Property Investing #Ep 1 - Freehold vs Leasehold

Hi Everyone,

Today I would like to talk about another of my favourite topic beside for Financial Matters & Tips and Stocks Investing; which is Property Investing.

As we all know, everyone in Singapore generally loves Property besides food because it is relatively a stable asset that can beat inflation, allows for capital gain and provides investment or rental yield. It is an asset which you can call Home but at the same time, can be used for investment or rental purposes due to shortage of land in Singapore with the increasing amount of population due to influx of foreign workers and PRs.

However there are often various interesting debate or perceptions between buyers, sellers and agents on different topics of property investing. Of course, there are no right or wrong answers hence let us examine more in the topic which I would like to discuss today: Buy Freehold Condo vs Leasehold Condo?

Often I would hear people mentioning "If I want to buy a condo, better to buy a Freehold one than Leasehold" or "I can leave a legacy to my kids in future". However I would flinch a little whenever I hear that because in my mind, I will be thinking "Is Freehold Condo always better than Leasehold?"

Having a freehold condo is good, however what is more important is the location (accessibility) and their surrounding amenities. The rest of the details would include the price, size and layout of the unit and whether the development is a large one compared to smaller development.

Often you would see smaller development having Freehold status, and this represents lesser amenities within the development and maybe higher maintenance fee due to smaller number of units in the development. Majority of them would be "Apartment" status instead of "Condominium" status (I will discuss about this topic in the next Episode). 

Some of the location are rather inconvenient and out of the way, otherwise why would the Government agree to sell Freehold land tenure to the developer if it is highly sought after?

Hence does freehold status condo or properties in Changi, Pasir Ris or Tampines fare better when compared to a Leasehold Condo in CCR or RCR (let's say Queenstown, Bugis or Boon Keng)? 

Which one would you choose to put your money into in terms of own stay or investment? 

I think alot of us would prefer the one in Queenstown or in Bugis even though its Leasehold. Don't forget that Leasehold Condo have the possibility to enbloc as well. 

From my personal opinion, the most important factor for a Property is always Location follow by property type then entry point. If given a choice, I would think that the leasehold Condo in a better location would be far safer compared to Freehold Condo in the outskirt. 

Another point to take note is whether you are getting value back by purchasing the Freehold Condo which is usually at a premium price compared to Leasehold Condo. If you are looking for investment, would the tenants pay you more just because its Freehold status? Probably not. In this case, your ROI would be higher if you buy a Leasehold Condo at a lower price. Most of us would either stay or hold on to a property for 10 to 20 years time horizon, after which we would sell or change location due to our needs at different timeline of our life. 

Let's say you want to leave a freehold property as legacy to your loves ones. Would your loved ones prefer to receive cash, liquid assets or an aging freehold property? And by the time you pass on maybe at 65 to 85, your kids or loved ones that are receiving this would probably be in their 45s to 50s plus with their own kids.

They would have their own place to stay and will they care about the Freehold status of the Condo or would a better location leasehold condo be more attractive to them? And would your Children fight over the Freehold condo if it is located in expensive prime locations like Orchard? Would it be better to sell the property and use the money for your retirement and the remaining to be distributed according to your will to your loved ones after your passing? How would the Property be split if you want to pass 50% each to your two kids for example?

As such, freehold condo is not so appealing unless you intend to hold on for legacy purposes.

Pros of Freehold:

1) Able to leave a legacy to your loved ones.
2) No worries of depreciating asset due to lesser years of lease.
3) Stable price generally.

4) Not many developments with freehold status (or as much as Leasehold).

Cons of Freehold:

1) Usually at premium prices.
2) Lower rental or investment yield due to higher entry price.
3) Location may not be prime area or slightly further away from MRT.
4) Some freehold condo are small developments with few amenities and facilities.

5) Maintenance fees higher if there are only less than few hundred units in the development

    to share the cost.

6) Don't have much advantage over Leasehold.

