Key Points
- You don’t need millions to start investing for a return. You can start investing with as little as $100.
- The riskier the investment, the higher the potential return. The safer the investment, the lower the return.
- Fractional shares of growth stocks are one of the best ways to invest $100.
- The best long-term investment you can make is in yourself.
You don’t have to be a millionaire to start investing. In fact, many millionaires started investing when they had little. Why can’t you?
In this post, we’ve given you 21 of the best ways to invest $100. That’s right, you can start investing with only $100. And the only thing required is for you to start.
As the old wisdom goes, “The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.” Let’s begin.
Here are the 21 best ways to invest $100:
- Start a blog
- Invest in yourself
- High-yield savings account
- Certificate of deposit (CD)
- Government bond funds
- Investment-grade corporate bond ETFs
- Treasury Notes
- Treasury Bills
- Treasury inflation-protected securities (TIPS)
- Roth IRA or 401(k)
- ETFs
- Index funds
- Robo-advisors
- Flip items for profits
- Municipal bonds
- Dividend-paying stocks
- Growth stocks
- Penny stocks
- Peer-to-peer lending
- Real estate investment trusts (REITs)
- High-yield corporate bond ETFs
We’ve organized the investments into three different categories: non-risky, moderate risk, and risky.
Like with any investment, the safer the investment, the smaller the return. The riskier the investment, the larger the return. Keep that in mind when you’re deciding on a way to invest your $100.
1. Start a blog
Starting a blog can be one of the best ways to invest $100 if you are looking to start your own business. And yes, starting a blog takes less than $100. The bulk of the work will be you being consistent in writing blog posts.
To remain as practical as possible, let’s break down how much it would cost to start a blog with $100.
- Web hosting through Bluehost — $47.40 (for the first year)
- Domain name — Free (typically about $12)
- WordPress installation — Free using Bluehost 1-click installation (typically about $99 to hire a developer to install WordPress)
- Blog Theme — Free if you choose a theme from the WordPress repository, or you can purchase a cheap theme from ThemeForest.
As you can see from the breakdown above, it’s totally possible to start a blog under $100 using Bluehost.
There are a lot of elements that go into starting a blog. Fortunately for you, Bluehost takes care of all the complex technical things such as web hosting, domain registration, security, and setting up WordPress.
By choosing Bluehost as your hosting provider, you’d only be paying for the web hosting. Everything else is free, including your domain name.
These are simplified instructions on what it takes to start a blog.
If you really want to take the step and start a blog that makes you some serious life-changing money, head over to my definitive guide on how to start a blog. This is a completely free guide on what it takes to start a blog from nothing and turn it into something great.
2. Invest in yourself
Investing in yourself is an investment that will pay you dividends for life. In fact, I would argue that it’s one of the absolute best ways to invest $100.
There are books that you can buy and courses you can purchase for well under $100. The knowledge and skills that you gain from these resources are priceless. You could earn millions of dollars from the knowledge you gain by reading a single book.
“Give me six hours to chop down a tree I will spend the first four sharpening the ax”
– Abraham Lincoln
The premise behind this quote by Abraham Lincoln is that you should spend time learning and improving before doing.
If you took a weak man with a sharp ax and put him next to a strong lumberjack with a dull ax, who do you think would cut down their tree first?
Obviously, the weak man with the sharp ax would cut his tree down first. He’s got the right tools for the job because he took the time beforehand to invest in making his tools better.
In this analogy, the “tool” could be anything. It could be that you want to get better at writing to start a blog.
In this example, writing is the tool. And where can you learn how to become a better writer? For starters, there are likely hundreds of free resources on YouTube and Google.
You could also sign up for Skillshare and take a writing course. Or any course. Skillshare has thousands of high-quality courses for just about every category. If you sign up usinqg the link below, you can get 3 months for free.
Whatever it is, you have to start taking action. And with $100, you should be able to start somewhere.
