Bogleheads.org

kayak.com also shows trends and recommendations. That might help a little.

[quote="technovelist"][/quote]

Thank you for the answers.

I'm not sure of the definition of "gold bug", but I do keep a significant proportion of my assets in gold. I'm not too concerned about this drop, as I expect the price to continue its decade-long rise as soon as all of the weak hands have been shaken out. None of the reasons for that rise...

I use Yodlee (moneycenter.yodlee.com) to reconcile my YNAB. I looked into Yodlee as a Mint alternative before I started using YNAB. How do you like it? Coming from someone that already uses a full fledged budgeting software, does it do anything that Mint doesn't do, or that it does better? I've nev...

First let me say I believe whole heartedly in indexing with Vanguard funds and have a 50/50 asset allocation. Retired in 2002 and know how much I had in total in my IRA and investment accounts at the end of that year. Know how much I have taken out each year in the form of RMDs and profit taking on...

i don't do charts well they always seem to scrunch up. if you want to know take a piece of paper. number left to right 62 t0 90. then under this firsrt line 23000 each yearstarting at 62. second line -STARTING AT 70- 16000 per year-you are now receiving 39000 total(23000 plus 16). line 3 starting a...

I don't think so. I got a letter in the mail (USPS) as well.

although you get more absolute dollars from ss the op has a point. say your 62. you get 23000 yearly at 62 next to the 62 you also put the figure eight years is worth(184000). so each year until 70 you get 23000 from ss and this is 23000 you don;t have to take out of your savings. so at 70 you've g...

Rich in Michigan wrote: I'm not double counting. At age 79, my lifetime accumulated SS payout is the same regardless of whether I started at 62 or 70. However, there is still the 200K hole I referenced that was used from the nest egg between ages 62 and 70. At age 79, I am even on SS and going forw...

roymeo wrote:Well, your plan of moving to VTSAX is good. Good luck with the timing of when.

I thought that the OP was in VTSAX all along using the self directed brokerage option in the 457b. The only thing is that the asset allocation was 100% VTSAX with ZERO% in fixed income/bonds.

Last Thursday I pulled the trigger and liquidated all of my mutual funds in both the 457 and the Roth. I'm up about 40-50K over the last 6 years, and I just couldn't bear to be the idiot holding on tight during the next reversal. I decided to lock in my gains and hold my funds in cash until I see a...

Usually, the numbers 20-25% are relative to gross income. People define net income in some many different ways. How do you calculate yours?

It's almost been a year since I last refinanced. At that time the best rate I could get with no closing costs was 3.5 %. I've been waiting and rates have not dropped significantly since then. Maybe that will be the lowest I can ever get. You never know.

We are approaching our mid 40s as well. I have been reading Zwecher's book as well and am intrigued by it. My main problem is that so much is unpredictable and there are many scenarios. The biggest variable is the amount of social security income we will get at age 70. This can provide a significant...

I have a possibly related question. I apologize to the OP for digressing. Due to some mixup, my escrow balance is negative. My mortgage lender has offered me two options -- 1. Make a lump sum payment for the negative amount 2. An extra monthly payment would be added till the escrow impound account w...

Bertilak, Some of what you say is indeed true. In a strong bull market which returns more than you expected for the VA path, it will definitely have a lesser total accumulation than DCA. However, that is not the goal of the VA strategy. Once you have reached your goal using the VA method, it is no ...

Bertilak, Some of what you say is indeed true. In a strong bull market which returns more than you expected for the VA path, it will definitely have a lesser total accumulation than DCA. However, that is not the goal of the VA strategy. Once you have reached your goal using the VA method, it is no l...

Thanks for all the responses and tips. - I have decided to put aside the amount in online savings accounts. One thing to check out before locking that decision in stone. I did that (no escrow account) on a refinance ten years ago and at the closing was hit with an "escrow waiver fee" of $...

This is for the safety of the technicians who may be working to get the grid back up and running. It's not just about safety. Grid-tied systems use special inverters that lock onto the power company's AC signal (60Hz in US). When utility power goes away, these inverters can't product output because...

... The alternative is to use the PV panels to generate your own electricity, storing it in batteries and using inverters to get the AC. It's a bigger upfront investment, but you're making your own electricity and so you're not dependent on the utility company or subject to brownouts, blackouts, po...

No. I don't think/believe that benefits outweigh the cost when you consider payback and actual effect on the "environment". When you consider the manufacturing, disposal/"recycling" and payback, it just doesn't make cents (not an error). So many times we make decisions that &quo...

OP,
Search the forum. There are a number of threads that discuss VA.

I only started to put serious money starting in 2008. Before that my accumulations were not a whole lot.

4.

In Tax Advantaged:
-----------------------
CREF Stock
TIAA Traditional
TIAA Real Estate

In Taxable:
--------------
Vanguard Total World Stock Index (VTWSX)

I'm in the process of doing exactly that (refinancing from 3% to 2.625% with no costs). We will save about $1,100 in interest this year, which is very much worth the three hours in total that I will spend on it. I will do it again when I can get 2.25% with no costs. I'm at 3.5% (30yr fixed) and am ...

My only concern, is if it would be considered tacky considering modern US sensibilities? Not sure what sensibilities might be offended. For wedding gifts down a generation (uncle/nephew for example) I have always thought a check was the best gift of all. The gold coin is a near cash equivalent I su...

livesoft wrote:I must be an anti-picker because 3 of the 4 picks in my Fiscal Cliff Joy hedge fund have lost money this year and the 4th pick is up only 0.1%.