Pros of Leasehold:

1) Some of the locations are convenient and near to MRT station and shopping mall.
2) Bigger developments with more units and more facilities to enjoy.

3) Price is at acceptable range for the mass market.

Cons of Leasehold:

1) Depreciating value due to decaying lease.
2) More loan restrictions and harder to sell when the remaining lease reaches 40 years.
3) Too many of such developments out there.

4) Question of whether the development would be En-bloc.

Conclusion: 

In conclusion, many of us would choose Freehold Condo in Prime Locations like Orchard or in CBD area IF Money is not an issue. But in reality when it comes to Practicality, I would choose to buy a more affordable Leasehold Condo at RCR or OCR location which is relatively near to MRT so it will be more convenient when going to work.

Having a lower entry price means it will be easier to achieve capital gains on our properties upon TOP compared to those high end properties located in CBD area or prime districts. 

As I am a Dad of a boy, I would be looking at some developments which is situated within 1km radius to some reputable schools in my opinion. Focusing at some developments located within an area where the Government has big plans to develop is another option. GSW, Greater Southern Waterfront was just announced by the Government during this year's National Day rally and all the hype is about that area now with new launches coming up.

In this way, you can better safeguard or prevent the price of your property from dropping too drastically in times of economic crisis due to stable demand where there are more jobs opportunities for locals and foreigners (for rentability).

Good school and education for their kids is one of the most important indicator that Parents look at when buying a Property and price entry and capital gain would be the next important factor to consider when buying a property as well.



There are definitely more factors to look at beside for Freehold vs Leasehold and I will discuss these topics in time to come:

Episode 2 - New Launch vs Resale Condo
Episode 3 - Condominium vs Apartment Status

Regards,
SG Cashflow Investor

Disclaimer: This is my personal opinion and does not constitute any recommendation to buy any Leasehold or Freehold property. Do your own due diligence before making any purchase.

My Portfolio Performance - October 2019 Update

Hi Everyone,

This is my Portfolio update in the month of October 2019.

Not much changes for my Portfolio in the month of September but there were various or rather exciting moments for S-Reits. IPO for Lendlease Reit also happen in the month of October.

As of now, Reits prices have rallied up to their peaks thanks to the low interest rate environment. US-China trade war and uncertain Brexit deal coupled with the looming of economy recession contributed to the volatility of shares prices on a daily basis.

However this have not affected the confidence of investors in quality Reits with a number of them announcing further acquisition with Private and Preferential Offering to fund their purchases. CRCT starts in the month of August followed by Keppel DC Reit and Manulife Reit in the month of end September to early October.

Even MAS is considering to raise gearing limits for S-Reits to 45% and if that happens, it definitely will boost S-Reits even further with more acquisitions.

We are now seeing a trend of quality Reits purchasing properties from their Sponsors. CRCT is one of them where they are purchasing 3 Shopping Malls from Capitaland. We are also expecting results announcement from majority of Listed Companies and Reits in the month of October.

Below is an extract of my top 10 Counters at the moment.

As of 16/10/2019:
Total Cost: SGD 188,529.28
Current Value: SGD 196,772.73
Current P&L: SGD 8,242.75

Portfolio Current Yield: 4.99%
Dividend per Annum: SGD 9,396.25

For those who is interested to see my whole Portfolio, please follow me at:
https://stocks.cafe/user/profile?username=sgcashflowinvestor

For the month of September and October, I have done the following:

1) Initiated positions on Manulife Reit
2) Applied for Preferential Shares on Keppel DC Reit
3) Applied for Preferential Shares on Manulife Reit

Lastly, I am waiting for Mapletree Commercial Trust preferential offering which to me will be one of the most exciting deal in Year 2019. MCT has proposed an equity fundraising comprising of 406.5 million new units via in a private placement and preferential offering to raise at least $902.30. The funds will be used to acquire Mapletree Business City (Phrase 2) for $1.55 billion.

