Strategy. Under normal circumstances, the Fund intends to invest at least 80% of its net assets (plus the amount of borrowings for investment purposes) in companies that are important to the economic development of rural America. The Fund primarily invests in equity and fixed income securities of U.S. issuers. The Fund considers an issuer to be important to the economic development of rural America if the issuer satisfies at least one of the following criteria: 1. Rural economic factors - the issuer has meaningful economic exposure to a key driver of rural American economy by either normally deriving at least 10% of its total revenue from, or having at least 10% of its annual capital expenditures made and/or committed to, one … Show more… Under normal circumstances, the Fund intends to invest at least 80% of its net assets (plus the amount of borrowings for investment purposes) in companies that are important to the economic development of rural America. The Fund primarily invests in equity and fixed income securities of U.S. issuers. The Fund considers an issuer to be important to the economic development of rural America if the issuer satisfies at least one of the following criteria: 1. Rural economic factors - the issuer has meaningful economic exposure to a key driver of rural American economy by either normally deriving at least 10% of its total revenue from, or having at least 10% of its annual capital expenditures made and/or committed to, one or more of the sectors listed below, or other sectors that Homestead Advisers determines to be key drivers of rural American economy: Agribusiness value chain agriculture equipment, chemicals, food & beverage Infrastructure development broadband telecommunication, water infrastructure, road construction, waste management Industrial transportation rail, trucking, distributors Consumer products and services rural retailers, restaurants Financial services banks (based on loan breakdown and branch locations), financial exchanges (based on trading revenue associated with products integral to the rural economy), insurance (based on net premiums written for rural areas) Healthcare providers (providing healthcare to rural areas), payers (members based on rural areas), animal health (providing services to livestock) Technology enterprise software (providing software to rural banks and rural merchants), payments (providing payment processing to rural banks and rural merchants), automation (for example, providing automatic farming equipment) 2. NRECA cooperative service areas - the issuers headquarters and/or material business operations (at least 10% of the issuers physical store or branch locations) are located in one or more zip codes serviced by one of National Rural Electric Cooperative Associations (NRECA) cooperative members. 3. U.S. Census Bureau or issuer definition - the issuers headquarters and/or material business operations (at least 10% of the issuer's physical store or branch locations) are located in rural areas, which the Fund defines as (i) a county where at least 50% of the countys population is in an area considered rural, as defined by the U.S. Census Bureau, or (ii) an area that the issuer has represented that it considers to be rural. The U.S. Census Bureau currently defines rural as all population, housing and territory not included within an urbanized area or urban cluster. In general, urbanized areas include areas with 50,000 or more people and urbanized clusters include areas of at least 2,500 and less than 50,000 people. The U.S. Census Bureau also considers density (the density of people per square foot in a single block), land use (land cover and impervious surfaces) and distance in order to determine what is considered an urbanized area or urban cluster. The Fund may invest up to 20% of its assets in instruments that do not have exposure to rural America, within the criteria described above, primarily including U.S. Treasury securities; corporate bonds; municipal bonds; asset-backed and mortgage-backed securities; common stock and preferred stock (fixed maturity and perpetual); other investment companies, including open-end funds, closed-end funds and exchange traded funds (ETFs); commercial paper; and money market securities. The allocation of the Funds investments across equity and fixed-income asset classes can vary substantially from time to time. Under normal market conditions, the Fund seeks to invest 30-70% of its assets in each asset class. Homestead Advisers expects to allocate the Funds assets in response to changing market, financial, economic, and political factors and events that the Funds portfolio managers believe may affect the values of the Funds investments. For equity securities, Homestead Advisers follows a bottom-up approach in selecting stocks of companies based on its fundamental research and consideration of variety of factors, such as a companys business, potential earning power, financial ratios, competitive advantages, and the experience and qualifications of the companys management. The weighted average effective maturity of the Funds fixed income portfolio, under normal circumstances, is expected to be between three and ten years. The Fund may invest up to 15% of its assets in securities rated below investment grade (securities rated below BBB- by Standard & Poors Corporation or its equivalent by other Nationally Recognized Statistical Rating Organizations (NRSRO)) or unrated securities judged by Homestead Advisers to be of comparable quality. Corporate bonds and other fixed income instruments rated below investment grade are high yield, high risk bonds, commonly known as junk bonds. The Fund may invest directly in secured or unsecured loans or invest in loan assignments or participations, and may invest in mortgage-backed and other asset-backed securities. Show less