfolio” is really going to behave just like that one stock. If the price goes up, that’s great, you’ll likely benefit from that move in the stock…

A recent visit with a client revealed the deep regret they have because their college savings for their children had not grown very much, yet it has been invested for many years. They gave me permission to share the story so that others won’t make the same mistake, but I’ll keep their identities a secret as I promised. What happened? Seventeen years ago when their son was born they began to save for college. They were excited parents, and also very diligent parents and good savers. They want a brighter future for their kids and greater opportunity. The couple met with their advisor who set them up with a college savings account so that many years down the road, aiming for Spring 2018, the funds would be ready to be used to pay for college expenses. They invested faithfully over all those years, however, they neglected to meet regularly with…