3. High-yield savings account
For starters, let me be honest with you. You won’t see amazing returns just stashing your money away in a savings account.
In fact, I wouldn’t recommend it for longer than a year. Why? Because there are other ways to invest $100 that will give you much better returns.
The idea here is to store your money in a high-yield savings account and build it up. Then, you take it and invest it in something that will give you better returns. Sound good? Let’s continue on.
High-yield savings accounts are virtually the same as traditional savings accounts. The only difference between the two is that high-yield savings accounts pay higher interest rates. As in… much higher interest rates.
Traditional savings accounts can pay anywhere from 0.01% APY to 0.06% APY. You can check the current national rates on the FDIC website. Your bank’s savings account may be lower than the national average.
For example, the nation’s three largest banks—JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, and Wells Fargo—only pay 0.01% interest on traditional savings accounts. That’s 0.05% lower than the national average.
Let me put that into perspective for you.
If you have $100 sitting in a traditional savings account that only pays 0.01% interest, after one year, you’d earn a whopping $0.01. That’s right, a single copper penny.
Not such a great way to invest $100, right?
Meanwhile, a high-yield savings account will pay you between 1.0% APY and 2.0% APY or more. That’s between $1 and $2 per year on a $100 deposit. Not enough to help you retire early, but significantly better than one penny.
The interest rates on savings accounts are variable. This means they can increase or decrease at any point, depending on the federal funds rate.
If the economy is in a downturn, interest rates on traditional and high-yield savings accounts will drop. If the economy is in an upturn, interest rates will increase.
For example, in early 2019, I opened a Citi high-yield savings account. The interest rate on that account at the time was 2.36%. However, because the federal funds rate has decreased, that same account now only pays 1.20%.
Still much better than any traditional savings account.
A high-yield savings account is a very safe way to invest $100. Especially if you want to avoid risk. They are FDIC insured, will protect you from inflation, and are very liquid, meaning you can access your money any point.
However, as I mentioned at the beginning of this point, they aren’t a long-term investment. Instead, they’re just a place to temporarily save your money until you have enough to put toward higher-yielding investments.
If you’re looking for better ways to invest $100, continue reading.
4. Certificate of deposit (CD)
A certificate of deposits (CD) is a cash equivalent investment offered by banks and credit unions. They are one of the safest investments available, and, as a result, have very low-interest rates.
CDs are essentially loans that you give to the bank for a specific period. In exchange, the bank pays you a fixed interest rate.
CDs are actually a lot like savings accounts. You can think of them as cousins. The difference is that with a savings account, you can take out your money at any point without paying a penalty. Savings accounts also have variable interest rates, which means the rates can go up or down at any point.
CDs are a little different. When you open a CD with a bank, you promise not to touch the money for a set time. It could be as short as one month, or as long as five years. This time frame is known as the term length.
If you break your promise and take out money from the CD before it matures, you will be slapped with a penalty.
CDs have fixed interest rates, which means the rates will stay the same the entire length of the CD.
The interest rate on CDs has varied over the past decade. They have ranged from lows of 0.15% to highs of 2.12%.
If you want a low-risk way of investing $100, consider opening a CD. They are FDIC insured up to $250,000 and will provide some protection from inflation.
If you are looking for ways to invest $100 that will give you much higher returns, consider some of the moderate risk and risky investments on this list.
5. Government bond funds
Government bonds (also known as treasury bonds) are issued by a government to investors to raise money for various projects and government spending.
Although you can invest in foreign government bonds, for this example, I am referring to United States government bonds.
When you purchase a government bond, you are essentially loaning your money to the government for a profit.
If you buy a government bond for $100 today, you are buying a guarantee from the government that they will pay you back in full with interest.
Government bond funds are basically just a diversified bundle of various treasury securities, including treasury bonds, Treasury Notes, and Treasury Bills.
To avoid confusion, government bond funds can often be referred to as treasury funds or treasury bond funds. That’s because a government bond is just a fancy name for any number of treasury securities.