MCT is one of my favourite top holdings and I have been holding them since IPO time. I first bought it at $0.88 and divested it when it reaches $1.55 around 3/4 years later. Subsequently I bought it back at $1.585 and have been holding since and added another 2 lots at $1.99 few months back.

Through this, I have personally experienced the Time-Weighted returns of holding quality Reits on a long term basis. I feel there is a lot to gain with share price appreciation and increasing DPU year on year and a lot to lose if you sell too early. 

Sometimes, you will never be able to buy back the shares at the same price that you have sold as the next low would be higher than the previous low. However this only applies to quality stocks and Reits which you have hand-picked and I'm not saying you should be doing the same for every counter.

As such, this increases my confidence and faith of my strategy being a long-term investor with majority of my money invested into the market. I am focused on long term returns instead of short term gain. Of course, it's never wrong to take profit when you feel the price has reach its ceiling with the risk of global economy recession lurking round the corner.

Financial Horse has given their comments to sell MCT early this year January when their share price has driven up to $1.74 but no one would expect MCT to be elevated to be part of STI few months later with share price richly valued at $2.30 now. https://financialhorse.com/sell-mct-reits-2019/

Sometimes the price will get higher even though the price seems unreasonably high over their NAV and P/B ratio. So when is the right time to sell your shares or Reits? No know can give you a definite answer except yourself.

I am waiting for the Preferential Offering to open on 30 October and will be bidding in excess of my allocated shares for MCT.

Disclaimer: This is not a Recommendation to buy or sell any Stocks and please do your own due diligence and research before making any decision.

Regards,
SG Cashflow Investor

Financial Matters & Tips #Ep 2 - How to think about Money

I was reading this book titled "How to think about Money" by Jonathan Clements which I bought recently.

This book highlighted a few interesting points and offers different perspective about Money and Investing which I find particularly true. It is very refreshing and allow readers to make smarter financial choices and squeeze more happiness out of your cash.

Here are the final thoughts from the Author:

There are all kinds of explanations for why we are so poor at handling our finances. We can blame our hardwired instincts, conventional wisdom, relentless corporate marketing and the financial industry's greed. But while I can understand why people go astray, my sympathy is in shorter supply. In the end, nobody stick a gun to our head and forces us to spend too much or buy overpriced investment products.

We all still have a choice - and we should be especially careful with our financial decisions, because the stakes are so high. Make the wrong choices, and our lives could be dogged by financial worries. Make the right choices, and we could have the financial freedom to lead the life we want.

These are the 12 suggestions for getting the most out of your money:

1) We favour possessions for their lasting value, but often we get greater happiness when we spend our money on experiences. Forget the new car. Instead, travel across Europe and other Continents.

2) We should use our pounds, Euros or dollars to create special time with family and friends. Take the kids to a sports event and your spouse to a theatre. Have dinner with friends. Book a trip to see the grandchildren.

3) We should design a life for ourselves where we can spend our days doing what we love. To that end, we should save every penny and dollar we can early in our adult life, so we quickly buy ourselves some financial freedom. In our 40s to 50s, we might use that freedom to switch into a career that's perhaps less lucrative, but which we may find more fulfilling.

4) We should worry less about dying early in retirement, and more about living longer than we ever imagined. Faced with that risk, most of us should delay our pension or CPF to get a larger monthly cheque, and also consider buying immediate annuities that pay lifetime income (we have CPF Life).

5) Our investment time horizon is measured not in months and years, but in decades and decades. We should strive to look beyond market's short-term turmoil and instead aim to collect the staggering gains that can accrue to those who globally diversified stock portfolios for 30 or even 50 years. Indeed, while a long bear market can impoverish retirees who don't have enough in bonds and cash investments, it can be a great gift to young adults who are good savers, because it offers the chance to buy stocks at bargain prices.

