First it is important to understand that those are big subjects and will take you a while to get a good grasp of. There are also many ways of looking at those subjects and they do not all fit together in a nice package. Here's a start for you.

1). Wait until you can put 20% down on a personal residence. Make sure the payments are not a stretch and try to keep your emotions in line. Buying a home is more an emotional than financial decision. When you add in the costs to keep the property up, such as maintenance and property taxes as well as interest payments, it is hard to believe you come out ahead. Now the emotional joy of having something that is yours is very nice.

2). For investing, start slow use fake money before losing your own. MarketWatch - Stock Market Quotes, Business News, Financial News, the wall street journal, Welcome to Investopedia.com and Morningstar Stock, Mutual Fund, Hedge Fund, ETF Investment Research are all good places to learn about investing and what is going on in the world.

3). Traditional planning does not help you understand all of your risks, including the risks of fiat currencies. Make sure you go to The Rational Investors > Home, RunToGold.com — Monetary science applied to current events focusing on the role of gold and silver.. and GoldSilver.com - Buy Gold & Silver Online - Gold & Silver Charts, Graphs & News as well to understand the big picture and the risks not everyone will tell you about.