Ask Matt: How can I make money on stocks?

Q: How can I make money on stocks?

A: Today is the final Ask Matt column.

I’m joining a money-management firm as a writer. It seemed time to impart the top lesson I’ve learned from answering your questions for 17 years.

Here goes: If you want to make money on stocks, stop obsessing about minutiae. Get started. Invest, diversify and hold on.

If you don’t know how, hire help. It’s easy to fixate on details like choosing which stock to buy, which investment accounts to open and fees. But investors get so bogged down with details they often make the big mistake – they sit out the market.

Consider this. Let’s say 25 years ago, you invested $10,000 in a disappointing investment that trails the market by 2 percentage points a year. Let’s make it even uglier and say this investment charges a 1.5% annual fee, which is twice the average of mutual funds.

Even this horrible investment would have gained 274% over the 25-year period to $38,934. Had you sat out the market and bought 6-month CDs instead, your $10,000 would have increased just 81% to $18,057.

Don’t make it hard. Just buy a diversified stock and bond fund.

If you don’t know how, get help.

Just get started.

USA TODAY markets reporter Matt Krantz answered a different reader question on stocks and investing several times a week for almost 17 years. This is his final column.