6) We should hold down our fixed monthly costs, such as the sum we devote to mortgage or rent, cars, utilities, groceries and insurance premiums. Those low fixed costs will give us more financial breathing room, which can ease our sense of financial stress, leave us with more money for discretionary 'fun' spending - and allow us to save voraciously.

7) Good savings habits don't come naturally, so we need to make socking away money as painless as possible. That means signing up for payroll contribution to our employer's retirement plan and setting up automatic investment plans, where money is pulled from our bank account each month and invested directly into the funds we choose. It also means adopting easy-to-follow financial rules, such as always adding $100 to the monthly mortgage payment and always saving financial windfalls, including tax refunds or bonus and income from a second job.

8) The harder we try to beat the market, the more likely we are to fail, thanks to the hefty investment costs we incur. To avoid that fate, we should stop trying to outsmart other investors and instead embrace humility - in the guise of a globally diversified portfolio of low-cost index funds.

9) We should never forget that stocks have fundamental value. For a diversified stock portfolio, that fundamental value will change much more slowly than market prices. To keep ourselves grounded, we should focus on the dividends and earnings we buy with every dollar invested, we should have a handle on the market's likely long-run return, and we should think like shoppers, viewing market declines with the same enthusiasm that we view a sale at the local department store.

10) Chronologically, retirement might be our life's final financial goal, but we should put it first. Retirement is the most expensive of our goals, and hence we need to save and collect investment gains for many decades to amass enough money. Retirement is also distinctly different from other goals, like buying a home or paying our children's education. What's different? Retirement won't be optional for most of us and we can't expect to pay for it out of our pay cheque, because at the point we won't have one.

11) We should take a broad view of our finances - and the unifying notion should be the income from our human capital, or the lack thereof. The pay cheques that we collect over our lifetime are like a bond that generates 40 years of fairly steady income (assuming not being retrenched). The income stream can diversify a portfolio that's heavily invested in stocks, provide the savings we need to set aside for retirement, and allow us to take on debt early in our adult life and then repay it by the time we retire. We also need to protect our human capital, be ensuring we have adequate health coverage, and sufficient disability and life insurance.

12) The goal isn't to get rich. Rather, the goal is to have enough money to lead the life we want. We shouldn't put that at risk by incurring excessive investment costs, straying too far from a global index strategy and failing to buy insurance against major financial risks.

None of this is especially complicated or clever. But putting these ideas into practice takes thought and effort. We need to ignore our instincts, rein in our emotions, take a deep breath and focus relentlessly on what's best for us - for our happiness and our financial freedom over a lifetime that might span nine decades.

Sounds like a lot of work? It's nothing compared to the potential reward. With a sense of mission and the simple steps outlined above, it is amazing how much wealth we can amass - and how much happier our financial life can be.

Regards,

SG Cashflow Investor

Financial Matters & Tips #Ep 1 - Rich Dad Poor Dad (Cashflow Quadrant)

I recalled when I was young, one of the first financial book that I read was Rich Dad, Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki. 

He mentioned about how the rich earn their money through businesses and real estate, while the poor focus on their jobs and save money. And of course, the rich always get richer and the poor always get poorer. Hence is life fair to the poor? It never was.

Subsequently, he came out with another book titled "The Cashflow Quadrant" and I didn't complete reading the book as I couldn't totally apprehend what it was trying to say entirely at that age of mine. However there was this cashflow quadrant which caught my eye and I find it very interesting:

Basically this is a Cashflow Quadrant where each and every of us are being break down into one of the four categories based on their financial intelligence. Some of them could belong to two categories but no one could possibly be in all four categories. The trick is to move from an Employee (E) to Self Employed (S) and to Business Owner (B) and eventually Investor (I).

The left quadrant are the guys that are earning active income constantly using their own time, effort and energy whilst the right quadrant focuses on earning passive income from your businesses or investments. The question is how do you actually move on to different sectors from E, S, B, I and with B and I being the most valued categories.