A few of the most common treasury securities are:
- Treasury Bills (T-Bills)
- Treasury Notes (T-Notes)
- Treasury Bonds (T-Bonds)
- Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities (TIPS)
- Savings Bonds
Although you could invest your $100 into any of these individual securities, investing it into a bond fund will provide more diversification.
Many government bond funds have higher minimum investment requirements. Most generally range between $1,000 and $3,000. Some have minimum investments as high as $5,000,000, such as the Vanguard Intermediate-Term Treasury Index Fund.
However, since you came to this article to learn how to invest $100, let’s talk about funds with minimum requirements of under $100.
- DFA Intermediate Government Fixed Income > YTD return: 8.8% > Minimum investment: $0
- Fidelity® Series Long-Term Treasury Bond Index Fund > YTD return: 8.0% > Minimum investment: $0
- Fidelity® Government Income > YTD return: 6.8% > Minimum investment: $0
- Fidelity® Short-Term Treasury Bond Index Fund > YTD return: 3.4% > Minimum investment: $0
For a full list of government bond funds, head over to MutualFunds.com and visit the government bond funds page.
» Also see: 15 Best Short-Term Investments (August 2020)
Government bond funds also have tax advantages. For example, the interest that you earn on these funds is not subject to state or local taxes.
Overall, they are a safe way to invest $100. Since these funds invest in treasury securities, they are backed by the full faith and credit of the United States government.
The only way you can lose your money when investing in treasury securities is for the government to collapse. This is virtually impossible because of the sheer size of the United States economy and the government’s taxation power.
6. Investment-grade corporate bond ETFs
Corporate bonds are very similar to government bonds in the way they function.
When a company needs to raise money, issuing bonds is one of the few ways they can do it. A bond is like an IOU. The company is essentially taking out a loan from you, which they promise to pay back in full with interest.
Corporate bonds do not have the same tax advantages as government bonds. Government bond interest is not subject to state and local taxes, only federal. However, corporate bonds are subject to federal, state, and local taxation.
There are two general types of corporate bonds
: investment-grade and high-yield (also called junk bonds).High-yield bonds are riskier than investment-grade bonds. As a result, they tend to pay you more money. You are exchanging higher interest rates for a higher chance of the bonds defaulting.
If a bond defaults, it basically means that the company is in deep financial trouble and cannot pay back it’s bondholders in full.
On the other hand, investment-grade bonds are considered safe. These types of bonds typically come from large corporations with a proven financial track record. For example, think of companies like Coca-Cola, Apple, and AT&T.
Investment-grade corporate bond ETFs add an extra layer of safety by automatically diversifying your bond investment. Instead of buying individual bonds from a single corporation, you can purchase corporate bond ETFs which hold dozens (if not hundreds) of bonds from various corporations.
6. Treasury Notes
Treasury Notes (also known as T-Notes) are a type of treasury security. They have fixed interest rates and maturities ranging from one to 10 years.
Like any treasury security, T-Notes are very safe because they are backed by the full faith and credit of the United States government.
T-Notes have a few key advantages that make them a great way to invest $100. Let’s go over each one:
- Tax advantages — Interest earned on T-Notes are not subject to state or local taxes. They are only taxed federally.
- Interest payments — Interest is paid out every 6 months until the notes mature.
- Liquidity — Because T-Notes are such popular investments, they have a large secondary market. This is where investors can buy and sell securities they own before the maturity date. If you ever need to convert your notes into cash quickly, it can be done.
T-Notes can be purchased directly from the United States Department of the Treasury through TreasuryDirect.gov. Setting up an account is free and easy.
Alternatively, if you don’t want to purchase T-Notes directly, you can consider buying a government bond ETFs. These can also be referred to as treasury ETFs.
Government bond ETFs can be purchased through any broker. I’d recommend checking out Stash. Stash allows you to build a portfolio and choose the investments that you want in it.
