Bogleheads

Do you have a large unrealized loss in Large Cap ETF? If yes, that would be a good reason - tax loss harvest. Are you familiar with tax loss harvesting?

Here's a link to the Mother of All Tax Los ...

I zeroed out a few accounts in 2008 and received 1099s from those institutions (mailed and available online). If there was activity that has to be reported to IRS, they will send you the 1099. How l ...

Income tax on conversions can be deferred to 2011 or paid over more than one year, no?I believe that's a special rule for conversion done in 2010.

http://www.fairmark.com/rothira/expand.htm
Income ...

If you carry a credit card debt at 8.9%, that costs you 8.9% after tax. Paying down that debt reduces or eliminates that cost so it's like a guarantee return of 8.9% after tax.

If you choose to in ...

I've recently wondered this as it applies to Target Retirement funds. It would seem more beneficial to rebalance periodically rather than daily. If you rebalance bonds to stocks every day during a d ...

I agree with pshonore. It is better to pay the conversion taxes using money that's outside the IRA.

Here are some things to consider:

1. How much are you going to convert? If you're going to c ...

You can use Morningstar's Portfolio X-Ray to give you more detailed information about your portfolio. TRowePrice offers access to these tools for free. You don't need to have investments with them, ...

The 23K of credit card debt at 8.9% is a concern. Paying down or paying off this credit card debt is a risk free after tax return of 8.9%. There is no investment available today that can give you th ...

Useful information would fund names, tickers and expense ratios for the 457plan. It may be helpful to see what else you hold in other accounts and if you're married what options are available in the ...

Natureexplorer, thanks for that link. I like the graphical display of the ETF premium/discount to NAV.

WorkToLive, Welcome to the forum. You should take some time to decide what stock/bond mix you'd like to use. This is the most important decision you need to make. Once you have that, it is relative ...

So the losses are capped at 3000 to offset any gains? I thought (so much for thinking) that the offsets would first cancel gains/losses and then there is $3000 on top to lower the tax bill.

Will h ...

Yes, it is true.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_gains_tax_in_the_United_States

Your capital losses can only offset capital gains. If you still have a net loss after you offset your gains, y ...

Is there something a bit more abridged that will give me at least some of the requisite "education" or knowledge so I can begin figure out what allocation might be best for my situation?

...

Dude, Welcome to the forum. You have come to the right place. Here are some links to start you off:

Investment Planning:
http://www.bogleheads.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=6211

Asking Portfolio ...

Hi Scorpion, Here's a link for "More Ways to Research Funds" which has that ETF vs mutual funds comparison tool and many others.
https://personal.vanguard.com/us/funds/tools

My posts here have been to suggest that you can can pay down your debts and growth roth space as well by shifting some of the emergency cash reserve into the ROTH so that you will have a constant 6 mo ...

Good points raised by retiredjg and nisiprius.

My posts here have been to suggest that you can can pay down your debts and growth roth space as well by shifting some of the emergency cash reserve ...

Here's a link showing the difference in the two share classes of Berkshire Hathaway:

http://www.berkshirehathaway.com/compab.html

A share of Class B common stock has the rights of 1/30th of a sh ...

For individuals whose first dollar of investment income is their first dollar of income, using the top marginal tax rate in many of the above analysis makes taxes more punitive than they actually are. ...

DSInvestor,

I understand your data but not sure I get your point? Are you saying that the 5 yr tax cost ratios are incorrect? Sia, Let's use your assumption that the addition of ETF share class ma ...

I disagree with the comments about missing an important opportunity with the Roth because it will only be three years of lost Roth. The savings in interest will make up for the lost money.

I don't ...

sia, Neither fund distributed capital gains distributions last year. Here's a vanguard page for 2008 Qualified dividends.
https://personal.vanguard.com/us/planningeducation/taxcenter/PEdQDIfinalCo ...

BRK may not be in the S&P 500 but it's in TSM. See:
https://personal.vanguard.com/us/FundsAllHoldings?FundId=0085&FundIntExt=INT&tableName=Equity&tableIndex=1

It's halfway down the ...

Would six month of cash reserve be around 24-30K? I'm estimating around 2600/month for the two mortgages, maybe another 1000/month for prop taxes, utilities, insurance etc. Then you have other loan ...

here's a link to thefinancebuff.com "The case against ROTH 401k"
http://thefinancebuff.com/2008/03/case-against-roth-401k.html

Here's another link for "ROTH 401k for People who con ...