However I have slightly different perspective when it comes to Cashflow Quadrant. Robert Kiyosaki focuses on how the people from the left column could successfully move to the right column to achieve success. In this current age and time, I believe we could actually be able to take part or be in four categories at any one time but this involves master prioritization of tasks, expert time management and hard work.

Will you rather choose to have SGD500k cash sitting in your bank with no income coming through for the rest of your life or would you choose to be secured with multiple cashflow of example SGD10k coming to you each and every month for the rest of your life? I will choose the latter.

Therefore, my financial aim is to build multiple streams of positive cashflow coming to my bank account each and every month. Of course some of it you need to use your time and effort to exchange and maybe some with lesser effort until passive income take over.

For me, I will be trying to build positive cashflow from all categories at any one point of time. That is how my name of SG Cashflow Investor came from, which is primarily the cornerstone of my strategy.

Employee (Active Income):

This is your full time job where you earn your main active income. At the start of any person's working cycle, this would be the main source of income. The income which is being earned from the employment should be saved, retained as much as possible and transfer to investment.

The key risk is being stuck in a monotonous job where there are no job progression. Many office workers dread the coming of every week Monday where the usual routine of travelling in packed public transport rushing to work place to clock 8 to 10 hours of work and then back home. There are risk of having horrible bosses and political colleagues to work with, and you have to constantly prove your worth in order to survive in the competitive corporate world.

In addition, there is also increasing risk of retrenchment especially for PMETs in their 40s and above in this current volatile economy. At the point of writing, I just received news that one of my childhood friend whom is in his mid-40s was out of job since March this year and he has nothing to do at home beside looking for job? As such, you should always prepare a back-up plan while you are still employed to minimize any risk of job/income loss in times of crisis.

Self-Employed (Active Income):

Self-employed means you could own your business such as insurance agent or property agent being full-time or part-time.

There are also many side hustles which you could do during your free time and hopefully one day it could generate revenues to replace your main income. Blogging is one of the hustles which I'm working on. Other examples you could do is setting up online websites and advertising, selling of items online or developing other interests or hobbies you might have and where it could convert to some small sidelines.

Self-employed sits on a slightly higher-tier than being an employee as you are your own boss, you manage your own time and income depending on the Clients you serve. There will not be any risk of retrenchment however you need to be disciplined enough to continuously find and develop new business and sales to maintain or increase your income. The only set back is you still have to work to continue receive your income and once you stopped working, the income stop as well.

Business Owner (Passive Income): 

Business owner is the most difficult to achieve for majority of us here in this category. Being a business owner involves large amount of money and risk, and there is always an element of risk and uncertainty as all businesses are not guaranteed for profits. Do you have $100k or $200k to start a business from scratch? Do you have time and expertise for that? Are you willing to risk it to succeed? Do we have enough capital to endure the period?

Indeed there are so many uncertainties where the business could fail however we do witness some great businesses breaking even within the first 6 months or less than a year, and subsequently the company is making profit for the Business Owner months after months. This can be a great source of back-up plan and you do not have to be physically there once the business is up and running by a team. Examples are investing in a franchise business or some other small businesses with a couple of friends or partners.

Investor (Passive Income): 

Investor where you focus on investing your extra money for dividends and passive income. We are now at the right time to invest in great stocks and reits where 20 years ago all these were not available. Being a reit hub in Singapore offers opportunity to investors like us to invest in different real estate and to be rewarded with dividend yields ranging from 4% to 9% on an annual basis.

At the beginning, you will not see much returns but you have to be patient and persevere to build your portfolio day by day with dividends as reinvestment until one day, your passive income coupled with capital gains will surpass your expenses or even replace your employment income.

Of course, the aim is to invest as much as you can building a million worth of portfolio so you can achieve FIRE. One of the few bloggers that inspire me is Dividend Warrior and AK71 with their portfolio and I do inspire to build a similar one like them.