This means you can choose between many excellent government bond ETFs such as Schwab Short-Term U.S. Treasury ETF and the Vanguard Intermediate-Term Treasury ETF.
7. Treasury Bills
Like Treasury Notes, Treasury Bills (known as T-Bills) are a type of treasury security.
The two are virtually identical, with the exception that T-Bills have shorter maturities.
T-Bills can mature as quickly as 4 weeks, or up to 52 weeks, but no longer than a year.
You can purchase T-Bills directly from the United States Treasury through TreasuryDirect.gov.
You can also purchase a short-term government bond ETF. These ETFs contain a diversified portfolio of short-term government securities, including T-Bills.
If you purchase T-Bills through TreasuryDirect.gov, they can only be purchased in increments of $100. This is perfect since you are looking for ways to invest $100.
If you would prefer to not buy T-Bills directly, but instead want to purchase a short-term government bond ETF, consider using Webull.
Webull is a free broker that allows you to purchase stocks, options, and ETFs. And as a bonus, when you sign up for Webull using the link below, you’ll receive 2 completely free stocks valued up to $1400.
All you have to do is deposit $100 to get started.
8. Treasury inflation-protected securities (TIPS)
Treasury inflation-protected securities (TIPS) are another type of treasury security.
TIPS are specifically designed to prevent you from losing your money to inflation by automatically adjusting your initial investment (called the principal) based on the Consumer Price Index.
For example, during a period of inflation, your initial investment will increase. Say you purchased $100 worth of TIPS. During your first year of owning this investment, inflation increases by 5% (remember, inflation is based on the Consumer Price Index).
This 5% increase in inflation means that your initial investment of $100 will increase to $105, to adjust for inflation.
Additionally, you’ll receive semi-annual interest payments by owning the TIPS. The interest rate on TIPS are fixed, meaning they won’t change based on the Fed rates.
This is an oversimplified explanation of how TIPS work, but it should give you a good understanding of their advantage.
TIPS are purchased in increments of $100, making them perfect for your $100 investment.
You can buy TIPS directly from the United States Treasury by visiting TreasuryDirect.gov.
10. Roth IRA or 401(k)
If you have a Roth IRA or 401(k), you can easily invest $100 into these accounts and take advantage of the many benefits.
If your employer offers a 401(k), you can have them automatically deposit $100 per month from your paycheck to your 401(k). After a couple of months, you wouldn’t even notice the difference.
Investing $100 per month into your employer-sponsored retirement plan is even better if your employer matches your contributions. An employer match is (quite literally) free money.
Basically, every time you add money to your 401(k), your employer will add the same amount of money up to a certain amount.
If you don’t have a 401(k) but instead have a Roth IRA, you can still use this retirement account to invest your $100.
Treat your Roth IRA the same way you would your 401(k). Set aside $100 each month to contribute toward your Roth IRA.
The more money you can contribute, the better off you’ll be in the long run.
If you do not already have a Roth IRA, consider opening an account with Wealthsimple. They make it easy to open a Roth IRA and will even manage the investments within your Roth IRA for you.
11. ETFs
Exchange-traded funds (ETFs) are essentially baskets that hold dozens, sometimes hundreds of individual securities, including stocks, bonds, and commodities.
There are many different kinds of ETFs. Earlier in this post, you learned about government bond ETFs and corporate bond ETFs. These are both ETFs that invest in securities pertaining to their niche.
» Learn more 11 Popular Types of ETFs (ETF Categories & Themes)
For example, government bond ETFs invest in treasury securities such as T-Notes and T-Bills.
But it doesn’t stop there.
COW is an ETN that tracks… yes, cattle and other livestock such as pigs and chickens. You can even buy ETFs for 5G internet.
Some ETFs track entire indexes like the S&P 500. When you buy one of these ETFs, it’s like you are buying all S&P 500 companies with a single share, except at a fraction of the cost. The actual anatomy of an ETF is a little more complicated and outside of this post.
