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When you are talking about estate planning getting all your wills, beneficiaries, medical paperwork, term life insurance, etc in order is always a good idea but unless you have some special situation I don't see a big need for complicated estate planning until your net worth gets to be in the millio...

Here is a link to the posting guidelines that outline what information is usefull in being able to provide suggestions;

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=407

Be very careful about any of the "business" credit cards that some of the promotions are for.

The problem is that there are lots of protections for "consumer" credit cards but these mostly do not apply to business credit cards.

Further assume current tax-deferred savings of $500,000 and current taxable savings of zero. You are likely in trouble and shuffling the order of mortgage payoffs around will not make much difference. Even if you save some more and your investments grow to a total of a million dollar(adjusted for i...

It isn't law, or tax rates, change but lots of things could change in your life, career, or finances. T

The best thing to do is to diversify so that you are dependent on any one account type to be best.

Should they (a) apply all free cash flow first to pay off the HELOC in full, then to savings, (b) apply all free cash flow to prepay whichever debt is higher rate (currently the mortgage, but could be the HELOC if rates rise enough) until fully paid off, (c) apply all to savings, leaving the HELOC ...

Personally I don't like the idea of still having a mortgage in retirement even if the theoretical numbers seem to work out. There is always the risk that you could have career or health issues, or decide you want to retire early which could make it hard to handle a large mortgage payment each month....

a) take $51K lump sum It is sort of implied but I am assuming that this is really referring to taking a lump sum and rolling it into an IRA. Depending on how long you are between jobs then you may be in a very low or zero tax bracket this year so rolling part that money into a Roth would be worth l...

Any suggestions or other stuff to consider ? Also take a look at the Honda Fit too. I have one and I am very happy with it. It is small but it is very well laid out so it has a lot more usefull space then some larger cars. It is OK for four adults for around town driving and it sounds like you have...

Are these funds in a regular account or in a tax sheltered account (like an IRA)? If it's a regular taxable account what kind of capital gains do you have? What is your tax bracket? The loads you paid to buy the funds are sunk costs. Waiting to change your investments will not get that money back. ...

"Back to the future!" I have not used one in years but if you still have a landline you should be able to send faxes with most modems. If you have an older PC or laptop they might even have a built in modem that you could use. I just checked Newegg and they have USB modems starting at less...

With the likely tax complications of the company stock and the size of your portfolio finding a local fee only financial advisor, that charges by the hour, would be worth considering too.

You are doing great. The Bogleheads guide to investing is a really good beginners book so you might want to read that next. http://www.amazon.com/s/?search-alias=aps&tag=bogleheads.org-20&field-keywords=Bogleheads If you will be buying a house in the next few years that will give you lots of...

The model number is likely on a label inside the door of the dishwasher. It may also have the date of manufacture on the same label so you could get an idea how old it is. You can likely get a PDF of the owner's manual for that model on the manufactures web site. Look in that for suggestions and als...

One thing that you might consider is what the person who set up the trust would want you do in this situation. This could be the exact reason that the trust was set up.

If the trust is set up correctly, .... The tricky part is making sure that ..... Unfortunately the answer is it depends..... Pay attention to those comments. I know of a situation where it was done incorrectly, or at least not clearely right, and there was a big question about if all of the funds f...

Often one of the signs of an older person losing their mental capacity is that they manage their finances poorly. You might keep that in mind and see of your mother-in-law can get all the details of their finances and find out what their exact situation is. She might need to get a lawyer involved wh...

personally, I would dump that Nationwide fund yesterday ..... +1 on that In investing there are only three things you can reliably control. 1) How much you save or spend each year. 2) Keeping your investing costs low. 3) Your asset allocation. (Both the percentages of stocks/bonds/ etc and which ac...

One thing to watch out for is that right now the old 401K is clearly something that you accumulated while you were single. If you move it to an account you will be making future contributions to and you get married then in a divorce it could be considered something that would be split with your ex-s...

We just got back from a trip there in late April which was the end of their dry season. From what I have read August is in the middle of the rainy season which lots of people apparently enjoy but many of the roads there were pretty marginal even in the dry season so they would be very difficult in t...

Some people get their financial wheeling and dealing fix by focusing on how to get the most out of credit card rebates and frequent flyer miles. These are constantly changing so researching what the current best deal is to both get rebates and frequent flyer miles and the best ways to use them is an...

The high expenses really hurt the compounding over the long term, but compared to investing in a taxable account they can still come out ahead. The reason is that the earning on the differed taxes can pretty much cover the higher expenses. For example if you are in the 25% tax bracket and your choic...

So far, no one has shown any math. Ok lets assume you buy a $350K house with a $50K down payment and $300K 30 year fixed rate mortgage at 4%. To buy the house there will be various expenses for things like inspections, appraisals, loan origination costs, etc. 1% of the purchase price is probably lo...

Congratulations, I would give it a few months for all the paperwork to be processed but then it is good to double check with the county(or whoever records the mortgage liens in your area) to make sure that the mortgage was removed from your property title. I would do this even if you at a letter say...

Just to make it clear, my allocation goals currently are: 60% Stocks (60/40 Domestic/Int'l) 15% Taxable Bonds 10% TIPS 10% REITs 5% Commodities Your asking " Buy Munis or Payoff Mortgage?" is an incorrect question. You should be asking "pay off mortgage or invest in the above asset a...