The rewards could be very enriching on a long term basis and you don't have to spend any of your time and energy in maintaining the portfolio except for some re-alignment or management once a while.

As such, one of my most favourite quote for investing is by Charlie Munger (the right-hand man for Warren Buffet):



In conclusion, I would say Cash is King but healthy positive Cashflow is Father of King.

Regards,
SG Cashflow Investor

My Portfolio Performance - August 2019 Update

Hi Everyone,

This is my first Portfolio update in the month of August 2019.

Below is an extract of my Portfolio from Stocks Cafe (which is a great platform that I stumpled upon recently) and will discuss about the usefulness and effectiveness in the next chapter of Stocks Investing.



As at 16-08-2019
Current Cost: SGD 177,435.95
Current Value: SGD 177,984.14

Portfolio Current Yield: 5.19%
Projected Dividends for the next 12 months: SGD 9,139.82 (almost one-quarter of my target)

This month due to the US China Trade War and continuous HK Protests, I have initiated one of the highest number of transactions when Market is volatile all thanks to Mr T's tweets and when the counter reaches my entry level:

Sell:
1) Some of DBS, UOB and OCBC before Ex-D and after Ex-D (let's discuss about this in the next episode when is the right time to sell your shares)

Buy:
1) Mapletree Greater China Commercial Trust
2) Fraser Logistics and Industrial Trust
3) Ascott Reit
4) Mapletree Logistics Trust
5) Parkway Life Reit
6) Hong Kong Land
7) Keppel DC Reit
8) Mapletree Commercial Trust
9) AA Reit
10) Jardine C&C

This is the usual process of building my portfolio day by day, brick by brick until my portfolio reaches a substantial size with compounding effect for retirement.

I am looking to achieve minimum of SGD36K worth of dividends per annum for a start which could help alot in my expenses and as a back up in case one day my job is at stake (I have witnessed a number of my colleagues being retrenched having said that).

At the point of writing, majority of the stocks which I have chosen to buy are all in the green (mainly reits). I believe market volatility always present two perspectives to different investors. It present pockets of opportunities for investors who see great value buy of the shares while the pessimistic investor sees economic crisis and downtrend of the shares and focus on getting out fast. So which one are you?

The Trump administration had made official announcement of its extra 5% tariff on $300 billion in Chinese imports on September 1 and this adds more uncertainty to the Asian stocks market, but I am still taking a long term view on my positions and will continue to add on a regular basis.

With such news coming your way, will you be adding more of your positions or prefer to go to the safer route of selling and holding cash instead? What are your thoughts?

Regards,
SG Cashflow Investor

Stocks Investing #Ep 2 - Types of Investing Strategies

Hi Everyone,

Today I would like to share my personal investing strategies which I have used over the past 6 years. For those who are consistently investing in SG and overseas markets, you would definitely came across the various types of investing strategies used by different investors.

Below are some examples of different stock investing strategies:

1) Value Investing

Value investing is buying stocks when the stock is trading at a discount to its intrinsic value. By assessing the company's financial reports and using financial ratios, value investors buy stocks with huge margins of safety to provide "insurance" in case the valuation goes wrong.

2) Growth Investing

Growth investing is buying stocks based on the high growth potential of a company. This is despite a higher share price or price to earnings ratio or higher instrinsic value.

3) Momentum Investing

Momentum investing is the art of buying stocks to take advantage of the news and trends of the company. Momentum investors can invest in shares based on good and bad news. Investors will ride on the rising share on good news while they can also capitalise on bad news by buying shares on lower price and hoping it will appreciate at later stage. It is more like trading in that you buy and sell more frequently.

4) Income or Dividend Investing

Dividend investing offers a chance to create a stream of income in addition to the growth of your portfolio's market value from asset appreciation. Buying stocks that pay dividends can reward you over time as long as you take care to follow a few guidelines and make intelligent buying choices. Generally good dividend investors tend to focus either a high dividend yield approach or high dividend growth rate. But I'm not saying you should based on these factors only and you should do your own due diligence on the company's fundamentals, earnings and potential growth etc..

