When purchasing stock, many individuals cringe at the thought of paying high prices. But nowadays, there is a wonderful alternative to purchasing stock. Instead of spending all that money, try buying only a portion or a partial peice of stock(s). What this means is that, you can invest in mutual funds, stocks, etc for only  1/2 or 1/4 of the price. According to the Wallstreet Journal…

At consumer investing website ShareBuilder.com, you can buy a partial stake in about 7,700 securities—including Apple, Google, McDonald’s, the iShares Russell 2000 Index Fund and the Vanguard Bond Index Fund. There’s no minimum investment requirement and you can set up automatic investment increases as often as weekly. But there are pertrade and selling fees.

These partial shares are “not meant to trade and flip out the next day,” says Dan Greenshields, ShareBuilder’s president and chief investment officer. “It’s really to accumulate over a three-to-five-year period.”

For instance, you can buy $100 of Google stock, which is about 1/5 of a share. (The stock is trading at around $524.) Over time, you can add money, say $25 each month, to accrue more partial shares.

Also, there’s another way to buy into the partial stock plan. DRIP, the dividend reinvestment plan, allows you to use your stock dividends to purchase additional shares. To learn more about this option, go to www.DRIPinvestor.com.

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