Hearing your story, it sounds like it would be a good opportunity for you to begin learning about investing.
Going to a brokerage firm or bank is an excellent starting place, but ultimately what decides where you will want to put your money has to do most with the degree of risk you're willing to deal with.
The greater the risk, the greater the potential for gains, but also the greater risk for potential losses. Going to a brokerage firm you aren't likely to experience massive gains on top of any investments because they tend not to encourage particularly risky investments, but they do know what they are doing.
If you want modest annual gains (10-15%+), I agree, go to a broker, if you want to try your hand with more aggressive gains (50%+) since you are young, you need to do your own research, and a lot of it!
Assuming you have no experience with investments at age 15, overall I would say you are probably going to be better off going to a broker for starters and using play money to see how you do with risky investments, and putting your 12k somewhere safe where you will achieve modest gains.
cars go down in value, perhaps you recognize that already
if you take your 12 thousand and put in a cd you will not reap much, cd's only pay about 0.5% a year, that is less than 1% bro
if you take your 12 thousand and put it in a corporate bond, you pay the commission on the corporate bond and probably end up paying a premium since rates are low (like $1,050 for a $1000 bond which pays 2% a yesr, and at maturity you get $1000)
so your best bet is a mutual fund or a couple stocks which are investing in high quality companies. For example if you buy say 150 shares of PG, you will get the 3% dividend, pay about $12000 at $80 a share, and by the next three years, you will have collected the dividend plus the stock hopefully will be over $80 a share in 2017.
You don't have the skill level to invest $12,000 wisely.
A much more practical idea is to use your time to learn about used cars and the stock market. Then when you turn 18, you can buy a good used car for less than $12,000 and put the rest into a trading account.
You need to educate yourself - taking investing advice from anyone is a bad idea.
cars are not investments. investments have the chance to appreciate in value & cars always depreciate.
make an appointment with your local brokerage firm or your bank they'll advise you on how best to invest the money. (I like Edward Jones because you can open an account with a relatively low amount of money--$300 to $500-- & their agents are very good at educating you & I've never had any issues with one trying to load me up with expensive fees.) You'll need one of your parents to go with you as you're not allowed to have your own account---you can get a custodial account & make arrangements in advance to have the account switch over to you at 18.
if you take that 12k & never add anything to it & your investments average 8 to 12% (this is a reasonable number to expect but you can average more: I've been averaging 24% for the last 10 years) then in 10 years you're looking at something between $24k to $37k; in 20 years $55k to $115k; in 54 years when you're 62 & maybe looking at early retirement--$765k to $5.4 million.
you'd have even more than that if you invest 10 to 15% of your income on top of that original $12k
I have heard ira's are good
Alright, so here's the deal. My parents said they would buy me a 12,000 dollar car when I turn 16 (I'm 15). Now for some reason 12,000 dollars seems much more alluring than a used car. I have heard a car is a horrible investment. My parents have agreed to give me the 12,000 as long as I am responsible for buying my own car in the future. I don't need a car honestly so I would like to put the money where it will grow by the time I turn 18. Other than put it in a bank savings account, where is the best place to invest it (bonds, stocks?). thanks!
