[journalctl]

I see this a lot online, but this is not good advice. Savings are meant to provide liquidity in an emergency. If you have $20,000 in a savings account, you can walk to an ATM and withdraw some of that immediately. If you have $20,000 locked up in mutual funds, well... you’d better hope your rainy day has some lead time.

Investing is great. Put $10,000 in something diverse and passive and sit on it. But also keep a savings account for immediate emergencies, and keep some cash on hand for even more immediate emergencies.

[novok]

Yes, that is called an emergency fund. I didn't want to go into a big explainer of how a typical pre-tax & post-tax index fund savings brokerage works + cash emergency fund in savings works to a random on the internet while there are many other better resources out there.

[sokoloff]

I can wire money out of my Vanguard (mutual funds) account before 4 PM today and it will be in receiving bank tomorrow mid-day.

I can withdraw money from my ETrade or IB margin accounts using the debit card that came with those accounts (or write a check on them), same as you can with a savings account.

I do keep a few thousand at a local bank and have a separate checking account at USAA that I use for most daily/monthly transactions, but that's for convenience not access/liquidity reasons.

[gowld]

What emergency requires $20K in less than a week? A kidnapping?

[journalctl]

The number was illustrative. If it helps, feel free to imagine a different one.