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I receive a royalty check every year for a few hundred dollars and pay self-employment tax on it. I have a 6 figure job in which I max my personal contribution to 401k every year and get company match as well as profit sharing. My total contribution this year was around $42k, will be maxed this year...

So if I am able to a tIRA "rollover" into my 401k (which is a combo or pretax and after tax dollars) provided the plan rules allow, is it possible to only rollover the "after tax" money directly into a Roth, followed by rolling the rest back out into a traditional? Sounds too go...

If you already have a basis in your TIRA as documented on Form 8606, there are only 3 ways to eliminate it: 1) With RMDs and other distributions over your entire remaining lifetime that drains the accounts while you are still alive 2) Converting the entire balance and paying taxes pro rate to elimi...

Is it possible to do student loan consolidation? I did mine years ago, when interest rates were much higher than today, and got a much lower rate than you have, but not sure if these consolidations are still available. I made the mistake years ago at figuring I can get a better return on investing t...

3. If my plan allows it, and I do take in in-service distribution of my after tax money into a Roth IRA, will I have to pay taxes on a proportional basis since I have a tIRA (similar to if I did a back door Roth with 2012 tIRA dollars)? Not if the money goes directly from 401k to Roth IRA. Yes, if ...

Thank you everyone for your thoughtful replies. So to summarize what I have learned, I am maxing my 401k contribution every year and getting a company match. My company is adding another $25k plus every year as employer profit sharing, up to the max (I think $50k). I want to get as much money out of...

I contribute to the tIRA every year at the max (all after tax dollars), am no longer converting to Roth because of the high tax rate. My tax rate is 35%, maybe higher this year. Let's get back to this tIRA. If all of the contributions are after tax (non-deductible), there should be little tax if yo...

My 401k contribution is about $50k per year, I now realize a significant portion is after tax dollars. The fact that your 401k is filled to the $50k limit does not necessarily mean those contributions between $17k and $50k (using last year's numbers) are "after-tax employee contributions"...

The more I learn on this forum, the more I realize I don't know!!! I recently started a thread on my overall asset allocation, and one of the issues I am having is that my 401k plan has relatively high costs, but it is my largest yearly contribution. I have read more on this and realize this is beca...

JW Nearly Retired- thank you, correction made.

YDNAL- Thank you for your suggestions. You don't think it is worthwhile to have holdings in a REIT ETF?

Here we go, I hope I didn't miss anything. Emergency funds- 3 to 6 months Debt- 500k mortgage 4% 100k HELOC 6% 50k misc school loans, car 4-5% 500k commercial property 5%- I am now a partner in my business, most principal partners own the real estate, and our rent pays the mortgage + 10% extra princ...

I would like to keep a 40% bond allocation in this account as the account is now 45% of my retirement funds, and will grow much faster than my other investments. What about the other 55% of your retirement funds? Are they in IRAs? Each time I have left an employer, I have rolled over the 401Ks to a...

I am working on my post with the total portfolio, written up in the appropriate format, but I wanted to ask for basic guidance on my 401k bond fund options first. My 401k is my "least efficient" investment (i.e. high costs), but it is also my fastest growing as it receives more contributio...

Thank you both for your responses... I had no idea that the bid/ask number didn't matter when people weren't actually trading!

I am getting serious about asset allocation, using David Swensen as my main model, and have no foreign stock exposure. I am trying to keep it simple, using an ETF Total International fund, and I like the ER of Vanguard's (VXUS). 1) The BID-ASK spread looks high to me. Does that matter? Is there a be...

I sold equities a few months ago, some due to concern with the cliff (knew it would not be settled by now), and partly because of the concerns about people cashing in long term gains while the 15% long term gains tax was in effect, particularly with Apple. Only problem is, not sure when to get back ...

Aloha Taylor, a nice story, thank you. What regiment were you? My grandfather was the Chaplain of the 502 PIR, Raymond "Chappie" Hall. Merry Christmas! HonoluluGator: I was in the 502 Parachute Infantry Regiment. Chappie was a very brave and caring Chaplain. You can be very proud of your ...

Aloha Taylor, a nice story, thank you.

What regiment were you? My grandfather was the Chaplain of the 502 PIR, Raymond "Chappie" Hall.

Merry Christmas!

If he really wants to hold gold, shouldn't he be buying the real thing and not an ETF? When the Zombie apocalypse hits, the ETF gold is going to do him no good. I'm pretty new to all of this, and I say that only partly tongue in cheek. My wife is alive today solely because her family had enough gold...

dhodson wrote:
The above mentioned plan is a group plan and it will have the same limitations. Stamping guardian on the name does not improve it.

Thanks! Just what I wanted to know.

I can't find the exact details of the Guardian group policy, but it is referenced on the paperwork as G-00458022 which (through Google search) appears to be a standard Guardian group policy for professional organizations such as Florida Medical Association, Florida Bar, etc. The above replies indica...

I am a physician who has "maximum" coverage for my salary through NWMu. I just received a mailer from my state medical association offering group rates through Guardian. Also, I just found out I am also covered by a group plan at work, which I think is through NWMu. I was considering switc...

downshiftme wrote:My "advice" is that this is too much house for you. A 680,000 loan on your incomes will rule your finances forever.

I second this opinion.

So basically you'd want to put $3k into each of two funds, one of which would be driven to zero and the other to $6k. OK... so fund one is a loss of $3000/ Fund two is a gain of $3000, but no taxes on it due to the losses of one. At the end of the year, for your initial investment of $6000 you now ...

