Then, decide how much you expect to earn from your investments. This is a little more complicated, I know. It requires you to think about how risk averse you are (for example, how scared you would be if you lost some, some, or a boatload of your investment portfolio) and to consider the types of investments that are likely to help you earn a return on investment. investment you feel comfortable with. Before we start talking about the performance of different investments over time, you should know this: the performance of an investment in the past does not necessarily mean that it will have the same return in the future. Even so, the longer your investment horizon (the amount of time you will invest your money), the greater your chances of receiving an overall return that is closer to the long-term historical average. Let's look at how some different investments made over the last 20 years (which includes the so-called “lost decade,” the first 10-year period on record where stock returns were stable.)