Hi Ron: We were posting at the same time however I got a phone call while writing. Lack of decision making is a problem that is why I think IRA's are a better solution. You can keep a simple FDIC i ...

Hi Vic,

Capital loss can offset capital gains. If you have 100K of LT capital loss, you can sell another holding for 100K LT capital gain. The LT loss offsets the LT gain to give you a net LT capi ...

IRS allows us to participate in employer plans such as 401k and make Traditional or ROTH IRA contributions as well. However there are some tricks.

ROTH IRA is only allowed if your Modified Adjuste ...

Welcome to the forum. It sounds like you have the bulk of the portfolio in taxable and a little in tax advantaged. I'm guessing 80% taxable and 15% IRA, 5% 401k for tax advantaged. At your high tax ...

You're in a high tax bracket so tax efficiency is a major concern for investments in taxable accounts. This rules out the use of the LifeStrategy balanced funds which hold taxable bonds which are not ...

Will your friend have a defined benefit pension? If no pension, does your friend know how much will be required at retirement? Will the current savings rate be sufficient to give your friend a good ...

TGD, I think you'll be OK with the PC and the router. The only issue is the potentially high cost for consumbles for the inkjet printer. If you don't need color printing, laser printers are a little ...

The bond fund investor probably doesn't get 100% of the income generated by the bonds held by the bond fund. Some of it will be used to pay the fund's expense ratio. If you look at the dividend yiel ...

You can get admiral with 50K and 10 years in the fund.
https://personal.vanguard.com/us/content/Funds/FundsAdmiralSharesOverviewJSP.jsp?Entry=VGFundsOV

Here's something from SEC "Ex-Dividend Dates: When Are You Entitled to Stock and Cash Dividends":
http://www.sec.gov/answers/dividen.htm

Hi Dave,

1. When she sells securities in the Vanguard brokerage account, those trades settle to the Vanguard money market fund. Once money is in the money market fund, she can exchange from the mo ...

Just a personal note. I/my wife have had that "status" in our Healthcare (VGHCX/VGHAX) funds.

Nothing to write home about Crying or Very sad

...

Not to "burst your balloon" but in the ...

https://personal.vanguard.com/us/content/Funds/FundsAdmiralSharesOverviewJSP.jsp?Entry=VGFundsOV

What are Admiral Shares?

Admiral™ Shares are a class of Vanguard funds created to recognize and ...

Please see [url=http://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Individual_Bonds_vs_a_Bond_Fund]Individual Bonds vs a Bond Fund on the [url=http://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Main_Page]Bogleheads Wiki.

Here's a link to ...

Is there a easy way to import existing data (ie: Vanguard Portfolio funds) into the Portfolio Manager ?Not that I know of. I just typed my portfolio as a watch list portfolio (ticker symbol and numbe ...

If you're able to buy VWO ETF for less than 0.50% premium to NAV, you're coming out ahead. The 0.50% purchase fee makes it easier to get a better deal with the ETF. You can see some premium/discount ...

Sometimes google works much better than the search functions found inside the web sites (IRS, vanguard, bogleheads). There's a neat trick that I learned here at bogleheads. You can limit search resu ...

Tom, I apologize for links above. I saw that your posted link didn't didn't work so I gave you the correct link.

I googled "draft IRS forms" and got this IRS page which 245 files at the ...

The website for IRS is www.irs.gov

Here's a link for the 1040 form:
http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/f1040.pdf

Here's a link for the 1040 instruction book:
http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/i1040.p ...

I'm happy with market weight of EM provided by Total International or FTSE All world ex-US so I don't own VEIEX. How good is good enough?

Can you get something close to your desired AA with a com ...

New annual Contributions
$16,500 = his 401k (including matching contributions)
$5000 = his Roth IRA
$5000 = her Roth IRA
$5000 = taxable account

Funds available in his 401(k)
All way too expen ...

Also, with regards to my time, I look at it like this: If I have to sit down and spend time on *any* trades each month, I might as well do all trades. So I'd only switch entirely to automatic funds if ...

DSInvestor,

I always appreciate your perspective on this stuff. I'm also a big fan of simplicity, but if I could be reasonably confident about saving 16k in ER costs over the long run without drivi ...

Thanks DSInvestor. Why do you say that Vanguard Total Market (VTSAX) is the best choice if accessible given that its ER is higher than Fidelity Total Market (FSTVX)?VTSAX has er=0.09% compared to FSTV ...