Forgot to mention... I use both PC and Mac, and also iPhone/iPad...

I am looking for software to track my financial status over multiple different accounts at different banks, to include checking, savings, 401k, IRA, mortgage, etc. I want to be able to look at one place to see where my money is, what the value (and earnings) of my investments are, what my asset allo...

Most of my "cash" allocation goes to my home equity line of credit. It is therefore a liquid asset that earns me 6%.

Most of my "bond" allocation goes to pay down my first mortgage. I see it as a 4% return.

When I pay both off completely in a few years, I will re-allocate.

It has been 20 years, but worked through high school and college in a pool supply store... will do my best to remember details. 1. Use liquid chlorine once a week for your shock treatment. The pool grade is stronger than the laundry grade, and generally any cost savings of laundry grade is negligibl...

It is negotiable, but the "best" agents won't accept it, as another poster mentioned. The last time I sold, I got the best agent in the town, paid full commission, but used other ways to save some money. For instance, the agent did all the legwork for minor repairs, touch-up, and new appli...

For a common phone, the repair kits on Amazon are dirt cheap, and there are YouTube videos on how to do it.

Also, with the advent of the popularity of the iPhone (and the ridiculous Apple repair costs), independent repair facilities are now everywhere. Your town probably has one.

bc you are getting a guarantee interest rate on the cash surrender value. Assuming no loans, you fully paid the premium etc then the csv should be going up at that rate at least. The csv is usually zero for a few years. The actual return on a whole life product meaning the death benefit from all th...

I think the original poster has a great idea. Change the tarps yearly, and use last year's tarp to cover the cars on blocks in your front yard or to wallpaper your outhouse. Or, you could use the tarps you now use to cover your collection of velvet Elvis paintings (or your 37 year old collection of...

Somewhere in that meeting, this was probably said as well: "You are guaranteed a 4.5% rate of return, without the risk of your money ever going down/backwards " --- Am I right? Yes, that is correct. I'm pretty sure that is one of their training techniques, because everyone that I have spo...

Mandrale wrote:
Somewhere in that meeting, this was probably said as well: "You are guaranteed a 4.5% rate of return, without the risk of your money ever going down/backwards" --- Am I right?

Yes, that is correct.

I think the original poster has a great idea. Change the tarps yearly, and use last year's tarp to cover the cars on blocks in your front yard or to wallpaper your outhouse. Or, you could use the tarps you now use to cover your collection of velvet Elvis paintings (or your 37 year old collection of ...

For the OP, I have been pitched permanent life insurance many times by a Northwestern Mutual agent, and I bet the pitch you are referring to is from them as well. The one thing I keep coming back to is he guarantees a 4.5% rate of return, which sounds great for a "conservative investment."...

gd wrote:I have no financial advice to give, just wanted to comment that it's nice to read an inheritance thread where, for once, all that's being discussed is the best way to do a profoundly decent thing.

Amen.

OK, so have followed this thread and links, and getting more confused all the time. I am in my 40's with a 3 year old child, possibly another on the way. I just started a 529 (Utah) and the grandparents plan to contribute to it. IRA's may be some back up money to fund her education. There is no stat...

1. Which company does the 401k representative work for? 2. Who would you use for recordkeeping and administration? 3. Would index funds that cost not more than 0.07 to 0.25% per year be included in the menu? Which index funds would be used? 4. Do you have a list of all the costs involved? Am asking...

Our company has met with a 401k representative who would like us to switch our 401k's to him, and he primarily wants us to use American Funds as our investments. It appears these are higher cost than Vanguard, but am interested in people's experience with American Funds. My opinion is Vanguard is be...

Someday a cool, better search engine will emerge, and the masses will never “google” something again. Remember when you used Yahoo, then before that Excite, and before that AltaVista? Just a matter of time before Google is added to that list. Could be tomorrow, could be a decade, but it will eventu...

nisiprius wrote:

Thanks for that. A picture is worth 1000 words, and the chart really cleared up some misconceptions I had on bonds.

this is interesting. As far as noise goes it's harder to get more noise than Apple. In fact a year ago I posted this -- > http://www.bogleheads.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=70569 I pointed out that every day, without fail we could see one or more stories about Apple. At that point the stock price was ...

Their performance in bonds over 1 and 3 years seems pretty average. Their lower costs would normally mean that a high percentage of their funds would outperform, as happened over 5 and 10 years. Anyone know a specific reason for the 1 and 3 year numbers. It could be something mundane like being gro...

Remember, the question was only about capital gains tax, not gift tax, although some posts did mention it. The OP mentioned a gift and then the $10,000 in Apple stock. I wasn't clear if the Apple stock is the whole gift or if the gift is $25,000, of which the Apple stock represents $10,000 worth. T...

rr2 wrote:Some countries (like the US) tax your worldwide income. Does the country where your sister is a resident not have capital gains tax?

They don't have capital gains.

Update... this scenario is perfectly legit, you can gift stock and no one pays the capital gains as long as their home countries tax code doesn't charge it. My scenario hit a bump though when Firstrade just informed me they won't allow a person from Cambodia to open an account (although they will le...

MySpace was a pretty hot thing until Facebook cam along. What happens to Facebook stock when the next website trumps it?

Thank you, and thanks for your great replies on my first thread as well!