Is it time to buy stocks?

This is a question many people are asking now that they have seen a 20% run up in the stock markets over the last three weeks. My question is, why weren't you a buyer three weeks ago? For some reason, everyone likes to buy TV's, cars, and clothes on sale, but not stocks? Why? If you are an investor with more than 15 years to go to the time you would possibly need to withdraw some of your investment, then stocks are always a buy. One way to take some of the emotion out of it is to use a technique called Dollar Cost Averaging. This is basically a strategy which says you will invest the same amount of money each month into your portfolio. When the market is up, you buy less shares, when the market is down, you buy more shares. Over time, the markets will tend to go up more than they go down. The next strategy is to determine how much stocks, bonds, and cash you should hold in your portfolio. This is called asset allocation. Conservative investors may only want 20 to 40% of their portfolio invested in stocks or stock funds, while aggressive investors may have 80 to 90 percent in stocks. If you are uncomfortable with your allocation or cannot sleep at night because you are worrying about your portfolio, then you may need to adjust your asset allocation mix. There are many online questionnaires you can take, called risk tolerance quizzes, to determine how your portfolio should be constructed. Sometimes it pays to seek the help of a professional. Ask yourself this question, when Tiger Woods needs help with his swing, does he go to a professional golf instructor or pick up the latest copy of Golf Digest?