Most people can make money in a bull market -- it's what you do in down markets that can make or break your long-term returns. Will you panic and sell everything? Or will you do the opposite: hold on for dear life and possibly miss the fact that one of your properties or stocks has truly taken a turn for the worse and will never recover?

I tend to lean toward active holding. That means not selling because of price drops but paying close attention to what's going on with all of your investments. I have a mixed portfolio of stocks and real estate, and I'm also proactively increasing my reserves, analyzing when I would sell my investments, and averaging into growth stocks. Here's a look at each of these actions.

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Source Fool.com