re: Where to invest for income

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being charged $500.00 per month in management fees by her CFP.

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I would check around with different ones and get pricing like with anything else. Don't pick one that charges a monthly fee! Mine charges $200 per hour (and nothing when I don't use him), but I usually don't have to pay as I've got several things with him. I don't trust stock brokers or bank financial advisers as they are trying to make money off commissions. Make sure your CFP has fraud protection (SIPC).

To answer your question about what kind of interest stuff pays, here is some stuff I have (some through a CFP, some though my bank, some I trade by myself on TD Ameritrade):

Mutual Funds: about 3.5% (through my bank).

REITs: about 6-7% (WPC, Lightstone, Inland).

BDCs: about 7-11% (FSIC 11%, Corp. Capital Trust 7%).

Dividend paying stocks:

COP: 7.5%

I would say $200 for an hour of time is money well spent to come up with a plan. You can lose big if you buy stuff without researching first and getting good advice. Good luck

ETA: a good first step may be to go through your bank for a financial adviser. They won't charge you for an initial consult and you can ask what mutual funds pay. I wouldn't put more than 1/4th of your investments in these however, as they don't pay that well (but pay better than CDs or municipal bonds).

Personally, at your age, I would stay away from putting too much into equities at this point, just to capture a dividend. I mean, you said you were looking to avoid risk/loss of capital. And while that means different things to different people (the relative risk level, I mean), maybe debt is something that would fit the bill better for you. MAYBE.

I'll toss an idea out that I'm looking at for yield/income. I'm looking at senior, medium term debt (bonds) on larger cap oil companies that have reasonably healthy balance sheets - but they've been beaten down in price. I don't know where the economy, interest rates, the stock market or the price of oil are going to be over the medium term. But I do know that firms will pay their interest obligations on senior debt before they'll pay dividends, if it comes down to that. Even if rates go up and the price of the bonds continues to fall, that's no different than the real value of your CDs being lower if rates rise, if you could sell them before maturity. But by staying with bonds that I'll hold to maturity (just like your CDs), I'll get the face value at maturity. If I pay less than face value now, then all the better.

The trick is to choose carefully (I don't want any speculative dogs that are already gasping for air) and I'm enlisting an adviser to help with this. I'm not going to plow all of my cash into this strategy, but I'll probably put 15-20% of my cash toward this. Then when I'm paid off in 4 or 5 years, I'll see what the landscape looks like then.

BTW, I'm also a great believer in real estate as a great creator of wealth and income. It's been the single best investment vehicle over the course of my life. But I fully understand your point. Most of my properties are several hours away from where I live now and they're all under management. But even then, there have been times when I've had to step in to address management issues. In the worst case, several apartments (that I never had a problem renting) kept getting reported as vacant. I found out that the manager, who I'd known for years and trusted, was skimming the money. I was in my 30's back then and at 6'3", still looked like I ate steroids for breakfast. After a surprise visit, that involved me taking two days off from work and making a longish drive, I told the manager about the corrective actions that I was considering, ranging from legal action and going after his license to "other things"... he decided to write me a rather large check and sign off on a contract cancellation. I didn't file legal action but I did have to hire a new manager... who got to hear how the last character was dealt with. She did OK, but I've had two more managers since her (people retire, move, die, etc.). Would I be in the mood to drive three hours and try to pull the Don Vito Corleone tough guy routine now? No. Would I want to do it at 80? Hell no! It wouldn't work anyway. So maybe the risk/reward of a sizable rental real estate investment isn't there for you. I don't have children to help me (having a sociopathic kid named Michael might be handy), so I'll probably sell out within the next ten years. I won't want the hassle either. But it has been a good ride.

So much for my "cool story, bro" diatribe. So anyway, maybe think about that bond/senior debt idea and tell me what you think. I'd like to hear from others who are thinking about income investments now too. What are your thoughts on looking at medium term senior debt in this environment?