Earlier today, I published part 1 of What Would You Do With a Windfall. If you missed that it might be worth catching up. What did I ask the bloggers? Simply this:

Where is the single best place to invest a $50K after-tax windfall now? Assume the following: you don’t need the money for at least 10 years, you’ve already max out 401k and Roth IRAs. Pretend that the windfall came under a couple conditions… 1) You can only invest it in one area. 2) If your investment doesn’t make 6% a year you lose it all.

Silicon Valley Blogger at The Digerati Life responded with the following two possibilities:

For our particular case, I have two options that come to mind with regards to what I can do with an extra $50,000 or even $100,000. The first is to follow in the footsteps of Ben @ MoneySmartLife with a similar strategy [editor’s note: see part 1]: use the money to help continue financing the startup our family is trying to build at the moment. It would help us delay having to acquire any additional external investments that would dilute our ownership: self-financing would potentially allow us to reach a critical mass that could keep the business running on its own with positive cash flow. Of course, that’s a dream at this point, but that additional $50K would get us there!

Secondly, I could also consider using the windfall to fund my second child’s 529 account. Since my child is still very young, we would have almost 18 years before we would draw on this money. By virtue of a lump sum investment into a more aggressive area of the stock market, such as US small cap stocks or a combination of US small caps/emerging market exposure/foreign REITs, we may possibly fund his entire education on this one lump sum investment if the markets continue to be favorable.

Those are two great answers. What happens if markets don’t continue to be favorable though? Well Henry from Binary Dollar has a plan for that:

I would invest my money into energy and various fuels. People really like driving cars and heated homes. The demand has never gone down for it. Another thing I would invest in would be lumber/wood. People sure love their toilet paper…

If that isn’t some recession proofing, I’m not sure what is. It would offset the costs of his own use of those products as well. I wonder about the growth in such industries though.

Don’t miss part 3 of this series.

Let me know in the comments, what would you invest in? Can you guess what I would invest in? I’ll let you know in the conclusion of the series.

Over the past couple of weeks, I decided to go out and ask a few of prominent bloggers a question that’s been on my weighing on my mind lately:

Where is the single best place to invest a $50K after-tax windfall now? Assume the following: you don’t need the money for at least 10 years, you’ve already max out 401k and Roth IRAs. Pretend that the windfall came under a couple conditions (like Brewster’s Millions)… 1) You can only invest it in one area. 2) If your investment doesn’t make 6% a year you lose it all.

Why would I pick this one question of all the possible questions? Lately I have noticed that the typical places to invest seem “expensive.” The Dow is setting new records each day. Recently it was up 22 of 25 days – something that hadn’t happened since the 1955. With stocks at an all-time high, I would typically turn my attention to real estate. I like to buy out-of-favor assets at a bargain and real estate doesn’t fit the bill – especially in northern California where I am.

Ben from Money Smart Life had this to say:

How someone should invest a $50K windfall depends on their current financial situation. Since we’re pretty much squared away on the personal finance basics and have built a solid base of investments, I’d take a risk with the money and start my own company. It would definitely be more work than passively investing in the stock market, but I think the potential returns would be far greater.

How I’d use the money is best introduced with a short story. My dad is an avid jogger and an even more avid pack rat. Almost every day he finds something during the course of his run that someone has left on the curb for the trash man. His back porch is overflowing with “throw-away” items that someone, somewhere, might likely be able to use.

I think this story reveals that our country buys too much stuff which later translates into too much junk. If I had $50K fall in my lap I’d rent a warehouse with a storefront, buy some trucks, hire some drivers, and market our services. I’d charge people and businesses money to come pick up their junk and then I’d sell it off through eBay, craigslist, the storefront, and any other appropriate sales channel I could find. There are already companies that do similar things such as 1-800-GOT-JUNK but their franchise fees are over $50K. If I had $100K I might consider buying a GOT JUNK franchise, there just happens to be one available in my area. So if I happen upon a windfall, I’d likely use it to turn trash into cash!

I think Ben’s idea is a terrific one and could set him on the road to freedom. In the process, he would make the world a cleaner place.

Don’t miss part 2 of this series.

Let me know in the comments, what would you invest in? Can you guess what I would invest in? I’ll let you know in the conclusion of the series.

I’m not sure what sum counts as an official bonanza, but for the purposes of this article, I’m going to go with two. A couple of other bloggers had been taking questions and took a couple of my answers.

• Money, Matter, and More Musings asked, “How do you handle financial disagreements with your spouse?”
• The Digerati Life was curious about my (and other’s) investing philosophy when it comes to asset allocation. I had written about this in the past, but click through to see my updated thoughts.

First, I started giving a weekly review of my finances, soon after came guest posts and Personal Finance Weekend Reviews. Today, I’ve been included in the debut of the Money Question.

The concept is pretty simple. Someone submits a question and a few personal finance bloggers tackle it the best we can. By the end of the article the person asking the question has lot of ideas to explore. All the usual disclaimers apply, such as seek out a financial professional. This may be more true than usual because often the questions will come with only half the information.

So be sure you check out this week’s Money Question. If you need a question asked send it to