If I want to start putting $50 away per month for long-term investment - what should I do with it?

Even though $50 may seem like a small amount, you do have some options:

1) As one or two of the other responders stated, you can put that amount towards your 401k (provided your company offers one).

2) If you don't want to go the 401k route, you can open a Roth IRA (assuming your compensation isn't over the limit).

Let's assume you want to go the route of opening a Roth IRA. You can save more money until you get $1000 and invest with a mutual fund company. I like Vanguard, but you have to have a minimum of $3000 initial investment and then you can invest $50/mo through their automatic investment plan. The exception is the Vanguard STAR Fund which has a minimum of $1000 initial investment. Fidelity has a SimpleStart IRA that you can invest $200/mo through their automatic investment plan.

If that $50 is burning a hole in your wallet, then you can invest with T. Rowe Price. You can start investing with as little as $50/month if you sign up for their automatic investment program.

I would also do some additional research at this website www.mfea.com (Mutual Fund Education Alliance). They have a list of funds for $50 or less.

As far as what to invest in, you definitely should diversify. It really comes down to your risk tolerance. You should invest in funds that will meet your overall financial and investment objectives.

Save it until you have $1000 and then put it in an aggressive mutual fund. After that you can add your $50 per month directly to the fund.

look into if your job offers 401K if they do you could put that into it and they would probably match a certain percent. you could also open a roth-IRA. and it'll payoff in taxes in the long-term

Until you have about $1000, you ought to put it into a savings account with a fair yield. Check with local banks to see what they pay and what their minimums are. Make it a goal to get to $1000. Once you have, I'd suggest you look into an index fund. Vanguard has a very cost efficient S & P Index Fund called the Vanguard S & P 500 fund. It's a great way to own total participation in the companies that make up the Standard & Poors Index with only $1000 dollars.

if your job has a 401k, contribute to that, sometimes they match, but even if they dont, you get to contribute tax free.
If you don't open a cd or something short term, until you build up about 1000 bucks.
Check online brokerage houses to see what the minimum ammount to open an account is, and then start with stocks

One of your responders mentioned saving it until you have $1000 to buy a mutual fund. Well I agree with that in part. I do not agree with the suggestion to buy an agressive fund. They do well in a raging bull market but we have not had one of those for 7 years. And so many people got scalped at the end of the last one that agressive funds may be out of favor for some time to come.

Frankly, I do not recommend investing in just one fund. There is too much risk. Of course you have to start somewhere. Many of the better mutual funds have higher minimums than $1000. Some much higher. It is true that once you make an initial investment funds will allow you to add to your holdings, some in $50 increments. And do that periodically helps average out your cost of shares, which is good. There are several funds with excellent long term track records that in general are more conservative and consistant than agressive growth funds.

Go to yahoo finance and do a search on mutual funds. What I would suggest is to develop a long term plan that involves 5 diffierent funds with different investment philosophies to give you the best chance of obtaining consistant long term results. Maybe one small to mid cap fund, one large cap fund, one developing markets fund, one overseas developed markets fund, and one value fund. You will not be able to invest in all of these at once but invest in one and then save up your money and invest in another and so on. Here is a very important point. Pick funds that have a low portfolio turnover and expense ratio of under 1.5% and a good long term track record.

If after 3 years one of the funds is a disappointment, pull your money out and invest in a different fund. Unfortunately, that will happen.

To be blunt, $50/month is a great start if you are not already a saver, but isn't enough to support a retiree.

I pulled out the old financial calculator and found that even at 12% APR (which is aggressive), after 30 years you would only have $176,000.

Put it in a high yielding bank savings a/c and when you have at least $1000 try the stock market.
Use the time until then to educate your self about investing.