Are you ready to start earning an average return of 10% per month on your money? That’s a 120% return a year. Sounds too good to be true but it isn’t. It’s time to stop being a passive investor and stop listening to the so called ‘experts’. After all who cares more about your money than you? That’s the beauty of my system. Since I am investing my own money in the same trades that I share with you, you can feel confident that I am keeping a close eye on it. I use a system of investing that averages 10-12% per month return in any market condition. In fact, I’m most profitable when the market trends sideways. Compare that with investing in stocks where your only profit scenario is when you guess right on the direction. This can be done but it’s very, very difficult to be consistently successful using this approach.

Who am I, and how did I get started trading options? The journey was filled with countless obstacles, learning experiences and failures, but let me try and paint a picture for you. Let’s go back a few years ago. I used to work in Corporate America like many others. I was a corporate trainer for an insurance company. Working in this environment did several things for me. First, it made me realize that I wasn’t built for office work. I needed more freedom with my career. I needed challenges, variety and, most of all, the ability to determine what I was worth. I took the big step several years ago and resigned my position to be a full time real estate investor. I had done this part time for a few years and was making more at it on a per hour basis than my full time job. So one day I found myself self-employed and loving every minute of it. Everything was good; next thing I knew, the real estate market went off a cliff. Don’t get me wrong, I was still making money. It just wasn’t nearly as easy and it wasn’t nearly as much. About this same time I noticed that my IRA had decreased significantly since I had left my job. It was at this moment that I decided I was no longer going to be a passive investor. I was tired of just putting money in the market not knowing how to improve my returns.

With this approach the only way I could make money was when the overall market was increasing. Meaning I couldn’t profit if it was decreasing or going nowhere.  I didn’t like those odds. I had always had somewhat of an interest and curiosity about how the stock market worked. This began at an early age when my uncle, who was an economics professor, gave me some Coke stock. Ever since then I was fascinated by the fact that money could make money but never really had the time or motivation to properly educate myself on how it all worked. The sudden decrease in my IRA coupled with my newly cultivated entrepreneurial spirit provided the spark I needed. Luckily, my current career as a RE investor allowed me plenty of time and freedom to educate myself on the stock market. I started at the beginning and read every book I could find on the subject. I attended many seminars and opened an on-line brokerage account. I started trading with what they call paper money (which basically means pretend money). This is a great way to learn the technical side of trading. Placing orders, closing orders, setting stop limits, etc. I eventually funded my account and started trading for real. It was at this time that the education really began.

So much of trading involves fear, greed and every other emotion that you can think of. It’s just not the same when the money is not real. It’s like playing Monopoly. I was excited and nervous and proceeded to lose nearly 40% of my account in less than 2 months . So I thought maybe I should do day trading. I did this for a couple of months and made and lost a lot of money. The commissions were so high that there was a very fine line between success and failure. I was basically even for this time period. I also found this trading approach too stressful for me. I found myself spending hours staring at a monitor waiting for the perfect moment to place a trade. I felt like the office job I had left several years before had been replaced with another similar fate.  I did learn a lot during this time period. Things such as pivot points, recognizing trends and reading and understanding technical indicators became second nature to me. It was at this point that I reviewed my actual returns or lack of returns for the year and decided to go back to the drawing board. I started by reviewing all of my winning and losing trades. I determined that there were a few strategies that had a high rate of success and were very profitable. Six months after my adventure began I finally settled on a strategy that would make me consistent returns and have a high rate of success. Since then I have averaged 10-12% a month. The new strategy was centered around the concept of selling Options instead of buying them.

The reason I understood this strategy so well is because of my background. First of all I understood the concept of options because I had sold many properties using a Lease Option approach. This basically gives the buyer of the property the RIGHT to buy the house at a certain price within a certain time period. As the seller of the Lease Option/House you have the OBLIGATION to sell the property at a certain price and within a certain time period. I also understood the role and importance of options as an insurance vehicle in the stock market. After all, I had worked in the insurance industry for many years and this is basically the purpose of options. The seller of the option acts as the insurance company and collects a premium from the owner of the stock. The buyer of the option has to pay a premium for this protection that insures him that if the stock goes too low he will be reimbursed. If the house doesn’t burn down, the insurance company just keeps the premium collected once the policy expiration date arrives. The insurance company is simply balancing out policies that may experience a loss with those that will not. It’s a constant balancing act. I do basically the same thing with my option strategies.

My main strategy involves selling options and collecting premium. I only place trades that have at least an 80% chance of success and I always have pre-determined exit prices. In other words, if the house catches on fire, I’m not going to wait around until it burns to the ground and then pay out the insurance claim. I’m going to adjust the trade or simply exit it early enough to put a cap on the loses that occur. After all, you will have losing trades, and even losing months. Even with a 80-90% chance of success you are going to miss on a couple here and there. It sounds easy and you are probably wondering, “Why can’t I  just do it myself?”   Well, you can…if you have the time and energy to devote yourself to education. I certainly didn’t have this luxury back when I had a job. When I first started learning the market, I was spending at least 8 hours a day for the first 6 months just to get to a point where I felt comfortable enough to start trading. If you remember I then proceeded to lose a significant amount of money. Once you get up to speed you can expect to spend several hours a day watching the market, babysitting open positions and analyzing dozens of possible trades to find the perfect one. The other option is to ‘Follow My Trades.’ As I said earlier, I love teaching people. It’s definitely in my heart and I love to educate someone who truly wants to learn. Unfortunately, most people have full time jobs, family and other responsibilities and they simply don’t have the time to learn, apply and master something like this.

I’m also a big believer in creating multiple streams of income. I think this is more important now than ever, especially given our current economic situation. If you’ve got a full time job/career this can be a little challenging. You could start a part-time business which takes time and money. You could get a part time job. But in each scenario you are working for your money, so if your time is already limited they are virtually impossible to do. Instead you need to learn how to have your money work for you. You can do this through real estate or through the stock market. I have done and still do both. I actually think you should do both: remember, multiple streams of income! But, given the choice of the two, selling options requires less capital, is easier to manage and can have a greater return…IF you know what you are doing and have the time to do it OR you follow the trades of an experienced investor like myself. How much more reassurance do you need than to know that you are following the exact trades that I’m doing with my hard earned money? I do the research, pick the best options, give you the numbers, tell you when I’m adjusting or exiting a position. You simply do the same.