ETFs are similar to stocks in that they can be traded on the stock market throughout the day. This is different from a mutual fund which only trades once a day when the market closes.
ETFs are my personal favorite investment vehicle. They give you instant diversification, have great returns, and are very liquid.
» Learn more about ETFs: ETFs Investing for Beginners: A Powerful Guide
If you want to invest $100 into ETFs, I’d recommend going with something like the Vanguard S&P 500 ETF (VOO). It’s one of the best performing ETFs. It allows you to essentially own a stock that owns 500 of the largest companies in the United States.
However, this ETF is currently trading close to $300, which is $200 more than you can currently afford to invest. This leaves you with two options.
You can save up more money to buy a share of the Vanguard S&P 500 ETF, or you can use a service like M1 Finance to automate your investing.
With M1 Finance, you can still choose to invest in ETFs, but all of the work is done for you. All you have to do is deposit your $100 and tell M1 Finance what you’d like to invest in. That’s it.
Now you can sit back and perhaps start making some more money so you can keep investing.
12. Index funds
Index funds were invented in 1975 by Vanguard founder John Bogle.
An index fund is a type of mutual fund built to track an entire index, such as the S&P 500 or Dow Jones.
It gives you a general idea of how a certain index or market sector is performing without having to look at each individual stock in the index.
For example, if you wanted to get a general idea of how well the stock market was performing, it would be very time consuming to check all 4,000 stocks individually.
Some stocks would be up 10%, some down 10%. Others up 300%, others down 95%. Then you would have to add them all up and calculate the average to find that stocks are up 2.8% for the day.
To avoid this, you could just look at the S&P 500 and see that it’s up 2.8% and have a general consensus that the stock market is up 2.8% for the day.
There are roughly 5,000 different U.S. indexes. There’s an index that tracks utility stocks. There’s a defense index that only tracks defense stocks. There’s practically an index for everything.
The three most popular indexes in the U.S. stock market are the S&P 500, Dow Jones, and Nasdaq.
All of these indexes have index funds that match them that you can invest in. And unless you have a strong desire to invest in a specific sector such as health care or energy, then I would recommend investing your $100 in an S&P 500 index fund.
The Vanguard 500 Index Fund is one of the best performing S&P 500 index funds. You can also look at the Schwab S&P 500 Index Fund, which has a minimum investment of $0.
Index funds can be purchased at any brokerage firm. If you don’t already have a broker, I recommend opening an account with Wealthsimple.
Wealthsimple makes it incredibly easy to invest in index funds by automating the entire process for you.
13. Robo-advisors
A robo-advisor is just a fancy name for an automated investing service.
Before robo-advisors, if you didn’t want to take time learning about investing, you would have to hire an expensive (human) financial advisor to manage your money.
Nowadays, for the average investor, it’s almost always better to go with a robo-advisor. They are increasingly becoming more intelligent and can generate better returns than human advisors. And they are significantly cheaper.
Robo-advisors use complex computer algorithms to manage your investments based on your age and goals.
Most robo-advisor services will begin by asking you various questions about your financial goals and risk tolerance. Based on your answers, the robo-advisor will create a custom portfolio that fits your objectives.
So, how can you get started investing $100 using a robo-advisor? If you already have a broker, I would first check to see if their robo-advisor service is good.
For example, Vanguard is the broker my wife and I use for our Roth IRAs. Although I manage our retirement accounts for us, Vanguard has a great robo-advisor service that can manage yours if you aren’t up for the task.
You can also check out services like M1 Finance and Acorns. Both are designed to automate your investing.
14. Flip items for profits
Flipping items for a profit is a classic way of turning a small amount of money into something more substantial.
The term “flip” or “flipping” just means buying something and then selling it at a higher price for a profit. You can flip houses, cars, clothes, electronics… just about anything.
One of the best ways to flip items if you only have $100 is to go to thrift stores and garage sales. You can find high-priced items that are discounted as much as 95% at these places.
