Bogleheads.org

Thanks for posting this and bringing up the topic of what to do with extra income (taxable investing vs. mortgage payoff). Prior to starting a taxable account we sent a little extra money toward the mortgage every month which felt good. Since opening up a taxable account a year or so ago, most of th...

From the point of view of someone who works retail & may be on the other side of that cash register, we are annoyed about the extra work, but you are far from the only one who does it, if that makes you feel any better. My company often has coupons that generate based on specific purchase, e.g. ...

Larry Swedroe's book "The Only Guide to a Winning Bond Strategy" had an insightful chapter on the unique risks associated with mortgage-backed securities and how in most cases they outweigh the small return premium. Definitely a recommendation for beginners/intermediates who are interested...

I add to the taxable account once every 1-3 months, typically after paying the mortgage & credit cards for the month and seeing how much extra is left. A lot of people are anti-average-cost-basis, but for me, someone who is adding small amounts regularly, reinvesting dividends, and doesn't antic...

How do i know if my 401k has good investments? One of the sections in the template listed above gives a space to list investment options. Very smart people on the board will be happy to give their $0.02 on the options, but again, the best option/options for you will depend on a lot of other factors...

My mother just sold a couple of her late mother's paintings on eBay and the process seemed to go pretty well. They were a couple of original oil paintings by Kipniss (no idea who he/she is but apparently it is a pretty well-known name in the art community). Both sold for above what my grandma paid f...

I am in the accumulation phase and plan to add to my taxable account on a regular basis, for me I plan to just rebalance with new money, as opposed to selling some funds to buy others. In my case, I prefer the ease of automatic reinvestment, as well as the ability to keep my new money "in the m...

I know a lot of people consider any taxable investment accounts they have almost like an emergency fund, in that they can pull out of it if/when they need it, but you do run the risk of having to pull money out at a time when the market may be down (which in many lines of employment may be when layo...

Unfortunately, the general public would not know half of these answers. :( Count me among that general public as of a year or so ago, makes me feel good to see what I have learned in the last few months, thanks in no small part to the people on this site. I may be more of a consumer of knowledge on...

I just finished Larry Swedroe's bond book a few days ago, and while I know a lot more about bonds than I did before I read it, I didn't come away with a strong urge to move from Total Bond Index to anything else. There are definitely certain people for whom certain indices can be argued (i.e., TIPS ...

And if French Laundry will just take my reservation one of these days, then I can join the >$100 dinner club. If you (or any others on this thread) want to know the secret to getting reservations there send me a message and I can explain the trick to you, worked the first time I tried it. DEFINITEL...

Eating out is the one thing that the wife & I splurge on pretty regularly (although we try to limit ourselves to 1 per month). We take a lot of heat from our friends about it. But we also don't have cable, both drive 12-year-old cars that we bought used, go on vacation maybe once a year, and gen...

90% stocks at age 45 seems high to me even as an investor with a very long-term time horizon; I am surprised the line stays that high for that long. Maybe it's just because I'm hoping to save like a madman for long enough that I will be starting to eye retirement around that age.

There has never been a 30-year period in the US in which the stock market has lost money. Theoretically, this could happen. But, it is extremely unlikely. The philosophy of long-term investing is just that, that over the long term (i.e. decades) your money will grow. Not based just on what happened ...

I found an old paycheck on there for me. Only a couple hundred dollars, but I'll take it. Of course, from that point I spent the next several hours on the Illinois website, looking up everyone I could think of. Found 2 friends with unclaimed property too. Love being the bearer of good news! https://...

A lot of credit cards will give you year-end statements with stuff broken down into categories, which makes it easy to figure out how much you spent on essentials, and how much on stuff like vacations and nights out. Since we charge pretty much everything, my wife and I looked at the last 12 months ...

First , you should be indifferent to interest-rates changes if you are willing to hold your bonds equal to their duration. If wiser posters are correct, this means that if interest rates drop, you will be worse off until you reach the duration, but better off after you exceed the duration (because ...

Funny you should mention Lucent. My dad works for Lucent and he probably could have retired 5 or 6 years ago if he had exercised/sold his options at the right time, so I guess maybe that is somewhat playing in the back of my mind.

Thanks for the input all. I did think about (after executing my first batch of shares, of course) the potential tax implications. My wife and I are close to the phase-out period for a Roth IRA so at the very least, an extra $1200 of ordinary income could put us into the phase-out. I don't see either...

I am new to this stock option thing so if I am missing something, let me know.

Isn't that kind of the same as holding the stock, i.e. betting that the stock in question will do better than the market as a whole? If I take the money now and invest it in, say, Total Stock Market, any gains I make in the next 7 years would eventually be taxed as capital gains. If I wait the full ...

I work for CVS/Caremark, and every few years they award nonqualified stock options. I have exercised one in the past, and I just took it as a same-day sale, pocketing about $1200 after taxes, which is taxed as regular taxable income. I just looked at it as a bonus paycheck. My question is, is there ...

I hold 46% of my equities in U.S equities, since the U.S stock market represent 46% of the global market. Wouldn't you expect this percentage to change over time? Surely that number has gone down in the last few decades (i.e., US market share has declined). Just playing devil's advocate, but if nex...

Do you have student loans, or will you have them in the near future? Not sure what the going rate for student loans is these days, but it has got to be substantially more than what any money market funds will offer. Something to consider for future planning..

On a related note, I just finished reading " The Four Pillars of Investing, " there are a couple sections that are pretty heavy on math and theory that you kinda have to take a sentence at a time, but overall was a good read if you are up for that. If you are new-ish to reading investing b...