I love your choices Is there a prize for the funniest fund name/picks?

I have done a few Refi's recently with First Internet Bank. In every case, I got the estimated HUD the day before closing. I always insist on seeing it. I tell the closing agent that they can certainly save time at closing if I get the documents before. That has always seemed to work. Can you contac...

On my Mac, I use an application called Moneywell. It works great for budgeting and tracking as it has the ability to download transactions from your financial institutions just like Quicken. It uses the envelope budgeting system.

BTW, this is one very minor concern I have about the CREF Stock. The domestic-to-international split can and has changed due to the somewhat active-managmently nature of the fund. In the past, my understanding is that it did contain much lower international -- perhaps as low as 10%. Thank you for y...

VT -- The updated portfolio you posted is really close to what we have. The only difference is that I do not have any Inflation Linked Bonds. The 10% for the ILB goes into the Traditional as well. BTW, this is one very minor concern I have about the CREF Stock. The domestic-to-international split ca...

A portfolio of 45% TIAA CREF Stock 15% TIAA international 10% TIAA RE 20% TIAA Trad 10% TIAA inflation linked bond Hi VT, Do you mean CREF Stock at 45%? If so this already contains about 30% international. Then adding an extra 15% international would make the equity holding about 50% international....

At the moment we save reasonably aggressively as we have jobs paying decent salaries. Personally, I do not feel that I am sacrificing much. Most of our savings gains have been due to two people working instead of one. We have kept our lifestyle creep to a minimum and lived like we did in the past. O...

You want to avoid the access funds entirely because of their high expenses. TIAA did this a few years ago to charge smaller retirement plans more. If you stick to the basic 10 annuity options, all the expenses are about 1/2% (other than real estate). Here are some simple portfolios in order of fund...

As everyone says, you may have to verify the source of any large deposits into your bank accounts in the three to four months before applying for a mortgage. I have heard that some mortgage underwriters are so nitpicky, that even something as low as 5k has to be explained.

Thank you all for feedback. It really helps to get unbiased advise. Will look into a 15 year term with some pay down and try to keep in lower tax bracket while cashing in. One other concern was being "bank of dad" if we had the back up money. If we used the cash to pay down mortgage it wo...

I'm at 75% consistently. I'm 26. What % of your income goes to taxes such as federal, state, FICA? 18% (no state income tax). EDIT: I guess that doesn't really make sense does it? I think I was eliminating the taxes from my calculation. My non-tax cost of living is about 22.7% of my gross pay. Taxe...

Kriegsspiel wrote:I'm at 75% consistently. I'm 26.

What % of your income goes to taxes such as federal, state, FICA?

So let's say you were about to purchase 1K of VTI on Monday but you got all tied up in meetings and whatnot and couldn't get to your purchase until tuesday at which time the ETF VTI just happened to have a RBD drop of 2.55%, .. You don't think that would help you have more pennies in your pocket do...

ETF = VWO What if it kept going up and up for 60+ days? What would you do? If you are dealing with a usual BH AA, wouldn't that be unusual? I think examination of most charts of (VT, VTI, VWO, BND, TIP, etc) review a 60-90 day period when you could buy the same for price than many days prior. Is th...

xram wrote:

rr2 wrote:

xram wrote:ETF = VWO

What if it kept going up and up for 60+ days? What would you do?

Well then my AA would probably be satisfied and I wouldn't need to buy any additional shares I'm guessing.

Would you then hold on to the 5k in cash or just invest according to your AA?

xram wrote:ETF = VWO

What if it kept going up and up for 60+ days? What would you do?

I have a budget but it is more used to track expenses more than anything. The categories are very general and limited: Home includes mortgage PITI, utilities, minor maintenance plus extra principal Groceries includes personal care items, paper products, etc Dining out includes coffee, pizza, sandwic...

One useful thing with looking at 30 year bond prices is that they are often correlated with 10 year bonds. These in turn are connected to mortgage rates. So if you are getting a mortgage or refinancing today would have been a good day to lock interest rates. 10 year is not connected to mortgage rat...

One useful thing with looking at 30 year bond prices is that they are often correlated with 10 year bonds. These in turn are connected to mortgage rates. So if you are getting a mortgage or refinancing today would have been a good day to lock interest rates.

I come from a different country where male children are favored and females are looked down upon. My maternal grandfather had 9 children -- 5 male and 4 female. He left 40% to one male child, 20% each to 3 other male children and nothing to the rest. The worst was that my grandmother got nothing. Sh...

Do lawyers not use template based software as well in order to insert all the "gobbledygook"? Yes. At least, I did. There are probably lawyers who completely write their own wills from scratch and use their own language as a template for other wills. I wasn't one of those. And, of course,...

I just wanted to provide a follow up post. I asked an attorney to review the Will and Revocable Trust documents I cobbled together from older documents and a friend's document. She returned it with more red ink than I have seen on a paper since junior high. I told her to incinerate my old documents...

I am a lawyer who, at the beginning of my legal career, prepared hundreds of wills, some trusts, and other estate planning documents for military members, retirees, and their families. ... I'm not pleading with anyone to avoid using the will-creating software. But, there is some risk to it, especia...

jd88 wrote:38% of Gross at 24 & I think I'm doing extremely well, but bogleheads always finds a way to give you doubt

This is fantastic. At your age all I was saving was about 10% in an emergency fund. It took us to the mid 40s before we exceeded about 40% saved.