Where to put $5,000 now

What would you do with a million bucks? That's easy. But what about five grand? With a handful of broad goals in mind, here are Money Magazine's picks.

Best career moves:<br>Hire a mentor
Goal: Building wealth
Best career moves:
Hire a mentor
That's right: Pay someone who has occupied the job you ultimately want - preferably a retired legend who has no axes to grind - to meet with you every couple of weeks.

You can find potential mentors at industry conferences or through your professional association.

Your mentor shouldn't be a friend, lest things get awkward, but she can be a powerful ally, using her industry contacts to help you out.
If you see a mentor twice a month at $100 an hour, $5,000 will pay for more than two years of help. By then, you shouldn't need one anymore.
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Most stock quote data provided by BATS. Market indices are shown in real time, except for the DJIA, which is delayed by two minutes. All times are ET. Disclaimer. Morningstar: © 2018 Morningstar, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Factset: FactSet Research Systems Inc. 2018. All rights reserved. Chicago Mercantile Association: Certain market data is the property of Chicago Mercantile Exchange Inc. and its licensors. All rights reserved. Dow Jones: The Dow Jones branded indices are proprietary to and are calculated, distributed and marketed by DJI Opco, a subsidiary of S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC and have been licensed for use to S&P Opco, LLC and CNN. Standard & Poor's and S&P are registered trademarks of Standard & Poor's Financial Services LLC and Dow Jones is a registered trademark of Dow Jones Trademark Holdings LLC. All content of the Dow Jones branded indices © S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC 2018 and/or its affiliates.