If you like the allocate-it-yourself strategy, in a few years you should have enough money in your retirement accounts to be able to do a 3- or 4- fund portfolio using less expensive Admiral shares with Vanguard. Until then, the Target Retirement fund is probably your best bet. In tax-advantaged acc...

We were recently in a similar situation, my wife got talked into buying some very high expense-ratio mutual funds (nearly 2%) by a Chase broker a few years ago. B shares have surrender fees that go down by 1% every year over the course of 6 years, but once the surrender fee got down to 1% it made mo...

You should choose Medicare PART D plan based on the following criterion: Plan that is the lowest TOTAL annual cost that covers all your drugs (with no usage restrictions: Step Therapy, Prior Authorization and Quantity limit) . Speaking as a pharmacist, this an important distinction that I know gets...

It has been great to read everyone's responses on here and see the various ways people calculate the "number" (or not). After reading through, it makes me feel OK at age 29 to not really have one. Especially with the uncertainty of expenses that children throw into the mix if we decide hav...

As a couple of posters above have mentioned, does anyone have a recommendation of a good source (book, online, or otherwise) for actually calculating "THE number," and how to get there in terms of annual savings and current investments? Obviously a lot can change between now and then (espe...

4.5% front end load and a 1.5% expense ratio. I would say that this "adviser" did not have your best interest in mind! Get your investment money out of there ASAP! Transfer everything to Vanguard or Fidelity and research your investments before committing! We just closed out some Chase mu...

I am the same age as the OP and was fortunate enough to make it through accelerated undergrad & pharmacy school in 6 years. Now the wife & I are getting serious about the accumulation phase (we enjoy a very expensive dinner out a few times a year but other than that live very frugally). Havi...

livesoft wrote:Unfortunately, I cannot get a chart for 2 years into the future.

When you find that chart can you post it for us on the forum? Thanks!

My advice would be to stick with living at home as long as you can, especially if you are thinking about buying a place in the next few years and saving up for a down payment. Living with your parents can be a drag (at least sometimes), especially when your friends have their own places. But once yo...

My wife and I are close to the limit or at least the phase-out period too (depending on a couple random tax things we are still waiting on) and my tax guy basically said just to wait until everything is figured because it is way easier to but it in later than to put it in earlier and have to try to ...

Thanks for the thoughts! My 401(k) has Vanguard index funds available for most asset classes, so as of now I have 2 similar-looking portfolios in terms of allocation, 1 in a taxable account and 1 in my 401(k). It sounds like in today's market, moving bonds into 401(k) isn't super imperative, but ass...

I found the "Principles of Tax-Efficent Fund Placement" Wiki helpful:
http://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Principles_of_Tax-Efficient_Fund_Placement

Am I correct in assuming that the tax advantages of holding bonds in tax-advantaged accounts would typically outweigh the drawback of a higher expense ratio? The only bond fund that my 401(k) offers is PIMCO Total Return Instl Index (PTTRX, ER 0.46%). I have room to move all of my bond allocation th...

We recently refinanced to a new 30-year mortgage to take advantage of lower interest rate (went down from 5.5% to 3.25%) and get rid of our PMI. So, didn't "load up" but restarted the 30-year clock with a much lower payment, with the intent of using the savings to invest more.

The PIMCO bond funds seem expensive but according to the wiki, bond funds should go there first and the Roth accounts as an alternative. i can re-balance in my 401K... PIMCO Total Return Fund Institutional Class PTTRX (0.92%) If this changes your thinking at all, PTTRX has an ER of 0.46% according ...

Have been wrestling with the idea of more complex vs simpler portfolio too for a while. Lots of books seem to tout the slice-and-dice approach and weighting small-cap and value stocks a little heavier. There is a lot of pretty in-depth (read: above my head) info on threads here about the debate of &...

Either way I would encourage you to do SOMETHING with that giant chunk of cash. Probably not getting a great rate of return sitting in a savings account. I am accepting donations for my beer fund if you REALLY don't know what to do with it..

Was just in a similar situation (put a big chunk of money toward mortgage or invest it). Read thoughts & analysis from several sources. Ric Edelman is all about carrying the biggest, longest mortgage you can because you can invest and make a higher percentage in the market (probably) than you pa...

I recently just joined a different club (the positive net worth club) after aggressively paying down my student loans for 3 1/2 years, and am always inspired by stories of people who are at a different stage than I am. It helps me "stay the course"! Am a couple years ahead of you..it isn'...

I prefer to have my assets broken up a little bit by class. Depending on who you listen to, there is some evidence that small-cap stocks may outperform overall market in the long run, so if you are planning on being invested long-term, it may give you a modest benefit. If you just want to set 1 allo...

I am more of a console gamer, but if you are looking for "thinking person" adventure games, the Portal games and Braid are must-try games. Definitely both made me think in ways that I have never had to think before, in or outside of a video game. Neither are huge time or money commitments,...

Just read somewhere that more millionaires drive Camrys than any other car. So to all you fellow boglehead Camry owners out there, things are looking up..

Driving highway 1 south from San Francisco is a very scenic drive. If you can make it down to Big Sur the drive is beautiful. An earlier poster mentioned the restaurant Nepenthe down near Big Sur, food is just OK but the terrace has an amazing view overlooking the ocean. If you are heading north, we...

No cable for me either, I spent my cable find paying taxes on my REET/RIGHT/R-E-I-T fund. I overanalyze investing enough as it is without adding Jim Cramer's thoughts into the mix.

Asked and answered- thanks