You won 100 million dollars, now what?

MikeInFla wrote:

Grindboy wrote:So SA appears to be gone, but my understanding is that a person's 401k is their money.  The only way I can fathom that a company going under would cause somebody to suddenly lose their money is if it was all in the now bankrupt company's stock, which I suppose could happen but would be stunningly unwise.  Perhaps it IS a question to ask about anybody's company's 401k plan.  I'm fairly certain it would be unusual, however.  My wife's, for instance, we have the ability to choose how much to invest in what -- different types of stocks, bonds, etcs.  If the company was to suddenly disappear, her stocks etc. would 100% still be her stocks.  Certainly it's true that stocks go up and down as will anything with any real upside, but I don't think that makes them bad investments.

I've never invested in real estate outside of buying a home for our family, but absolutely it can be a great idea as well.  I actually have a "rich uncle" (I have no idea how rich, maybe pretty good, maybe just well set up, I don't know) who made an excellent living buying and renting places.  There are huge hassles with it, of course, but money can be made.  That said, David, I think it can/should be FAR better than your numbers.  I don't know if residential is a lot different from commercial, but in looking at commercial properties, a lease rate is typically 1%/month of a listed purchase price, so that a $1m property would lease for closer to $10,000/month than $3,000.  Maintenance, upkeep, unrented gaps between renters would eat up a chunk of that. . . but under normal circumstances the property should itself appreciate, so there ought to be 2 different financial benefits if it can be worked right.  Certainly money to be made.  But the numbers you gave, making $36,000 from $1m for a 3.6% profit, would not be considered a good return on investment.  At 5% interest on a 30 year fixed mortgage for $1m would be over $5000/month.  Charge more for that $1m house bro!

Our previous company did this. Gave us stock as match in the 401K and then went bankrupt. Some of the share holders sued and we eventually got some money back. I think I got about $230 back but i had invested about $7000 in company stock. Not bad when some people at work had over $250,000 in company stock. Luckily, we were bought by another company and they now match dollars instead of stock. I stay away from my company's stock. Not that it is bad but I was burned once before. Thanks to a new union contract they now match with $$$ instead of stocks.