From what you have said it sounds like you have a significantly negative net worth right now which concerns me. If you buy a house then with all the costs of getting into the house you could being near 40 by the time you get to the point where you have a positive net worth, if you value the house at...

You need to remember that the safe withdrawal rates are usually referring to being able to have a high probability of lasting 30 years. If you retired and put all your money under your bed and took out 3% each year then it would last 33 and a third years. Keeping up with inflation would make it a li...

You can likely buy a used or possibly even new RV type trailer for less than that.


Wherever you decide to put it will need to have electric, water, and sewer hookup which can be expensive to put in.

Why? Well for starters I find those who answer the phones at Fidelity and T.Rowe Price are often more helpfu on non-trivial questions . Also certainly Fidelity's web site is better. Of course its always possible Vanguard would raise the ER but things would not get better and that would not be good....

Watty: 15% Federal, and I am in NY (I think state rate is 6% or so). Right now, I invest enough in 401k to get full company match, and no more. I invest an additional $1500/yr in Roth IRA. I would love to hear peoples thougths about rolling money now from the traditional IRAs to the Roth IRAs. The ...

The problem is that you are just looking at one stock. Realistically you would have a list of 50 or more companies that you like but if they all have stock prices that are too high then you would just want to park your money someplace else and then research more stocks to expand your list or wait an...

I'm 30, married with 3 kids (maaaaaybe a 4th on the horizon). Wife works harder than I do on a job with horrible pay (a.k.a. stay at home mom) Annual income is good but reasonable (well under six figures). I'll save/invest around $15k/year in 401k/IRA. What are your state a federal marginal income ...

On the mortgage question... you can probably find a no-closing-cost option that still has a lower interest rate. +1 on that, assuming that you have really good credit and the mortgage is less than 80% of the homes value. If you have a fair amount of home equity it might make sense to refinance up t...

is this ESPP ? If its ESPP, you get 5% discount over six month period. Price is lowest of start date and end date or something similar, vary from org to org. ESPP is usually over six month period and you can sell immediately. There is almost guarantee positive return if you sell immediately. +1 on ...

As I recall second to dies life insurance is sometimes used in estate planning for paying large estate tax bills when there is a family owned business that people want the next generation to have. It is not clear that it would really make a lot of difference for your kids in the majority of situatio...

An hour isn't very long so realistically the best you can hope to do is to focus on why it is important and how and where to learn more. I would stick to the basics like; The power of compounding and why to start early. Compare starting retirement savings at 25 and 35. The effect of fees in investin...

1) Buy $2M basket of LPTs yielding 7.5% to 9% - distributions are partially tax deferred - so only pay tax on part of the income I would suspect that part of the reason that it is not all taxed is that part of the money that is paid out each year is actually your principal that is being returned to...

He is 24, in the 28% bracket, and has been contributing to a Roth. He has three questions: 1. What if you have a pension? If he has a pension that, when received after retirement, automatically put his income at the 28% level, he cannot pull out of any Traditional retirement accounts at < 28%, corre...

We're going to try to do the remodel ourselves ...

Go for it then.

Do be sure to get all the needed permits and inspections.

That is very doable if you are on a very tight budget or doing the remodel yourself but realistically you will likely not save that much since you will probably need to buy some basic tools. A couple of laborers that are used to doing labor like that and know how to do the demolition can likely take...

ruralavalon wrote:I would use the same funds, but more bonds.

+1

See these wiki entries

http://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Three-fund_portfolio

http://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Lazy_Portfolios

The downstairs neighbor is combining two apartments. I did the exact same work several years ago...

That is probably why they are interested in seeing your apartment, to see how it turned and to get any suggestions about what problems to avoid or what things you would have done differently.

Pay off the student loan and the car loan and then redo your numbers. They are relatively small and short term so even in the best case if you are able to keep the money invested elsewhere and earn some more, the difference will only be a couple of hundred dollars a year after taxes if everything wo...

So, I was thinking of rules for buying a first house.

If he is old enough to buy a house then he old enough post his question here himself.

Sounds like you've already got your mind made up. So why are you asking for opinions? My original question was whether there was anything for me to gain by allowing them access (at least that's what I intended and thought I had asked). In other words, I wanted to know if I was overlooking a reason ...

Its performance over the past five years averages to 4.8% a year. That’s not far from what I would expect it to earn, on average, between now and 2040. It wasn't clear but if he is talking about a 4.8% real (inflation adjusted) return then that sounds like it probably a reasonable guess. You need t...

There are mutual funds that have set or targeted asset allocations that will automatically do the rebalancing for you. If you can find something like a Vanguard Life Strategy or targeted retirement fund then that might work for you. https://personal.vanguard.com/us/funds/vanguard/LifeStrategyList ht...

"Do unto others ....."

Letting them in for a few minutes one evening while you are there could save them some grief and would have minimal impact on you. There is no telling when you will need some favor from them or when they could make something difficult for you.

(a) minimize any used vehicle risk by going with the brand new Toyota or Honda I don't know if I would say it was because of risk, but for me it was just because used ones were so expensive I decided to buy a new Honda a few years ago. At the same time I sold my nine year old Toyota with 130K miles...

Lots of questions like these can be turned around to get a different perspective. What if someone asked you; "I have $7000 sitting in the bank, should I buy a used car just so that I can have it for these occasional uses?" Most likely you would think they were crazy, but it is the same que...