@gearhead1960 and
@OutlawDrifter
Awesome stuff here. My wife has been really pressuring me to open an official investment account. So I think that will be the next step. Right now everything we have is in real estate, retirement plans and cash savings.
It's either that or we find a "real" business to invest in and partner with. But I don't want to be involved in anything that needs a time investment. I would want to be more of a silent partner but I'm sure that has more risk than the general market ??
My 2 cents for the little it's worth(hint...you'll probably get change back from the 2 cents)
Your cash savings, assuming it's sitting in a saving account in a bank is likely getting sub 2% interest. You can get short term CD's, short term bonds or high yield savings accounts paying 4.5 or higher and for several of the CD's have pretty good liquidity. Find a place that'll earn you more money(assuming it's in a conventional bank savings account) while still having easy access without significant penalities. Keeping some in a savings account tied to the bank so it's "instant" while having some others in a high yield or CD that might take a couple days to get your hands on if needed is pretty common
It's probably also prudent to mention the FDIC limit of insurance of $250k per depositer per bank given there have been 4 or 5 regional banks fail in the last 2 months. Staying under that limit would probably be prudent....or having it in one of the largest banks classified as "too big to fail". Cash Sweep accounts exist as well where a bank will automatically open and manage accounts in your name in other banks to keep your deposits under the 250k per bank level while only having to go to (1) bank to withdraw it
As mentioned, lots of advisors out there and guessing you have business relationships with several financial advisors. Generally they fall into 2 buckets....fee based or commission based. Most "guru's" recommend fee based fiduciaries so they're legally obligated to provide advice in your best interest, not the best interest of their commission structure. Not saying that all commission based reps are like that, but there are distinct differences
It's easy to open an account, with one of the larger brokerages...example Fidelity, Vanguard, TD, Schwab and setup an autodeposit/auto transfer from a checking on a weekly/monthly schedule....what you do with it once it's there is likely going to be more overwhelming, but they all have ways to make it easy
Assuming an investment in the general "stock market", your options in a brokerage for most people are going to fall into 2 buckets:
Equities: These are stocks....GM, Apple, Tesla etc-Assuming you're only buying equities(as opposed to derivatives like options) you're betting that the outlook in the company is positive in your investment time frame...be it short, medium or long. Most platforms can buy/sell equities for a very low or no fee/commission, so the transaction costs are very low
Indexes/ETF's-Index's are a "Basket" of equities put together to create a "benchmark" of a particular sector/industry or the entire economy....the NASDAQ or S&P 500 are both indexes. It's rather cost prohibitive for the average retail investor to trade the actual "index", so Exchange Traded Funds(ETF's) that mimic the index allow you to buy similar "exposure"....for example SPY is the largest ETF for the S&P 500, QQQ is the stock ticker for the largest NASDAQ ETF. Lots of other ETF's exist that allow you to get exposure to particular markets....US Entire Market, Global Markets, Latin America, Heavy industrial, Commodity indexes...and you aren't just betting on them to go up...Inverse ETF's that are intended to make holders profit when the value of the companies represented go down as well...and some are 2x or 3x leveraged....it's the worlds largest casino and legal in all 50 states!
With all that said, I think most fee based advisors would agree on 2 main things
-Time IN market beats timing THE market: AKA the vast majority of people can't accurately "time the market" and the vast majority are far better off putting money in on a frequency in an investment portfolio that matches their risk tolerance and timeline...and then forgetting about it
-Fee's matter-If you're looking at an annual return of 6 or 8% over 40 or 50 years...and 1 fund has a 1.5% fee and the other has a .15% fee...that makes a far bigger difference then most people realize on the size of the pot at the end of the rainbow. Jack Bogle
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/j/john_bogle.asp Is considered the "father" of index investing, or buying an index of a broad sector and leaving it the hell alone. He founded Vanguard which still today runs some of the largest ETF's with the lowest fee structure in the US. Those who advocate for this approach often refer to themselves as "bogleheads" so if you find it while google searching investing...that's what they're talking about
As for the risk of general market vs being an investor/limited partner in a business....I'd say yes, the investor in business is riskier. You could invest money in the broad market on Monday...and then let's say it crashes huge over the following weeks....it's highly unlikely you loose more than 30 or 40% of the investment assuming you're in a broad market fund...and even if it does that, you can still get your cash back(minus the losses) in a couple days depending on the platform you're on.
Your limited partnership/silent investment has a much stronger chance of going to 0, and generally has very limited liquidity or ability to get funds back. Your withdraw process is generally going to be outlined in writing, but just because you want money out, doesn't mean that they'll want or be able to do it. You're highly reliant on the competency and capability of a very small group of people(possibly just 1)...so yes it can be very lucrative....but it is riskier and has lower liquidity.
You already have significant capital ******* in real estate which is essentially "illiquid". Yes it cash flows(hopefully positive) but unless you're doing a cash out refinance of a property, it's very hard to get real cash quickly out of that property. With the littles, the birds, the business, the other hobbies.....I expect most advisors would recommend a easy, safe but liquid broad market exposure approach. They may each have a different approach and with high levels of volatility right now some may recommend more into bonds or other "safer" assets paying rather high rates right now...but easy, simple, proven track record but available when you may need it seems to be a good starting place and hard to be ETF's or other low fee(low load in industry terms) broad market exposure solutions for that.
. It's super unfortunate that I have been kinda jaded. I struggle with the decision of basically who is the lesser of all the evils lol. That's mostly what has held me back. 