5) Defensive Investing

Defensive investing is very popular for investors during times of Volatile stock market where investors look to accumulate Defensive Stocks. These stocks have high resistance level to any global news or economic downturn and generally, their share price would not be affected that much during any downturn.

Assessing your risk appetite:

However before deciding on which strategies to use, perhaps we should first try to understand what kind of investor we are and the type of risk appetite we have.

Are you an investor looking for quick growth or capital gain of the shares? Or are you a long term investor whom is comfortable having a large amount of money being vested in the market and values dividends as passive income ranging from 4% to 7% per year? Or are you a trader/investor and looking to do some quick trading to make some profit within the next few days?

For the past few days, one of the most trending stocks in SGX market is YZJ Shipbuilding which is part of the STI. Due to the news of YZJ Chairman missing, the share price plunged from all time high of 1.40 to 0.80 before recovering back to 1.04 resistance level and subsequently support level of 0.98. The volume traded reaches 100 million per day and definitely offers the opportunity to make a profit if you catch the right timing.

I have a friend who did just that. He would aim to buy 50K worth of such stock when the price is lower and he would throw it off within the same day once the price goes up by a few cents. He would make few hundreds to few thousands each time.

Question is do you have to courage to put your cash in when the share price is plunging? He told me it was very exciting and scary which I agree. Of course, you could be rewarded handsomely if the decision is right. However to me, this is similar to speculation and the risk of losing part of your capital is high.

Hence it all just voice down to making choices in life and I always believe there is no right or wrong decision as long you are making profits, regardless alot or little.

For me, I am definitely a long term Investor whom is hungry for Dividends as passive income. I am willing to hold as long as possible until one day my dividends surpass my expenses which means Financial Freedom for me. But at times, I will look out for some great value stocks and will offload some when the price is right.

In short, I think we should always first assess our own risk profile and understand what is our appetite for risk v.s rewards.

If you are someone who do not wish to take a little bit of risk on your money, bonds is one of the best option besides for fixed deposits and saving accounts.

Of course for equities, the next step would be to researching on the right companies to invest based on their fundamentals and also entry at the right price which is Financial Analysis and Technical Analysis. You also need to identify which are the stocks that you can hold for long term based on their fundamentals and which are the ones you have to sell.

Lastly, Portfolio Management is another important area to cover which we will talk about this in the next Episode.

Personally for my own porfolio, I am currently using the following strategies for different stocks:

1) Dividend/Income Investing:
Blue Chips and Reits - Hold for long term due to stability and consistent Dividends payouts.

2) Growth Investing:
YZJ, Genting, Thai Beverage and Sheng Siong - Aim for high growth and capital gain with entry at the right price.

3) Value Investing:
Basically buying any stocks that is trading below their NAV e.g. HK Land and etc.

4) Defensive Investing:
ST Engineering, ComfortDelgro, SBS Transit, SATS - These stocks are deemed necessities and/or have great resistance level against economic downturn or crisis.

There are also a few Nos for me when it comes to investing in Stocks. Some of them I have personally experience it and some of it are learning through the mistake of others.

Type of Industries that I do not touch at the moment:

1) Airlines
2) Oil and Gas
3) Penny Stocks
4) Pure Shipping and Offshore except for Congolmerate that have diversified businesses
6) China Small to Mid Caps


Regards,
SG Cashflow Investor

Stocks Investing #Ep 1 - Investing Quotes

Today I would just like to share a number of Stock Investing Quotes which form the bedrock of my investing strategy.

Warren Buffet is definitely the most famous and successful person for stock investing and looking at these quotes give me the perspective and reminder of how we should be an investor.

Never Lose Money
“Rule No. 1: Never lose money. Rule No. 2: Never forget rule No.1”

Invest for the Long Term
“Only buy something that you’d be perfectly happy to hold if the market shut down for 10 years.”

