Advice on what to do with my equity?
"How will 45K-60K ""end up in your pocket""?  Are you selling your home?  Where are you going to live?  You talk about moving to Arizona, what is so magical about that place? Congratulations on making a wise purchase.  Some people with new found money use it to correct past mistakes.  However, if they do not change their behavior they end up in the same situation just less them money they once had. While 50K income is respectable at your age, it is below the national average for households.  One factor in having a college education is those with them tend to experience shorter and fewer periods of unemployment especially for males.  Nothing will ever replace hustle, however.  I'd ask you to have a plan to raise your income.  Can you double it in 5 years?   You need to get rid of the revolving debt.  Do that out of current income.  No need to touch the house proceeds for something so small.  Shoot for 9 months. Then you need to get rid of the speeding fines and the vehicle loan.  That is a lot of vehicle for your income.  Again, I would do that out of current income or by selling the vehicle and moving to something more inline with your income.   As far as to moving or flipping foreclosures that is more of a question that has to do with your hopes and dreams.  Do you want to move your children every 3 years?  What if you move to Arizona and it turns out to be quite horrible?  You and your wife need to sit down and discuss what is best for your family." What to do with your equity?  Leave it alone...
I think with your background you would be well suited to Equity Research in Oil, Biotech, or Pharma.  Not an area I know well but people who have greater understanding of the company's business are valuable in that field when combined with finance knowledge.  By your questions I would definitely advise some more investigation into finance and your motivations for getting into it.  What do you want out of finance?  How does the field match up with your life goals and your personal values?  Read some primers on Wall Street Oasis and some of Mergers and Inquisitions if you haven't already.  Sorry for the unwanted advice rant.  Just see lots of people attracted to money, prestige, or perceived glamour of finance without thinking about whether it's really what they want. Some qualitative factors to consider when deciding whether to finance with equity vs debt (for a publicly traded company):    1) The case for equity: Is the stock trading high relative to what management believes is its intrinsic value? If so, raising equity may be attractive since management would be raising a lot of $$$, but the downside is you give up future earnings since you are diluting current ownership  2) The case for debt: What is the expected return for the project in which the raised capital will be utilized for? Is its expected return higher than the interest payments (in % terms)? If so raising debt would be more attractive than raising equity since current ownership would not be diluted  That's all I can think of off the top of my head right now, I'm sure there are a few more qualitative factors to consider but I think these two are the most intuitive Can you advice what I should take care about, or just continue to maximize equity? As others have said, you definitely need to learn about risk management and position sizing, but I also think you should consider: Uhm, this is my disclaimer that this is not financial advice. But. I would imagine a decent amount of high growth tech will go into the toilet. Also cyclicals that are heavily reliant on the low cost of short term capital. But really these are just some intuitive guesses. It would really depend on what the mechanism and impact of a future recession would be.   Curious though, why do you personally think a recession is looming? I know there's been a lot of talk but per the VIX, investors' worries don't appear to be affecting their behavior too much (at least in equities).   I think the big risk is the Fed not being able to control the yield curve, i.e if short term rates increase but the Fed can't or won't shrink the balance sheet enough to impact long term rates. Just an idea. "I will echo the others; your home should be worth more to you than its market value. It is YOUR HOME. It's where you come home every day to your wife and kids, where you build a life. Yes it's an investment, but it's not like a stock or bond that you hold for a little while and then cash out for the profit. The one time you should be worried about being ""upside-down"" on your mortgage is if you're getting out. If you're moving to a new job at a new company in a new city, you have to make good on the remaining loan balance, and that won't all be from the sale of the house. Unless you're at that point however, if you can afford making the payments and have no reason to move or to cash in equity (of which you have none), then just keep making the payments. Hey, it's better than rent; you'll never see rent money again, while even if you're underwater, you're making headway with each payment." I've read over these responses like a dozen times. It's really cool hearing from a business owner who has experienced things first-hand. Nobody in my family has ever been or known anything about business/stocks/Anything. I'm learning everything from the internet, friends, and now reddit. I'll certainly seek true legal advice but you have no idea how helpful you and every other person on this thread has been. Thank you! I'm all ears to anything else Disclaimer: I am not Canadian and have no experience with their laws and regulations. There really aren't any safe short term investment options at the moment (with interest rates being close to zero). So, just put the money aside you will need for the car and the computer, maybe on a callable savings account to make at least a few Dollars. Do not take out any loans, it is very unlikely you will earn more than the cost of the loan. You didn't say how much will be left but, unfortunately, it really is not much to go on anyway. Considering that you seem to have enough income to cover your expenses, you could transfer the rest to your RRSP, invest and just forget about it. I suggest to follow this rule of thumb: the growth portion of your portfolio, which for you means equities, should be directly related to the number of years you won't need to touch these funds. 1 year, 0 equity. 2 years, 10%, 3 years, 20%, and so on. What's not in equities, you could put in short term bonds, meaning an average duration of about 3 years. Needless to say, single stocks/bonds are out of question, ideally you can find 2 ETFs, one for stocks and one for bonds, respectively. However, if there is any possibility you did not mention that you could suddenly depend on this money, you have to keep your equity exposure, and thus your potential earnings, low. Just a humble thought: i really don't know your specific situation, my apologies if I'm out of line. Often disability means that you are not capable of doing one particular thing anymore, i.e. work physically. Just maybe you would still be capable to do some other type of work, maybe even from the comfort of your home, that would allow you to generate a certain income (and also keep you busy).  I hope this helps. Good luck. What's your basis? If you have just made a 50% gain, maybe you should cash out a portion and hold the rest. Don't be greedy, but don't pass up an opportunity either.