My Investment Club
I have been in an investment club for about 10 years. Originally I had no interest in joining since the monthly investment would have no significance in my portfolio. However, I joined after about a year understanding that it was more of a social activity than a serious investment move.
Basically, there were ten of us and we met once a month for a dinner meeting. We each invested $100 a month and then spent about $25.00 on dinner – for me it was a dinner club – a night out once a month with the guys. We had a private area in the back of a pizza restaurant that had unusually good food. The business meeting lasted about 30 minutes and the dinner about an hour and quarter. We ended up with about thirty stocks in our portfolio. Our criteria was dividend paying stocks. Nothing was purchased without an extensive discussion. Initial purchases were made for $2,000 and subsequent purchases of additional shares in a company we had was for $1,000. Obviously no one would get rich from this club, but it was also made with money we really didn’t miss, but at some point it would end and we would all get checks that would pay for really nice vacations for us and our family. As time went on, some members dropped out so we are now left with 8 people and we kick in $125 a month.
While the overall importance as an investment is not material, the discussions are very insightful. Because of the meetings, stocks that I might not have considered were brought to my attention. Considering ten years of monthly meetings discussing hundreds of stocks, something must have piqued my interest, and two stocks have. One, the club bought and the other it passed on. Well, I invested in both of them – substantial amounts – and they both did extremely well. The money I made on them can be directly attributed to the club. So, besides over a hundred of friendly dinners, and an eventual payout that will fund a grand trip, I also made a few bucks and increased my personal cash flow with the dividends from those two stocks.
The leader of our club meticulously keeps our books, prepares detailed monthly reports and has us examine the brokerage reports as an audit procedure. At one point he ran other clubs and he is really good at this. His reports are a model for anyone having their assets managed and should be emulated.
Investing is a serious business, but in the cloak of this investment club, a friendly night out, with investing actually a secondary activity. This is an exception of my exhortations of treating investments as a serious matter. Investing is a serious endeavor – except in cases such as my dinner club!
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