Everyday Stock (Re)Investing

[NorthWesterner]

As to selling with the intent of buying back, I occasionally do that, but not on the basis of projections of what I think the market will do. That's market timing, and I don't even try to do that. Rather, if a stock gets into the sell zone of my SSG (Stock Selection Guide) I will realize that it is overpriced for my purposes, and sell. Most of the time it comes back down again, and if it comes back into the buy zone and I still like the stock, I'll buy it back. But it is all driven by the SSG. (The SSG is a tool, not a straitjacket, so I don't always follow it, but the times I haven't I tend to regret not doing so because more often than not it turned out to be right.)

But as to thinking to sell now and assuming that there will be weakness in the fall, I just don't do that. I just don't know enough about the market to feel comfortable doing that, and frankly I don't want to try to understand the market on those terms. I believe in the philosophy that you buy a stock, not the market. In every down market some stocks still go up, and in every up market some stocks still go down. How do I know which my stock will be? I don't. So I just don't invest on that philosophy.

I know I'm probably leaving some money on the table. But I have made a conscious decision not to try to chase every dollar out there, but to aim for my goal, which is 15% year in year out and is better than the historical market results of about 11.4% (and I don't buy this "new economy" stuff; long term, earnings drive stock values, and long term the earnings overall of the nation aren't going to exceed 11.4% no matter what one says. IMO, of course! <g>) Which is why I had nothing in Amazon, AOL, Yahoo, EBay, etc. If I had timed them right I could have made a bundle. If I had timed them wrong I could have lost a bundle (as many did). None of them passed the SSG, so I passed on them all. And slept a lot better than a lot of my friends did!