I am generally a risk-taker, but having 5-10 years of nest egg is also a compelling idea. If it were my only 500K, it'd put 200K in CDs or something with limite

I am generally a risk-taker, but having 5-10 years of nest egg is also a compelling idea. If it were my only 500K, it'd put 200K in CDs or something with limited downside (assuming such exists). I'd put 200K in something more liquid but not crazy risky (eg a spread of stocks), again assuming such exists. The other 100K I'd use as runway to do my own startup, or the project (not startup!) of someone else I trust. From there, who knows? I'm not convinced it's a good idea to jump into startup angel investing with such a small (!) amount of net worth. If you can't participate in follow-on rounds your 10% of the company gets diluted to 3%, then 0.5%, then nothing much at all.