Search found 666 matches

by jegallup
Tue Aug 05, 2008 5:53 pm
Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
Topic: Death of the 30-year mortage?
Replies: 36
Views: 7558

Thanks to all who answered, I think. To answer questions, it is a re-fi with cash out, but the house appraises at 3 times the loan amount ($1.3M), and my friend is fortunate enough to have lots of other assets too. So the lender risk is minimal. And yes, 30 year-loans were available, but at astonishing rates with points, etc. What really irritated me was that many banks advertised 30-year loans on bankrate.com but then didn't really offer them when you called. As one poster noted, most of our national financial troubles seem to have begun with the proliferation of loans other than the old-style, 20% down, 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage with no prepayment penalty. Maybe it's a coincidence, but I don't think so. Therefore it seems odd that lend...
by jegallup
Tue Aug 05, 2008 5:39 pm
Forum: Personal Investments
Topic: Nationwide as a 401K plan administrator?
Replies: 17
Views: 9848

Our firm had Transamerica. They took 1.7% per year on top of the funds' own charges. When we switched to Vanguard, they provided names of three 3rd-party administrator firms, picked off a rotating list, I suspect. In any case, Vanguard charges $10/fund/employee/year, and the TPA charges $1K. Pretty reasonable. We had about half a million going in. I don't know what the minimum anybody would take is.
by jegallup
Tue Aug 05, 2008 5:35 pm
Forum: Personal Investments
Topic: Modeling the Federal Thrift Savings plan?
Replies: 5
Views: 1981

I'd do my best to dissuade the employer from going through an insurance-company-based plan. They take a big hit (1.6 or 1.7%, declining slightly as the balance increases) for themselves on top of the fund costs, limit the fund choices, and often don't actually hold the funds they say they do--they just move your money around as if they had invested it that way. Ours was with Transamerica, recommended by the insurance agent, and we moved it to Vanguard, using a 3rd party administrator Vanguard recommended. It's not as easy as Transamerica made it, but the choices are broader and the costs are lower ($10/fund/employee/year, $1K annually to the TPA), and the employees are happier. There's some thought that you get better participation by limit...
by jegallup
Mon Aug 04, 2008 1:35 pm
Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
Topic: Death of the 30-year mortage?
Replies: 36
Views: 7558

Death of the 30-year mortage?

A friend is looking to refinance her house--the amount will be "jumbo," since this is California, and she has lots of equity, good credit, etc. She's shopped various banks, eloan, bankrate.com and other places, and is not finding anyone willing to write a 30-year, fixed-rate, no-prepayment penalty mortage, at least not a competitive rates. I've had a few mortgages over the years and most of them were the old-style, which seems to be disappearing. I know why--because banks would rather put the risk on the borrower than assume it themselves--but I don't understand why now . Banks have never wanted to assume risk they could put on the borrower. Were Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac the engine that made the 30-year fixed-rate mortgage avail...
by jegallup
Mon Aug 04, 2008 12:58 pm
Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
Topic: Group Health Insurance - Good or Bad?
Replies: 8
Views: 2382

The group policytypically has the advantage of "guaranteed issue" for the employee and family--in other words, the insurer has to cover anyone the employer hires, even if they have pre-existing conditions such as diabetes. Looks like you don't need that now, which is great, but thing can change. Plus if you leave that firm, you have COBRA to carry you forward in the policy, with the length of coverage (at your expense) dependent on the size of the company and your state's laws.
by jegallup
Mon Jul 28, 2008 3:05 pm
Forum: Personal Consumer Issues
Topic: Debit Cards
Replies: 25
Views: 6556

Debit cards overseas

My banker told me that I could avoid credit card surcharges for foreign currency transactions (3%) by using a debit card when traveling. Did this on a recent trip but can't verify whether it works--the transaction just shows up as $US on the statement.
by jegallup
Sat Jul 26, 2008 1:18 pm
Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
Topic: Finding a mortgage lender
Replies: 7
Views: 2012

30-year fixed-rate mortgages are are scarce or ridiculously expensive to find these days, even for people with good credit and substantial equity. Lenders who advertise them on bankrate.com don't actually have them when you call. It seems that lenders prefer ARMs, or even interest-only ARMs, which of course put more risk (if rates go up) and expense (refinancing in 3/5/7/10 years) on the borrower. Well fine, that's business, and this must be a seller's market. But it reminds me of what I've heard about the Great Depression when, for instance, my grandfather lost his house--not because he couldn't pay the mortgage, but because he couldn't get a mortgage. Five years was the limit those days, and no one wanted to write the note in a period of ...
by jegallup
Thu Jul 17, 2008 6:51 pm
Forum: Personal Consumer Issues
Topic: Diesel-Electric Hybrids
Replies: 20
Views: 4210

Diesel-electric hybrids

One drawback may be that diesels (compared to gasoline engines) are hard to start owing to glo-plug warmup and high compression ratios. One way that the Prius, and some other hybrids and non-hybrids, save fuel is by switching off the internal-combustion engine when the vehicle is stopped or running on electric power only. Behavior that wouldn't be a problem in delivery vehicles or buses might not be acceptable in the family truckster or grocery-getter.

