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OK, so here was the trick for all who are interested. I was able to follow the interview in Turbo Tax related to paying my Nanny. I was able to take information from her W2 to answer the questions - which eventually turned into the Schedule H which needs to be filed. What I didn't realize, immediate...

Got an email from OptumHealth Bank indicating that they are removing the following funds in 30 days: Federated Master Trust Money Market FMTXX Federated US Govt 2-5 Year FIGTX John Hancock Classic Value PZFVX John Hancock Money Market Fund JHMXX Mainstay S&P 500 Index Fund MSXAX Thornburg Value ...

Not sure about the original post. I've been in Wellington with Optum HSA for several years now and the minimum cash balance is $600. It had been $500 but was recently increased. http://www.optumhealthbank.com/using-your-health-savings-account/investment-opportunities/~/link.aspx?_id=1D796CABD39341B...

My company switched from JPMC HSA to Optumhealth HSA this year. I was pissed, as we had just started with JPMC last year and now we had to learn all about the twists and turns that a new custodian would provide. As most of us know, cost is not at all straightforward when it comes to HSA. With JPMC w...

+1 to livesoft's reply. I find myself having no problem (what so ever) saying NO to actively managed equity funds. However, when it comes to PIMCO Total Return, something weird happens to my brain. Here is a recent example: My wife started a new job this year and we will be able to start contributin...

Hi Folks, I use GTM as my payroll service for paying my Nanny and handling quarterly tax payments. My understanding is that a Schedule H and Annual FUTA contribution need to be filed with my taxes. Has anyone here used Turbo Tax to handle these filing before? GTM provides a "End of Year Tax fil...

I would use total market index,so you don't miss mid cap index and tilt 5% or 10% small cap . John I would suggest considering the use of the Extended Market Index to tilt exposure capture of the mid and small cap indices. Only problem is and I haven't researched this, you are likely to have larger...

2006 Volvo v50 T5 AWD ~65,000mi
2012 Volkswagen Jetta Sportswagen TDI ~5500mi

Go Wagons!

Thanks Pennstateclj1. We would be selling the condo for sure. This is straight upgrade. Also, this isn't so much about "downpayment accumulation", but rather about tax efficiency, balanced against time horizon. Unless we are totally off base about what we will be paying for a single family...

Hi Folks, My wife and I own a 2br condo near Boston. We have a 1yr old and may have another kid in the next few years. At which point, we will want to move out of our condo and buy either a single family home or a larger condo. This is one of the largest financial unknowns we currently have: where e...

Hi Folks, My employer is switching HSA custodians (JPMC to OptumHealth.) I currently have money in JPMC from my 2012 contribution. They are telling folks who have money in JPMC that they have two options 1) Keep the money there, but incur a $3 per month account fee which our company had been paying ...

34 years old. Holding ~34% in bonds. 50% nominal, 50% TIPS (percentages of total holdings, not just FI) Vanguard Inflation-Protected Secs Adm VAIPX 16.61% - Retirement PIMCO Total Return Instl PTTRX 10.97% - Retirement Vanguard Ltd-Term Tx-Ex VMLTX 3.62% - Taxable Vanguard Interm-Term Treasury Inv V...

VTMSX - Tax Managed Small Cap is designed to be held in a taxable account. In theory, the fund throws off less non-qualified dividends than VSMAX will. I hold VTMSX in taxable. At the end of the day, however, you will probably end up holding both if you are diligently looking for opportunities to ta...

$65,000 in 2000 and living in the Bay Area.

Hi Everyone, My wife just started a new job and it offers a good, inexpensive PPO plan which would mean less out of pocket for us. Her starting a new job is considered a "qualifying life event" with my company, thus I can drop her from my health insurance. We are currently enrolled in a HD...

My wife and I just put down a deposit for a 2012 Jetta Sportwagen TDI w/ Sunroof. We currently own a 2006 Volvo V50 T5 AWD and would have just bought this car again. However, Volvo has stopped making wagons and we were forced to face the current market with very few wagon options. The TDI test drive...

