30 Ideas To Invest An Extra $30,000

Let’s say you end up with an extra $30,000 in your checking account and you’d like to invest that money and put it to work, what can you do with it?

Let’s set the guidelines here. This list is designed for people who are generally in good financial health. In short terms, that means no high-interest credit card debt, frankly no high-interest debt of any kind, healthy retirements accounts, and a solid rainy day fund for any emergencies.

ETFs & Funds

VTSAX

Launched in ’92, the Vanguard Total Stock Market Index Fund is a very simple and low-cost way to give investors with exposure to the entire U.S. equity market, including small-, mid-, and large-cap growth and value stocks. With an expense ratio of only 0.04%, it’s about as cheap as you can hope for. Just know that with this broad exposure comes investing risks. I first bumped into VTSAX from JL Collins in his book The Simple Path to Wealth. Also a great read and where I was introduced to the concept of F-You money.

Alternative Real Estate

Ground Floor

I first heard about Ground Floor on the Animal Spirits podcast from Michael Batnick and Ben Carlson. This company let’s you invest in short term loans to house flippers that usually pay off between 5-12% returns. You can invest as little as $10 in individual loans or get into their diversified fund. The average loans run from about 9-12% months in term – so you can keep reasonable liquidity by stacking loans of different maturities.

Fundrise

“High Interest” Savings Accounts

Crypto Currency Like Bitcoin And Ethereum

Pay Down Debt

Pay Down Car Loan

This may not immediately ring the “investment” bell in your brain, give me a moment. If you have a car loan and you have good credit, it’s probably something like 1.9% or 2.9%. If your $30K in cash is currently parked in a savings account earning 0.05% interest – your spread could be costing you money. If you are going to invest that money and try and earn a higher rate than your car loan interest – great. Otherwise this can still be considered investing it.

Pay Down Your Mortgage

Considerations about how and when to pay down your mortgage can be heavy. In particular, I love the perspective from the Financial Samurai that once his mortgage was paid off his motivation to work dropped sharply. BUT, similar to the option above of paying down a car loan. Unless you are going to put this money to work to earn more than your mortgage interest rate – it’s technically the smart math move.

Pay Down Student Loans

1 in 8 American’s currently have student debt. And at today’s rates, many people are paying upwards of 6% interest on that debt! While many people consider student debt “good debt” because it has let them increase their long-term earning potential – paying 6%+ is probably pretty painful. If you can afford to pay it down with some of your cash bounty, this is a great option.