For example, when I was in college, I found a $200 Ralph Lauren jacket with tags at Goodwill for only $5. I could have sold this jacket at a 50% discount and still made amazing profits.
Gary Vaynerchuck has an entire series on YouTube dedicated to flipping items. He goes to garage sales, finds various collectibles and memorabilia that will have some value, and sells them on eBay for a profit.
Other than garage sales and thrift stores, here are some other places you can find cheap items to flip:
- Facebook Marketplace
- Walmart clearance rack
- Target clearance rack
- Craigslist
- LetGo
- Offerup
- Carousell
You can also sell items on any of these apps and websites.
So, how do you start flipping items? First, you need to decide where you will find your cheap items. I’ve already listed several examples.
If I were to start, I would first check thrift stores and clearance racks and big retailers like Walmart and Target.
You’ll need a way to check prices while shopping so that you can confirm whether or not you can profit from your flip. For that, you can simply use the eBay app.
For example, say you are at a thrift store, and you find a Beanie Baby with the tags still attached. Instead of blindly buying it, you would first open your eBay app and check to see how much Beanie Babies are selling for.
If they are selling on eBay for $20, and you can buy it for $2 at the thrift store, that is $18 in profit. If they are selling on eBay for $3, it probably isn’t worth it because you’ll also need to consider fees and shipping.
If you want to avoid paying for shipping costs, you can either have the buyer pay for shipping or just try and sell your items locally using any of the apps mentioned above.
15. Municipal bonds
Municipal bonds are similar to government bonds. The difference is that municipal bonds are issued by state or local governments. In contrast, government bonds are issued by the Federal government.
Municipal bonds are issued to raise money for local projects such as building or repairing highways, building new schools, or improving sewer systems.
Municipal bonds come with really great tax benefits, making them attractive to investors. The interest that you earn on a municipal bond is exempt from federal taxes, and in most cases, state and local taxes.
Generally speaking, municipal bonds are safe investments. Since they are backed by local governments’ taxing power, the chance of the bonds defaulting is rare. However, like with any investment, they can still be risky.
When investing in municipal bonds, it’s best to invest in a municipal bond ETF or mutual fund. This will give you much better diversification and protect you from market volatility.
Just about every broker will have municipal bond ETF options. If you don’t already have a broker, I’d recommend opening an account with Stash or M1 Finance. Both of these services will help streamline the process of investing your $100 into a municipal bond ETF.
16. Dividend-paying stocks
A dividend-paying stock is a stock that pays you dividends. I know, profound, right? Let’s break it down a little more.
A dividend is a payment that a company makes to its shareholders (the people who own the stock). These payments are usually made once every 3 months and are taken directly from the company’s profits.
Not all companies pay their shareholders dividends. For example, Facebook, a multi-billion dollar corporation, does not pay dividends.
Many companies will take decades before they decide to start paying out dividends. Apple went public in 1980 and didn’t start paying dividends until 2012—32 years after its IPO.
Dividend-paying stocks can be a great way to invest $100 in the stock market. Not only are you experiencing capital gains by owning the stock, but you are also being paid quarterly dividends, which is a form of passive income.
Earlier, you learned about using ETFs and index funds as ways to invest $100. If you own an ETF that owns underlying shares of dividend-paying stocks, you can be paid dividends simply by owning the ETF.
Both ETFs and index funds will pay out the full dividend that comes with the stocks that are within the fund.
To help reduce the inherent risk that comes with investing in the stock market, instead of buying individual dividend-paying stocks, you can purchase a dividend ETF. These ETFs are designed to specifically hold dividend-paying stocks.
You can purchase dividend ETFs at any broker. If you do not currently have a brokerage account, you can open a free one at Webull.
If you sign up for Webull using the link below, you will receive 2 free stocks valued up to $1400. Webull will allow you to purchase ETFs directly, but if you prefer a more hands-off approach, consider using Stash.
With Stash, you can choose what you want to invest in, and they will take care of the rest. You’ll also receive a $5 sign up bonus if you sign up using the link below.
