Good game plan, and I think you're starting at the right time. I'm 30 myself and just starting to get into the gravy of understanding to trade. I am trading - but very small and less risky. I will suggest that you either trade small or do paper trades so you don't learn the hard way (aka by blowing past your $5K in a day or a week or a month). I am in a very similar situation overall. I'm limited due to a day job, and have found RobinHood to be my broker for swing trades. I pick up on the dip to

* I pick up on the dip towards the beginning and end of the days, and decide within the next day or two when I want to exit. It helps avoid PDT rule, but I'm also missing out on day trading opportunities. Start small and slow - is my biggest piece of advice to you at this point.

@ScrawnyB I've only recently started using robinhood. I like the convenience of easy on the go trading with my phone, but I'm finding the PDT rule to be limiting. What has your strategy been to make a profit but avoid going over PDT? It seems like I end up missing out on a lot of good profits because of it

Swing trading. I am going to move to RobinHood Gold soon so I can buy pre-market and after-market. I'm also thinking about developing my own alerts app for android. that's my current biggest pain is not being able to manage set price alerts.