Take a look at ING's Sharebuilder (www.sharebuilder.com) - it allows you to do automatic investing. You select the stocks/funds you want to buy, how much you want to invest, and the investment schedule. This allows you to automatically deduct a small amount of $$ from your budget and put it in the markets. For a long term strategy, I think this works well, much like a 401(k) that takes a set amount from your pay each check and invests it.