Bogleheads.org

A like all the strategy here to minimize tax on a traditional IRA during retirement. Why wouldn't this work? I plan to fully fund my 401k and roth every year and spend the rest leaving none in taxable. At retirement with 0 income can't I just convert my whole traditional to a roth at once and be pay...

I learned a lot here, thanks. And I did get the near instant trading to work with VBS. I realized I was missing one big thing though. I thought I could TLH based upon YEARLY losses of a fund, not the cost basis since initial purchase. So while VWO is down slightly this year, its still up since middl...

I have a VBS account and all my taxable funds are ETFs in here. But I don't see how to exchange funds to avoid the 3 day period. I only see the option to buy, sell, or trade but for all of them my funds available is essentially 0 (from my money market).

Great replies livesoft, thanks.



MoonOrb,

Right, its just assuming average returns and there is risk. Looks like livesoft says you can negate most or all of this risk

I trying to quantify how much a fund must drop before it is worth it to tax loss harvest. In particular there are at least two costs to tax loss harvesting that I would like to quantify. Those costs are the bid/ask spread and time you are out of the market (usually 3 business days minimum on Vanguar...

I hope I can ask two dumb TLH questions here. How do I know if my TLH for this year "worked"? I have a loss in capital gains this year so I'm assuming thats partly because of TLHing. The losses were over $3k. How do I know if these carry over yearly? Is this something Vanguard automaticall...

Wow, interesting. Will probably go with traditional from now on.


I convert my SEP IRA to a ROTH this year. I was a full time student so hopefully this was smart.

Thanks, that makes sense. I thought the whole marginal tax rate argument was too simplistic.

Does this logic apply to Roth vs Traditional IRAs too? Roth seems to be much more preferred here but I can't figure out why.

Great replies. Thanks. I just got an email today saying my company will soon be offering Roth 401ks. I assume this is (usually) clearly the best case? This is really good news for me. Will probaly save hundres of thousands in taxes. I'm 27 and converted my SEP to a ROTH last year, plus this ROTH 401...

I have plenty in my general investing account to try this for a few year if its worth it. To me it appears to be a tradeoff between tax savings now and higher expense ratios for many years. If i max out my 401k contributing ~17k I save ~$3200 in taxes a year. But then I have to invest in my companie...

Thank you for the clarification.

I was confusing things in my head. Between my SEP and my Roth I will put the funds with the highest expected return in the Roth. This is what I was thinking of. Emailing my CPA about a conversion. Thanks!

Thanks for the great reply. “How much are you looking to contribute each year?” I’m looking to max out each every year. I’m a self employed online poker player but with it being blocked in the US now my income from this has drastically decreased and is more uncertain. After this year it will be very...

It just came to my attention that my SEP IRA is actually a tradition IRA, unlike my ROTH. I have about 90% of my tax sheltered in my SEP now, but that will change. Soon all of my contributions will only consist of me maxing out my ROTH. I'm guessing since the traditional IRA (SEP) is taxed at withdr...

Are you guys buying similar funds during the 31 day waiting period? In the wiki example cash is held but I don't see how this can be better. I'm guessing for ETFs the bid/ask spread might negate any value but for indexes this seems superior. Now I see that you can trigger a wash sale if dividends ar...

Thanks for the great responses I learned a lot. When you get to a TLH opportunity and do it, you will be wondering why you thought it was so difficult when you find out how really easy it actually is. This is reassuring. The basics seemed easy after rereading the wiki. Good to know. _______________ ...

Can I do this more than once per year for each fund? I understand it might not be worth it once exceed $3000 in benefits. The bogleheads wiki example shows a repurchase of the identical fund. I've read elsewhere the fund can be similar but not identical. I'm looking for clarification. I had plan on ...

Thanks for all the great replies. I am looking into everything mentioned. I have been having trouble finding the tax costs of these funds. Is table 1 near the bottom of this site the best estimate? http://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Principles_of_Tax-Efficient_Fund_Placement If thats true my funds from ...

One question I forgot to add:

Can I buy the ETFs on Vanguard or do I need a broker account for this? If I need a broker account, how to I transfer funds from an IRA on vanguard to a different company?

The matrix of this portfolio is this, with a 60/40 international split: 12/13/12 15/13/9 10/8/8 for comparison, the US total market: 25/24/23 6/7/7 3/3/3 VEA 10% - All world xUS tax-managed VSS 30% - all world xUS small cap (includes 25% EM small cap) VWO 20% - emerging markets (0% small cap) VMVAX ...

I thought this was fascinating, at least in theory.

No one else? Is this simply too impractical?

Enhanced indexing: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enhanced_indexing Dimensional Fund Advisors does this but not for individual investors, although I believe they have some ETFs. What are peoples thoughts on these? Are there more options out there? I am having trouble finding them. Non market cap index...

The ETF vs index fund calculator is here: https://personal.vanguard.com/us/faces/JSP/Funds/Tools/FundsToolsEtfCostSelectionContent.jsp I must have only looked at Emerging Markets previously which have considerably higher costs in an index, probably due to purchase fees in this sector. Index fund app...

Thanks for your reply. I should have mentioned that I am 26 and not concerned about any additional risk assuming it brings higher returns. Of course I am in this for the long run of 35+ years minimum. What brought me to this decision was a finance course I took. I'm looking to switch from a total st...

Excellent PDF from Yale professors about this: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1139110 Assuming they are correct in that borrowing money to invest while young will reduce risk and increase return, I am wondering the best way to go about this. They recommend buying calls on S&P...

Age 26, 200k to invest. Trying to maximize risk/return for the next 40+ years. I expect returns of the rest of the world in these sectors to surpass those of the US.

60% - FTSE world ex US small cap - VSS
30% - Emerging markets - VWO
7% - US small cap value - VBR
3% - US mid cap value - VOE

I have 200k invested that I'm looking to move to the follow sectors: 55% world small cap ex US, 25% emerging markets, 15% value ex US, 5% US micro cap. Currently 50% is in an SEP IRA and I expect my future contributions to be mostly weighed to this tax deferred account. US micro cap - DFSCX Intentio...