question about two years ago i became permanently disabled and unable to work at the age of 39 due to a car accident i got 400000 from a legal settlement which doesn’t come close to making up for my future lost wages luckily we’ve reconfigured our lives so we can live off my husband’s salary i want to invest the settlement to be used in retirement or in case god forbid something happens with my marriage the money is currently in a money market account and i’m putting 500 a month into a roth ira how would you recommend investing the rest what percent should i put in the stock market and what percent in cds or bonds or other vehicles for what i put in the market should i invest the money slowly over months to take advantage of market fluctuations or should i not worry about that since i hopefully won’t have to withdraw the money for 20 years answer first let’s focus on what you’re already doing right “you’ve made a wise choice of adjusting your lifestyle to live off your husband’s salary this allows you to invest the settlement in a way that provides for more longterm growth if you needed this money to live on now you’d have to sacrifice this growth for more stability” says rj weiss founder of the financial site the ways to wealth pros also praise how you’re tackling your ira “the dollarcost averaging strategy you’re taking of contributing 500 per month is outstanding because you don’t have to worry about trying to time the market” says marguerita cheng founder and ceo at blue ocean global wealth looking for a new financial adviser you can get matched with a financial adviser who might meet your needs here so now let’s tackle your questions as for how you choose to invest that depends on what you’re aiming to accomplish says sheri hensrud vice president of risk and analytics at riskalyze “if you’re more comfortable with a gradual investing strategy you should create a plan where the goal is to be fully invested in your target portfolio within three to six months allowing for some dollarcost averaging without sitting on the sidelines for an extended period of time” says hensrud but how exactly do you choose your investments first up  pros say this is a very important step “the mix of stocks bonds and cash you hold is one of the most important if not the most important” says weiss have an investing question you want a panel of advisers to answer email it to picksmarketwatchcom both bond and equity allocations should be well diversified and equity allocation should include all market capitalizations and both domestic and international securities says hensrud cheng also recommends a diversified portfolio of stocks and bonds she recommends considering domestic and international as well as growth and value stocks “among domestic stocks make sure your investment allocation includes large cap mid cap and small cap” says cheng for bonds “be sure to include domestic and international growth and value” she says and hensrud notes “the fixedincome allocation should include shortterm and intermediateterm bonds investment grade and highyield and possibly a commodities security to provide an inflation hedge” looking for a new financial adviser you can get matched with a financial adviser who might meet your needs here consider too your willingness to take risk as well as age goals and net worth says hensrud “based on the limited information provided it seems your risk number may be on the lower side this would indicate a target asset allocation that has a larger weight to securities such as bonds cds and money market or cash” says hensrud her recommendation is that you may want to put about 65 of your money into fixed income intermediateterm bonds at 35 shortterm bonds at 20 highyield bonds at 5 and cash at 5 and 35 into equities largecap equities at 20 international equities at 10 midcap equities at 3 and small cap equities at 2 as for that ira investment cheng says for simplicity’s sake you may want to consider a targetdate fund an agebased retirement investment that takes on more risk earlier and becomes more conservative over time or a balanced fund you should also consider how large of an emergency fund you want to set aside “with one income supporting both of you you want to make sure you can handle the common setbacks like a job loss or the cost of hitting your deductible” says weiss emergency savings or funds that you’ll need in the short term should be placed in an account that is easily accessible without penalties or tax consequences says certified financial planner luis rosa “since the primary goal is accessibility and safety of principal it’s okay to trade a low interest rate for that” says rosa