08- 3-05, LearnTexasHoldem:

Building A Bankroll

Question: Here is my problem of the week - I kinda know how much money you should have for a certain level of games. What is a good way to build up a bankroll when you have limited funds on a week to week basis? (quite simply put, I'm married).

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So when I get paid I'll deposit $50 or $100 online and then play NL or PL $25 tables...I've found that this really isn't enough money to play this stake, even though it's the lowest stake for those games online...$100 can go pretty fast at even a PL 25 table - I love playing live games, but the lowest around my parts is $3/6 which I can't play comfortably with under $250 in pocket - I can't seem to find the time to invest playing micro limit online.

I probably get about 5-8 hours a week to play online(marriage does these things-lol) I was thinking about maybe just putting the $100 month in for a couple months until I have enough to play...But of course as soon as i have any money online, I go play it immediately. Do I just need to stay at low stakes until I can build up a bankroll to play with? the low stakes games are so frustrating - especially limit games - I feel like I have skills enough to play well at the games I like - I just find that I play timid, cause of bankroll issues -

thanks
Paul

Answer: I'm not sure if I have any answers that will solve this problem. I can understand that you don't want to spend a soigné amount of time playing tiny limits (what's the point?), but if you don't have the money, I think that is your only option. A lot of people might laugh at sitting there for 8 hours and making $20 at online poker. What they don't realize though, is that when you play low limit poker, the primary goal isn't the money.

Your main goal is to eventually build the skills and bankroll so that you can play at good sized limits where you can make real money ($1000 or more a session). This takes time. I think the main advice I can give you is to play more. You mentioned that you only play about 8 hours or so a week. Granted you don't want to spend your whole life in front of the computer playing online poker, but only 8 hours a week is pretty light. At that rate it will take you a long time to get anywhere. No matter how well you play, earning money via poker takes time.

The more time you put in, the more money you make. You can't force it. Now, as for whether or not you should stop playing and wait till you have more money to invest, I'm not sure what I think about that. My first thought is, why do you need to take a break from the small limits? Wouldn't you make more money by playing and saving that by just saving alone? If you are losing at the lower limits, you need to spend more time on strategy.

Two or three times, I've stopped playing poker for 6 months or so and I've spent my bankroll. When I come back to playing, I don't start from scratch again; I invest enough of my own money so I can play reasonable limits like before. Would I recommend this for you? Maybe, maybe not. If you want to play $50 NL online instead of $25 NL, ok, but I wouldn't recommend making a big jump in stakes if you haven't consistently beat the lower limit.

My next thought is that it will be difficult for you to play well if the money is an issue. A healthy bankroll gives you both confidence and security. My guess is that if you save up money and sit down at a larger limit, you'll be sweating too much. The worst thing that can happen in poker is that you sit down at a table without enough money, get cleaned out and have no way to build again at the same level. My advice is just play it safe so you can stay in action -- I would say that to anyone at any level.

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