The Market Can Price Things Wrong
“Price is what you pay. Value is what you get.”

High Returns With Low Risk is the Key
“Risk comes from not knowing what you are doing.”

Patience is Key
“The stock market is designed to transfer money from the active to the patient.”

Invest Only in Companies You Understand
“Our favorite holding period is forever.”

Only Invest In Wonderful Companies
“Time is the friend of the wonderful company, the enemy of the mediocre.”

Make Long-Term Investments Over Short Term Ones
“If you aren’t thinking about owning a stock for 10 years, don’t even think about owning it for 10 minutes.”

Don’t Be Greedy
“…not doing what we love in the name of greed is very poor management of our lives.”

If You’re Not Investing You’re Doing it Wrong
“Today people who hold cash equivalents feel comfortable. They shouldn’t. They have opted for a terrible long-term asset, one that pays virtually nothing and is certain to depreciate in value.”

About Me

Hi Everyone,

Welcome to my Blog and just a little about myself..

I'm AX who is just an average mid-thirties guy working in a sad corporate job in Singapore. Happily married with a kid. I started this blog with the aim to document my investing journey and also to share with like minded individuals who might be keen in investment and retirement planning.

Credits to a number of awesome bloggers out there which I have been reading for awhile, and decided to try blog myself one day.

1) AK71 (ASSI)
2) Dividend Warrior
3) Path to Forever Financial Freedom (3Fs)
4) Bully the Bear
5) Heartland Boy

and much more.... Still a noob when comes to blogging so pardon me if the article wasn't well written.

History:

Obviously not born from a silver spoon, I was an average guy who studied in Polytechnic and subsequently went to army and coming out to find a job at the age of 23. Armed with a Diploma in Finance, I first found my job in a Bank as a Temp and subsequently managed to convert to Perm with starting pay of $1,850. The amount was fascinating to me at that point of time but definitely not enough to save.

I subsequently moved on to other jobs and studied part-time degree at the age of 27 whilst working full time. It was tough and I have to save $800 every month to pay for my hefy school fees every semester with my slightly increased but still pathetic salary.

I managed to complete my studies and eventually was promoted and had a good pay raise. At the age of 29, my salary was in the mid of $4k to $5k but I still had no savings in my bank and still had credit card debts.

My salary come and go within the first two weeks and I knew I need to change bad habit of mine, which is poor management of money including reckless spending. I can see my parents (Merdeka generation) are still working in their 60s without much savings and I definitely do not want to follow their footsteps. I am determined to be the last Sandwich Generation.

I was first introduced to stock investing when my wife's sister-in-law asked us to open a Maybank Kim Eng Securities account so that we can buy IPO shares in the year of 2011. I still remember the time when I first bought my Mapletree Commercial Trust IPO shares through the ATM at $0.88 per unit. Managed to get a few lots and I left it there in my account for a few years before I started my investing journey again in Year 2013.

As we know, everything in Singapore costs money and living from pay check to pay check allows me to understand the importance of managing money or financial education, and how important it is to have multiple streams of income in this ever changing uncertain global economy.

I also realised that there are a lot of people out there who do not have much knowledge on financial education or basically how to manage their own money. I was basically one of them before the age of 30. To me, money is not everything but it could buy almost everything (let's be practical). The most important thing that I could buy is my own time and Financial Freedom so we don't have to slog away in the office days after days until our golden years.

Fast forward to 2019, I have a portfolio of Reits and Stocks after 6 years of investing and I am looking to continuously build a Dividend Stocks Portfolio reaching $1 million worth of value as early as possible, coupled with other options such as property investing and more for consideration.

I am also hoping to educate my children on Financial Education as early as possible.

I started my journey late but still believe we can all be financially free one day as long we are disciplined enough to stick to our plans.

Thanks and hope to see you around soon!

Regards,
SG Cashflow Investor