I didn’t have a good experience with SCORE. The dude basically told me it wouldn’t work and I would amount to nothing. He was old and jaded and I was young. He was wrong, I’ve come far.
Sounds like your experience with SCORE actually was effective. It motivated you to say to yourself that the old fuddy-duddy was wrong and you were right. You’ll show them. Sometimes “rejection” is all the motivation one needs.
As for the 50K. That depends. For some people, that is not even enough for their emergency fund. For others, it’s 3x too much. First: Take 6 months of your living expenses out of that 50K and put it in a high-yield savings account (“high” is a relative term), such as ING Direct or similar. If you already have an emergency fund, that’s great.
Then, put what’s left in a separate high-yiled savings account and based on what’s left start making decisions.
Are your retirement funds fully maxed out ? Have you contributed to a Roth IRA ? (too late for 2007). Do you have any outstanding bills? Pay them down in order of max interest rate *highest first). This is typically: Credit cards, unsecured lines of credit, car loans, student loans.
AFter that see what’s left ?
Oops: Do you have to pay taxes on the 50K ? If so take the taxes out and go back to the top of my response and start over.
After these things, how much is left ?
Whatever’s left is suitable for investment in stocks, gold, inverse funds, bonds, starting a business, touring the rainforest, etc.
