Bogleheads.org

The thing is I didn't know I was wrong about investing all this time.
I was in a midst of reading investment articles chasing the latest hot tips when Forbes had top financial web sites of the year listing.
I followed each one of them till I saw Bogleheads.org.
The rest is history...

This is funny...
I received the letter via snail mail from Vanguard today.

At work, we have non-person accounts used by the web system to the backend databases. The passwords for these non-person accounts don't expire. For the day-to-day login account, it has to be changed every 90 days. For my personal accounts, I don't change them often. I have several passwords so if on...

If there is no change in SS benefits, it would be over 50% if we take SS at 66.
However, we plan to take SS at 70, it should be even higher.

In 2008 I had never heard of Jack Bogle, and was 100% S&P 500. The only thing I did right at the time was not bail out, and continue making regular investments. Of course I didn't rebalance since I didn't know what that was and had no bond funds anyway. At some point during that nightmarish tim...

100%...

Trader Joe's.
They accepted my returns couple times.

After I max out on the $17,000 pre-tax and $5,000 catch up contributions last year (2012), I continued contributing several thousands more as after-tax contribution.
My employer doesn't offer the Roth 401K option.
Otherwise, I would have backdoor the after-tax contributions to Roth.

Today is a RBD.
It is not just the financial market.
Any tax owed must be paid today.

If you really need to reach your rep, there is also an option of setting up an appointment with him/her.
Most the time, if I've a question, I just him a secure message.
He will call me or response to my message the next day.

We e-filed our returns in March.
But, scheduled the payments in April.
We've been doing that for the last several years.
No more stress from doing tax returns in the last minute.

Our portfolio dropped by 1.4% today.
But, overall it is up 5.16% YTD.
Just checked my AA, it is not enough to do any rebalancing yet.

I don't remember any $100 dinner for the past several years. We go out 2 to 4 times a week, but mostly in the $30 to $40 range for two. Reading this thread, I realized that I should splurge once in a while. However, I need to find a restaurant that serves good vegetarian food instead of the same old...

For three millions, it is doer-able. According to Wiki, the maximum 401k contribution per year including after tax for 2012 is $50,000. For a high income person, $50,000 for 30 years would be $1,500,000. Even if the high income person contributes only $40,000 for 30 years, it would come out to $1,20...

Now, one of our kids is in college and the 2nd one will be in college next school year. When our kids were young, we both worked. There were several factors helped us to make the decision of keep working: 1. Our parents were willing to help out when our babies were infants. 2. We live close to work ...

Not yet… My oldest is a college senior and the younger one is a high school senior and will be in college next school year. However, they do know our incomes and some of the wealth because we had to submit FAFSA and CSS Profile for scholarship consideration. We plan to discuss our finance when they ...

We don’t have a budget either.
However, we do track our expenses through Quicken by downloading our credit cards and Credit Union transactions to reconcile them.

20 years is a long time to wait and it is not guarantee you will get it. I have a co-worker who was expecting several millions from his grandmother. But, when she passed away, he didn’t get a penny because the money disbursed amongst his mother, uncles and aunts. Instead of early retirement, he had ...

You're too young to consider pension.
So, for now, it should not affect your asset allocation at all.

I felt we can always do better.
But, life is good.
In reality, we're doing what has been expected.

It takes a lot of planning and years of dedication in order finally to answer the four questions correctly.
I think I'm ready to answer question # 4.

Well, when savings for colleges, plan for the worst, but hope for the best. With Common Apps, it is very easy for students to check the boxes of the schools they want instead of filling out applications individually. My kids did check some of those Ivy League schools and private schools in the Commo...

We do not qualify for any financial aid. But, we filled out FAFSA and CSS Profile for my son several years ago for merit scholarship consideration. We haven't filled out any form for him since his freshmen year even he receives National Merit Scholarship every year. My daughter is starting college t...

80.12%
We live in a good neighborhood, vacation at least once a year, two cars, two kids, one is a college senior and the second one will be in college next year.

The Vanguard CA Interm-Term Tax-Exampt Adm fund (VCADX) with expense ratio of 0.12% has YTD return of 1.04%.
And the SEC yield is 1.63%.
Sweet...

My wife cuts my hair.
My tipping would be giving her a massage or cook dinner for her.

I've been reading this thread for a long time... I ran my number on Firecalc, Fidelity Retirement Planner, Financial Engines, and Vanguard Financial Plan. I've got my number. According to all the calculators, my ending balance will be higher than the beginning balance in today's dollar if I retired ...

I used TurboTax for my Federal and State taxes too.
I count the # of pages if I print the pdf file.

0% - zilch

Ok - 1.6% for property tax

Just throw away the lawn chairs and stool in the front porch.
The clutters are gone and we feel much better.

TheGreyingDuke wrote:

biquet wrote:Flat fronts, no question. Pleats are an abomination.

+1

The year before the start of my retirement, I would: 1. Reduce all the debts to zero like paying off mortgage, car loan (if there is any), and no other consumer debt. 2. If my kids are still in college, I would make sure there is enough cash to cover the tuition. 3. At least two years' worth of livi...

Our target for international is 30% of the equity allocation.
According to Portfolio Watch from Vanguard, currently, it is at 29.1% of equity and they're all in Vanguard Total Intl Stock Index Admiral (VTIAX).

Doing my tax with turbotax now and having a question about foreign tax, etc. When I entered an amount for foreign tax paid in Turbotax, it then asked for the portion of income which is foreign income. For example, I invested in Vanguard total international stock. In my 1099-div, I got $1000 dividen...

Exercise… We run 5 to 6 times a week.

In 2012, we're averaging $1,346 per week not counting taxes and education expenses for a family of four.

All equities:
21-23-21
06-07-06
06-06-05

The general rule is to withdraw from taxable first, then tax deferred, then Roth. This allows your tax deferred and Roth to continue to compound. The Roth is last because it is not subject to required minimum distributions. However, this is not the best approach for everyone. One has to consider th...

I would use http://www.immediateannuities.com/ as one of the benchmarks to help me to make my decision.

I've a Yahoo email account so quotes of my investments are display on the my.yahoo.com screen.
So, I know the market and my investments' up and down every day.
However, I only download the quotes to my Quicken once a week to check.

Yes, if you have other properties such as a house, cars, jewelries, furniture’s, etc., you need a will preferably a trust.
Do you want your assets go thru probate and risk going to someone that is not in your wish?

33% of gross earned incomes with one in college.

I've lots of Apple stocks. :annoyed Based on the Portfolio X-Ray of my funds from Morningstar, I've $38,000 in Apple Inc. But, I only have $4,500 with Samsung Electronics Co Ltd. Portfolio X-Ray from MorningStar still shows me has $38,000 in AAPL. They must haven't been updated their database since...

This is a big milestone.
Congrats on your success.

Yes, I've 20% in small cap in my equity portion of allocation according to Vanguard.
US Stock Market is only 7.0% in small cap as stated by Vanguard.

Index - Vanguard REIT Index Adm (VGSLX) and VVA-REIT Index in my Vanguard variable annuity account.

That $10,000 annuity bought from an insurance agent in the early 90s.

Yes, I definitely will rebalance.
And it is not just rebalancing, there is TLH too.

We ran out of aluminum foil during Thanksgiving.
That is when we found out non-stick heavy duty aluminum foil can be washed and reused.

We keep 12 months of living expense in our checking/savings accounts.