This blog page shows how to approximate Total Stock Market using multiple funds generally found in 401ks: http://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Approximating_Total_Stock_Market You can got to Morningstar is plug in the Institutional Index (which is the S&P 500), the Mid-cap Index and Explorer and look ...

We're using the Vanguard Nevada 529 plan for our 6 month old daughter. We are currently contributing at 50% TSM 25% TBM and 25% TIPS. Our plan to rebalance annually to a new target allocation; each year the amount allocation to equities will drop by 2%. Thus, at her one year birthday, I will rebalan...

legendary, I'm going to take a different tack here without knowing your full situation. If you are in biglaw, there is a good chance that some aspects of your life kind of suck :) Knowing first hand as a husband (widow?) of a biglaw associate, I can see how demanding, stressful and soul-crushing the...

Congratulations on scoring a job with big law. My wife graduated a few years ago and went to work for a big law firm. Her job is outstandingly demanding and I'm not exactly sure how much longer she will be in her particular position. There have been a lot of very good suggestions in this thread. One...

I like in Brookline and can provide some thoughts on the Boston RE market. First off, you will notice vastly different prices based on where you want to buy. There are some Boston communities which were hit hard by the housing downturn (Roslindale, Dorchester, etc ...) and others which barely missed...

Should there be a tax planning consideration to this investment? My understanding is that the first $900 of her income is exempted from taxes. An otherwise tax inefficient investment (junk bonds, REITs, high unqualified dividend equity funds etc ...) could result in a larger return than if you were ...

I guess the question is: what is she saving for?

Retirement?
A pony?
College?

Time horizon matters as to how the funds would be invested.

Like many accumulators who hold most of their bond allocation in their 401k, I have very few choices for investment. My hope is that in a raising rate environment, Bill Gross will do the right thing - given that Pimco total return is the only bond option in my 401k :) I hold a small amount of bonds ...

I intend to purchase either the admiral share mutual fund or the ETF of: - Vanguard 500 index - Vanguard Extended Market Is one share class better than the other? It has been said here before by folks more knowledgeable than me ... The construction of the Extended Market Index makes it rather tax i...

Redemption fees are usually based on the amount of the sale and $171 is closer to 1.5%. Perhaps the difference is caused by something else? Alan, only a portion of the shares sold were purchased in the 60 days preceding the sale. Other shares were older and thus not considered for the 2% redemption.

I'd call up Vanguard and have them send you a corrected 1099B that includes the redemption fee. Did Vanguard report the cost basis on the 1099B? If yes, did Vanguard add the 2% to the cost basis? The 1099-B did not include cost basis information. I guess 2012 will for this fund, but 2011 did not. I...

HI All, I received my 1099-B from Vanguard for my taxable account. I made one sale which involved exchanging Total International for FTSE All World ex-US to take advantage of some TLH back in September. This turned out to be a good move, as the fund was pretty close to the low for the year. On the 1...

My wife and I usually spread our contributions out, but not this year. Due to some unique circumstances, we decided to take advantage of the ability for my wife to contribute 75% of her pay and bonus to her 401k until the max is reached. Her bonus pays out in late January, so by the end of this mont...

Quick update. My company surprised us this week and announced they would allow for a one time lump-sum contribution (pre-tax) to our HSA. The result is that I will likely have a pay check or two of zero post-tax dollars, but I will be able to fund my plan in January - instead of over the next twenty...

One child, almost three months old! Started my Vanguard 529 (Nevada) with the $3000 opening balance and have been contributing $500 per month plus any cash gifts. People have been asking what she "wants" for Christmas. I sent all of them a UGift invite! My goal for 2012 is to contribute th...

Unfortunately the option of doing a lump-sum contribution does not exist with my employer. I asked about this at our benefits presentation.

Thank you for the replies. Yes, cost-basis is something I should have been considering as part of this conversion.

