text: personal finance - someone please help me formulate a proper investment strategy!!? hey will someone suggest a proper investment policy for someone like me who has started working only about 2 months ago....i can invest upto 6k every month....but intend to take a break from work for about 2 years to finish my masters...  trying to help dad in financing his dream home is another objective...which would call for a loan of about 5-8 lacs and is hence a purely ambitious one considering the present scenario....  ive been doing some research on this as well...someone recommended franklin templeton sip to start with but i thought why not diversify...i can take some risks wrt the investments i make....my priorities are mainly long term but i can take a few risks too...  i am pretty amateur to all this so maynot know all the jargons...i hope ppl can still understand what i intend to say....  i also want to know how much returns can i expect from the various offerings currently available....  hope someone would help me out with this....  thanks in advance, rajit some people will tell you to invest in real estate.  you really need to know the marketplace, which is constantly changing.  you also need a good realestate lawyer when you buy or sell.  i suggest instead that you look at the stock market.  you can get a lot of information on the internet and at the library. you need to follow a few rules.       1) invest in high quality stocks and  no-load mutual funds.     2) diversify. (you are already aware of this one)      3) avoid "penny stocks" .     4) be patient