17. Growth stocks
Growth stocks are shares of a company that are expected to grow significantly more than the average company. A few examples of growth stocks are Amazon, Tesla, and Facebook.
Growth stocks come with more risk, but also have a higher potential for larger returns.
Most growth stocks cost far more than $100. However, you can still purchase shares of these stocks using fractional shares.
A fractional share is any part of a stock that is not the full share. Many services offer some form of fractional share investing.
For example, Robinhood, Fidelity, and Charles Schwab all offer their own fractional share products.
Buying fractional shares is a great way to invest $100 in growth stocks.
18. Penny stocks
The Wolf of Wall Street has convinced many of us that penny stocks are pure evil and should be avoided. However, this is not entirely true.
Let me preface by saying that penny stocks are extremely risky. In fact, for the average investor looking to grow their investments slowly over time, penny stocks should be absolutely avoided.
However, if you are willing to take the time to learn proper risk management techniques and understand all the various aspects of day trading the markets, you can mitigate some of the risks involved with trading penny stocks.
For the record, I’ve been trading penny stocks for a little over two years now. For the first six months, I didn’t trade with real money. Instead, I learned how to trade using paper trading software.
Paper trading simply means fake money. It allows you to trade on the market, except the money isn’t real. Webull’s trading platform has a built-in paper trading system, so you can start there.
The term “penny stock” is often misused.
A penny stock does not mean a shady stock that is worth pennies. In fact, many penny stocks are traded on popular stock exchanges like the New York Stock Exchange and are required to meet specific standards set by the SEC.
The official definition of a penny stock is a stock that’s value is less than $5. Apple was considered a penny stock for 25 years.
Many blog posts that tell you to avoid penny stocks are typically referring to OTC stocks.
An OTC stock is a stock traded on the OTC Market. These are stocks that are not listed on any formal exchanges such as NYSE because they fail to meet the exchange’s standards.
I would advise you to avoid OTC stocks. These companies are typically shady operations that don’t have much financial backing to support true growth and longevity.
If you plan on trading penny stocks, you must follow these rules:
- Take time to learn how to actively trade stocks — Trading stocks, in general, is extremely risky. It doesn’t matter if you are trading penny stocks or large-cap blue-chip stocks, it’s all very risky. You have to spend time learning how to read stock charts, understanding technical analysis, and developing proper risk management.
- Don’t hold on to penny stocks long term — Penny stocks are not meant to be held as long term investments. They are meant to be day traded to capitalize on volatility. Never, ever, hold penny stocks longer than a few days.
- Do not jump into trading penny stocks with real money right away — I cannot emphasize this point enough. Anybody who has ever been hurt trading penny stocks has likely treated it like gambling. They didn’t take time beforehand to learn. Instead, they threw real money at a penny stock, hoping to get more money back. With this mentality, you will lose money every time.
Trading penny stocks can be a good way to invest $100. I recently turned $100 into $700 in a little under two weeks. However, I also have a couple years under my belt and approach the stock market with extreme caution.
There are many free resources available online to learn how to properly trade stocks. A quick Google or YouTube search, and you’ll find hundreds of results.
If you want to start trading stocks but aren’t ready to use real money, consider paper trading. Webull offers a great paper trading platform that you can use completely free.
19. Peer-to-peer lending
Peer-to-peer (P2P) lending allows you to lend money to other people. P2P lending has gained popularity over the past decade thanks to services like Prosper and Lending Club.
These services facilitate all of the transactions between borrowers and lenders. They also provide the software to make the process easier for both parties.
When you lend money using one of these services, you aren’t actually lending an entire loan to a single individual. At least you’re not supposed to. Instead, you are purchasing what is called a note.
Notes are purchased at $25 each. They allow you to invest in multiple loans to diversify your lending. P2P lending can become increasingly risky if you are investing all of your money into a single loan.
