The Dallas Dinner- Curing the hobby's ills

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Posted By: Cat

I have been thinking a lot about cards and my percentage of net worth tied up in my collection. I am probably twice as passionate about the stock market as I am collecting cards. I enjoy each but certainly cards a little bit more. I have kept a personal balance sheet since 9/20/1991. I was worth ($20,892) on that date. Yep, I was upside down in life. Half of the debts were student loans...not an "investment" I will ever bitch about.

About three/four months ago, I decided having 23% of my net worth in cards was too much, and I wanted to go to 20%, but today I have about 25% of my net worth in cards...whoops wrong direction. I believe my cards will be passed to my heir(s), so no way do I consider them an investment. In fact, I look at them as an asset, but a dead asset (no return, assets only have returns when you sell them, until then it's just paper gain).

I am a firm believer in the stock market, but only keep a small portion of my net worth in individual stocks, but approximately 50% of my net worth is in mutual funds. Real Estate can be very lucrative but equally disastrous.