I did in fact file a Form 8606 for the non-deductible IRA contributions (totaling $10,000.)

With today's down market, I may have some more time to think about this. Thanks!

Thanks mhc. So I believe you are talking about making a post-tax contribution to an HSA (instead of through payroll deduction.) I understand that at the end of the year you can deduct those post-tax contributions from your taxes. However, the difference is that when making a pay roll contribution, t...

My company is offering an HSA plan for this first time this year. I plan to contribute the maximum amount ($6250) for our family in 2012. As others have said about most HSA plans ... the choices are rather lousy and expensive. After saving $2000, we can starting investing in these options at a cost ...

Hi everyone, My wife (32, me 33, in the 33% federal tax bracket, MA state taxes) opened a Traditional IRA in 2010 (actually, we both did.) She has contributed $10,000 (2010 and 2011 max.) The value of the account is now ~$9600. We opened the tIRA accounts because our income limits were too high for ...

Call your local ASPCA or animal hospital. They can give you the best guidance and connect you with any local organizations (or work with you directly.)

Cats are the best and they need homes.

So what about the 60-day frequent trading policy from Vanguard? My understanding is that if you sell VTSAX, you won't be able to buy it again for 60 days. I've read here, but haven't tried myself, that you can get around this by placing an order to buy or exchange back into VTSAX through the mail. I...

My wife and I were in a similar position when she was applying to Law School (a good amount of savings, not enough to pay for tuition, needing loans, targeting Tier 1 schools.) She ended up going to a top 20 school and we did a mix of loans plus "out of pocket" spending. This included payi...

hsv_climber wrote:I'd consider Educational IRA for the first $2K of annual college investment in this situation.

I believe we exceed the income limit for contributing to a Coverdell account. I've read that the limit for 2011 is $220,000 for a married couple.

Thanks.

Thank you everyone for the helpful feedback. Based on a very rough, non-professional, calculation assuming your $6000/yr contribution increases by 3% per year (inflation) it looks like you would need around 7% nominal returns / 4% real. Do you feel those numbers are way off to the extent that you wa...

Hi All, My wife and I are having our first baby in September. Over the past few months, I've been reviewing 529 plan options and I've come up with a plan - which I'd like to share for review. Some quick things about us ... - We are both early 30's and figure we have about 18 years until we'll need t...

If you look at the holdings, ITT is now ~15% GNMA bonds (since 3/31/11) If you are concerned about raising rates, moving to a shorter duration will lessen the impact on NAV. Consider that for each 1% in rate hike, you may see a 1% drop in NAV per year of average effective duration. You may have noti...

rrosenkoetter wrote:.
.

They do still have that 2 month lockout to stop frequent trading though.

Isn't this true with most Vanguard Funds? Does the trick involving sending your trade request by mail still work to get around the 60 day lock out?

Exciting news. Effective April 28, the 1% redemption fee on sales of shares held less than five years will be removed for the Tax-Managed Balanced, Tax-Managed Capital Appreciation, Tax-Managed Growth and Income, and Tax-Managed Small-Cap Funds. Vanguard Tax-Managed International Fund will continue ...

Thank you Larry and others for your comments and helping to increase my understanding of these investments. With this change to the Treasury fund construction, the net affect is that now 3-4% of my bond investments (which were once in Treasuries) are in these GNMA and other Government mortgage bonds...

Isn't it the Vanguard Intermediate-Term Index fund that is often suggested in this forum as a suitable choice those who wish to avoid mortgage-backed bonds completely? Or, it would appear, almost completely, anyway... Distribution by issuer (% of fund) as of 03/31/2011 Inter-Term Bond Index Inv Ass...

HI Everyone, First off, I've been reading this site for about six months and it has been so eye opening and educational. This is my first post! Based on suggestions I've read here, I rolled over my previous employer 401k into a Vanguard IRA. Part of the reason for doing this was to purchase the Inte...