[Like2Plan]

After you have maxed out on the other types of retirement accounts, you are mostly likely going to need to invest in taxable type savings.

No load mutual funds are generally a good starting point until you've built up some assets (there are lots of different types of mutual funds). The primary reason is it is hard to diversify stocks if you can only buy a couple to start with. And, that ties in with risk. If you have 1 or 2 stocks and they tank, your portfolio value plummits. If only those two stocks as part of a larger mutual fund go down, the loss will be more attenuated.

Maybe down the line you might want to consider indivdual stocks. One of the things that I like about owning indivdual stocks is you control when they are bought and sold (for the most part) and you control the taxable events associated with that. You can pick stocks which provide dividends. For some, this is a strategy for replacing income in retirement. The value of the stock can fluctuate, but you still get that quarterly dividend check. On the other hand, you could pick stocks that don't earn a dividend, but are growth stocks.

I am sure the folks on this board will have more investment recommendations, but the biggest obstacle to overcome is just getting into a pattern of regular saving...