Dear Jim,
I have been saving money and selling some of my unnecessary items and toys for a while now and have amassed $42,000. I have plenty of firearms and ammunition, tools, a house that is semi-remote, and a stash of food (which isn’t enough I’m sure). I have paid off my credit cards and only have a house payment left. My job is relatively secure I feel, as I work at a power plant; though once the coal stops moving I wont be needed, I guess. I’m not sure what iI should do with the money I have saved. It would seem there is nothing secure anymore and with the government attacking its own money, the dollar wont be worth anything soon. I’m going to look into gold and possibly some land, but might I ask any recommendations you might have. Thank you in advance! – C.K.
JWR Replies: Your highest priority should be rounding out your larder of long term storage food. I might be biased, but I believe that my “Rawles Gets You Ready” preparedness course preparedness course is a good guide for that project. But after you have deepened your larder, you should further depression-proof your life.
Even though you consider your job fairly secure, keep in mind that entering some almost unprecedented perilous economic times. I expect massive layoffs and chronic unemployment in this nascent depression. As Sarah Connor puts it so succinctly: “No one is ever safe.” Anyone can get laid off. You can be an outstanding worker, in a presumably “safe” industry, yet in a depression you can still get laid off or fired on a pretext, for example just to make room for a nepotistic replacement.
I recommend that you take part of your nest-egg and invest it in developing a second stream of income. Ideally this would be a family-operated home-based business. Take a look at the community nearest to your retreat, and see if you can determine what would be a good “niche” business that would be depression proof. Part of the savings that you mentioned could be used for education (to develop a skill, trade, or even a second profession), or for specialized manufacturing machinery, tooling and/or raw materials, or for buying inventory to re-sell or barter. The bottom line is that it takes money to make money.
Keep in mind that if you choose publishing or another mail order venture selling something compact and lightweight, then you can take advantage of a national or even global market. But if you are selling a service or a relatively bulky or heavy handcrafted item, then your market will be essentially local. So choose your venture wisely.
If, after you’ve expanded your food storage program and have developed a home-based bushiness, you still have some remaining cash, Then it should be used to either pay down your mortgage, or invest in precious metals. If you expect chronic deflation, then apply it to your mortgage. But if you expect Uncle Sugar to inflate his his way out of the current economic morass (as I do), then put it in precious metals.