For example, if you had $100 to invest and purchased four notes, you wouldn’t want to put all four notes toward a single loan. You risk losing your entire $100 investment if the loan defaults.
Instead, you would purchase four notes and put them toward four separate loans. This way, if one of the loans defaults, you are only losing part of your investment, not all of it.
Lending Club advertises that investors can earn returns between 4.83% to 6.73%. Of course, you have to factor in loan defaults. Even after defaults, your returns will be much higher than if your money is sitting in a bank.
20. Real estate investment trusts (REITs)
If you ever wanted to purchase a skyscraper or a shopping mall, REITs essentially allow you to do that.
A real estate investment trust (REIT) is similar to a mutual fund. A group of investors put their money together to purchase a large amount of performing assets.
In the case of a REIT, that performing asset is real estate. REITs themselves, like mutual funds, are actual companies that own income-producing real estate.
When you buy a share of a REIT, you are not buying the underlying real estate. Instead, you are buying a piece of the company that owns the real estate.
REITs provide a few great advantages. For starters, they are very liquid. Most REITs are listed on major stock exchanges. This means they can be bought and sold just like stocks.
By law, REITs are required to pay out 90% of their net income to shareholders in the form of dividends.
And finally, similar to mutual funds, REITs are professionally managed. You can be hands-off and still enjoy the benefits of capital gains and dividend payments.
You can begin investing in REITs for as little as $100. REITs can be purchased using any broker. If you do not already have a brokerage account, I’d recommend signing up for a free account with Webull.
If you sign up for Webull using the link below, you will receive 2 free stocks valued up to $1400.
21. High-yield corporate bond ETFs
Earlier, you learned about investment-grade corporate bonds. These are bonds issued by companies with proven financial track records and are given an investment-grade credit rating.
» Learn more: ETFs Investing for Beginners: A Powerful Guide
They are considered safe investments since the risk of the bond defaulting is rare. However, because of the low risk, the interest paid on these bonds is also lower.
But, there does exist a corporate bond with higher interest rates.
Introducing high-yield corporate bonds. These are bonds that have higher yields because they are riskier.
Companies that have higher chances of defaulting on their bonds cannot obtain an investment-grade bond rating.
To entice investors to still purchase these bonds, the company will pay higher interest rates to compensate for the higher risk.
High-yield bonds can also be called junk bonds or non-investment grade bonds.
While high-yield corporate bonds are risky, you can help mitigate some of that risk by purchasing high-yield corporate bond ETFs.
Like with any ETF, you can buy and sell them on the stock market the same way you can trade stocks. There are many high-yield corporate bond ETFs that can be purchased for under $100.
You can begin investing in these ETFs using any broker. If you already have a brokerage account, simply research any of the high-yield corporate bond ETFs on this list, then go to your brokers trading screen and search for the ETF to purchase.
If you do not already have a brokerage account, I’d recommend signing up for a free account with Webull.
If you sign up for Webull using the link below, you will receive 2 free stocks valued up to $1400.
If you prefer to be hands-off, you can use a service like M1 Finance, which will automate your investing.
Final Takeaways
Learning how to invest $100 is no different than learning how to invest $10,000, $100,000, and even $1,000,000. The principles are all practically the same.
In this post I’ve laid out 21 ways to invest $100. While $100 may not seem like a significant amount of money to invest, what’s most important is that you are starting. Starting is half the battle.
Next, what you should do is continue saving more of your money so that you can invest more of it.
On top of saving more, it’s crucial that you always work to improve yourself and improve your life. Why not work on making more money than you do now? If you make more money, you can invest more of it. And the more you invest, the more your wealth grows.
I don’t want to leave you with the impression that money is everything. It’s not. In fact, if you live your life solely to accumulate riches just for the sake of being rich, you won’t ever be satisfied.
But, accumulating riches so that you can build a better life for you and your family and a leave a lasting legacy… well, that’s something to work hard for.
If you’d like to learn more about investing, saving, and earning, be sure to check out all of these posts:
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