That said, a diesel-electric hybrid would be the vehicle of choice for any railroad buff, since that is the same system that drives railroad locomotives. All aboard!
by jegallup
Fri Jul 11, 2008 3:46 pm
Forum: Personal Investments
Topic: Vanguard Total Bond Market Index Inst Question
Replies: 7
Views: 2767

Our 401(k) used to be with Transamerica and they did the same thing, although they allowed if asked that you weren't holding the real funds, but an allocation manipulated as if it were each fund. The really painful part was the 1.65% or so asset management fee that TA was taking on top of the normal ups and downs. I was told that, as a small firm with a modest pot of money in the 401(k), we had no choice but to bear this cost.

I found this wasn't true at all when we moved the plan to Vanguard, with a 3rd party administrator who charges a flat rate to manage the plan. When I started to move out of TA, they offered a lower asset management fee as an inducement to keep us. Fool me once...
by jegallup
Fri Jun 13, 2008 1:08 pm
Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
Topic: Job quandary
Replies: 7
Views: 1983

Job changing

I've hired quite a few people over the years, and found the most reliable indicator of a good performance is longevity. In other words, two jobs at ten years apiece scores higher than ten jobs at two years apiece. Younger people tend to move around more and this doesn't count against them much, in my view. Titles don't matter if the person can describe what he or she did in a way that makes it sound like the experience I'm looking for.

On the other hand, I've also been a long-haul commuter (65 miles each way for 3 years) and found it built my resentment of the world in general. Gas is probably not going to get a lot cheaper.
by jegallup
Fri Jun 13, 2008 1:02 pm
Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
Topic: Charting/Graphing entire portfolio
Replies: 7
Views: 2562

Graphing assets

I use Excel, which isn't free, nor is it very simple. But it will do many useful things.
by jegallup
Fri Jun 13, 2008 12:32 pm
Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
Topic: Any Amtrak Travelers Here?
Replies: 29
Views: 6687

Maybe now...

...with gas above $4/gallon, we'll see that clean, efficient, timely passenger travel is a public necessity, like freeways or police protection, rather than a novelty or the province of rail buffs (such as myself!). Unfortunately, even if everyone came to their senses immediately, building the necessary infrastructure is time consuming and expensive.

Anyone besides me remember having dinner in a real dining car, with tablecloths and waiters, menus and pretty decent food? That was a good way to travel.
by jegallup
Fri May 30, 2008 1:31 pm
Forum: Investing - Theory, News & General
Topic: Saving too much for retirement ?
Replies: 51
Views: 12770

Retirement savings as a multiple of expenses

....We now have over 35 X our yearly budget.....
Just saw this in the post, and am always looking for rules of thumb to help plan for retirement. Is this a common indicator?
by jegallup
Tue May 27, 2008 12:17 pm
Forum: Personal Investments
Topic: Problems with my broker
Replies: 15
Views: 3153

VBS

Vanguard Brokerage Service charges $8/on-line trade if you have $1M w/Vanguard, and the first 12 trades are free, which seems reasonable.
by jegallup
Sun May 04, 2008 1:35 pm
Forum: Personal Investments
Topic: Monthly account rebalancing
Replies: 2
Views: 1054

Monthly account rebalancing

I make fairly large deposits in my VG brokerage account every month or so. I've been spreading the deposits among the 7 ETFs and bond fund to achieve my desired allocation. Is there any reason <i>not</i> to do this, aside from the brokerage fees?

I'm new to this forum and apologize if this question has been asked and answered already.
by jegallup
Thu May 01, 2008 11:15 am
Forum: Personal Investments
Topic: Are there any good 401Ks?
Replies: 28
Views: 5343

Good 401(k)s

We had ours with Transamerica, on the advice of an insurance agent who got a kickback out of the 1.6 or 1.7% Transamerica took off the top. There were 33 funds to choose from but all were expensive. So, we moved to Vanguard about 18 months ago, using a 3rd party adminstrator that Vanguards small business liaison guy provided from a list. They charge $1K/year, and Vanguard charges nothing, and the employees have about 100 funds to choose from. Doing it this way you don't get a lot of handholding setting it up or running it--they mail all the statements to one address--but the results are outstanding. Some advisors recommend restricting the number of choices so as not to confuse the employees, but ours are all professionals and they haven't c...