I do not think we can give you any specific advice on which particular stocks you should buy. However, I personally recommend dividend paying stocks, namely dividend growth stocks which have excellent dividend history. If you look at some of the great candidates then you will see that these were the companies which were increasing the dividend during 2008 recession. What does it tell you about the business which performs well during the recession so they can increase their dividend instead of cutting it? Well, it tells me that if a company does well in recession, it will excel in prosper time even more.

So, go to a dividend aristocrats list, or David Fish CCC list and look for aristocrats or champions, study those stocks and pick those which fit your criteria or you can familiarize with their business and the ways they make money. For example, Michael Baum started buying water stocks. I think it is not a bad idea and since I bought my water stocks, they already doubled in value and keep paying nice and increasing dividends.

As far as investment strategy and time horizon, well, people always over estimate their short term ability of investing and under estimate their long term achievements. The fact is, that people who tend to go in and out of the positions lose money in the end or significantly under-perform the market. More over, the high quality dividend stocks are turtles. They are huge and move slowly (you can look at their annual dividend growth which usually equals to the stock price annual growth, so if you see a stock which increases their dividend at 3% annually (average) you may expect 3% price increase annually (yes, there may be times when they may speed up, but also slow down). So trading in and out will not get you anywhere. Thus definitely, long term investment.

Consider your stock holdings as a money making vehicle, or a rental property. You buy a rental property and then rent it out. You do not buy and sell it next month, right? Well, why should you do the same with your stocks? Use your stocks as a rental property and rent it out, or in other words, monetize your holdings. How can you monetize your stock holdings?
 

There are three possible ways:
 

1. collect dividends
2. sell cash secured puts to buy the stock and collect premiums
3. sell covered calls (overwrite your account) ideally to prevent assignment, and collect premiums
    

If you do it right, you may be able to collect about $20 to $30 every three months on dividends (depending on a stock and amount you hold), plus about $20 to $40 dollars every month selling options around your positions monetizing them. My account where I do this averages about 30% to 45% annual returns doubling my account every 3 years…