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seed4great

P.S. The easiest thing to do is roll everything to Roth IRA and pay taxes on the pre-tax money (the earnings that have accrued on your contributions). Even easier would be to have a regular rollover, let's say every month: put all after tax contributions into some money market fund (some plans allo...

seed4great

One thing to know about Kaiser is that the hospitals and specialists tend to be concentrated in a few areas. If you need to see a particular specialist, it's probably worth checking to see if they have one near you . Probably not a big issue in the SF Bay Area though. Financially speaking, I don't ...

seed4great

Thanks a lot for the responses! It appear after all Kaiser may not be as bad as I initially thought. These are more specifics about plans: PREMIUMS HS Basic Plan $18.17 HS Standard Plan $37.53 HS Premium Plan $48.91 Kaiser CA $54.09 COVERAGE HS Basic Plan Deductible $2,500, OOP $3,250, plan pays 80%...

seed4great

For employer sponsored health insurance, I always had a traditional PPO plan from UHC or BCBS through my career. Currently, I'm preparing to move to new job and they do not offer traditional PPO. Instead, they offer a few HDHP plans from UHC and no deductible plan from Kaiser California. I'm not tha...

seed4great

I'm curious what are those after tax contribution subaccounts? Are they different from Roth 401K? Do they still count against $56K total contribution rule?

seed4great

In 2019, Mega-backdoor Roth contribution is limited by $56K and ordinary backdoor Roth by $6K (or $7K after 50). The question is whether $6K is included into $56K or not? Sorry if it has been discussed already: somehow cannot find much info on this topic. I thought I would add a couple more details...

seed4great

Thank you, that was my impression too.

seed4great

In 2019, Mega-backdoor Roth contribution is limited by $56K and ordinary backdoor Roth by $6K (or $7K after 50). The question is whether $6K is included into $56K or not? Sorry if it has been discussed already: somehow cannot find much info on this topic.

seed4great

My PenFed Visa Platinum Cash Rewards card pays 5% back on gas purchases. And I just discovered , it now pays 3% back on grocery store purchases. No annual fee. I have the same card. No information on the Pen Fed site about the other rewards the card earns. How did you know about the 3% back on groc...

seed4great

Spinola wrote: ↑Mon Mar 25, 2019 1:43 pm Cobra, or retire to Canada, or a European country..

In Canada, there will be Canadian tax which is higher than US (you pay the highest one, according to the double taxation treaty). The only European country which does not impose tax on non-EU citizens for 10 years is Portugal.

seed4great

FelixTheCat wrote: ↑Mon Mar 25, 2019 12:44 pm I see people mentioning keeping their MAGI below 65K for couples. How did you figure it out? I'm single living in CA.

This is for a couple. MAGI for maximum subsidy you get as a single would be around $20K, but $30K would be still reasonable.

seed4great

But there’s something wrong with the math in the second part of your comment. Even a lower spending level still requires a minimum multiple of that low spending for a “safe” withdrawal rate. I assume 15X - 20X is just a part of income. Most people would also have other income like SS, pension, rent...

seed4great

No dilemma from my perspective. I have a set dollar amount I keep in safe fixed income which is primarily derived by calculating XX years of expenses each month. The rest is invested in equities. My struggle on whether or not to retire is not connected to finances rather how I would occupy my time ...

seed4great

Somehow nobody mentioned another part of Prop 13, in particular 1% cap: Proposition 13 capped, with limited exceptions, ad valorem property tax rates at one percent of full cash value at the time of acquisition. I wonder how anyone could pay $30K property tax for the home worth $2.5M, like topic sta...

seed4great

It is also important, where you are with respect to the pay range correspondent to current position. If you are close to the upper bound, then likely you won't see any raise until you get promoted.

seed4great

I'm single and live in the extremely high cost of living area but currently spend about $31K per year (health insurance is partially paid by employer). The most part of it is property tax which almost $13K. I have a nice but not that expensive car and also spend $2K to $3K per year for vacation in E...

seed4great

Cycle wrote: ↑Mon Feb 18, 2019 9:43 am Avoid business travel except if absolutely necessary.

Excellent point. First thing I would do: refuse to travel, when my corp want me to share a hotel room with my colleagues on a business trip!

seed4great

I use TurboTax but always check the "FinanceBuff" notes on entry which help - looks like he has notes for TaxAct as well: https://thefinancebuff.com/how-to-backdoor-roth-taxact.html Thanks! Always a useful link but in this case the problem is a bug in taxact that is preventing reporting n...

seed4great

Many retirees will end up with a significant expense for long-term care, medical costs, or helping a family member financially. All you can do is get good insurance (for the first two) and keep a financial cushion. This is true. Though the question is: how much money suppose to keep financial cushi...

seed4great

Hmmm. So to be clear, if I withdraw $500 in equivalent foreign currency from a foreign ATM, Fido charges me $500? If I buy $500 worth of stuff, food, clothing, etc. on my debit card, Fido charges me $505? So cash is fee-less? Why do I think I read that they charged 1% on all debit ATM withdrawals o...

seed4great

Great point about health care. A coworker has proposed the idea of retiring early and moving to Canada for free health care. Is this feasible? There must be minimum residency requirements. In Canada, you have to be permanent resident to qualify for government ran health care. If you have close rela...

seed4great

I plan to live at the same place, reduce all expenses as much as I can and spend almost everything on health care. With $1-2M savings, do I really have a choice? Health care cost will likely skyrocket in coming years: ACA is questionable and Medicare is running out of funds so it will be substantial...

seed4great

I have lived abroad for years while maintaining US mailing address for financial institutions (family member), have not done travel notifications, and no issues with transactions being declined. I do occasionally get texts asking me to confirm I initiated a particular transaction, but transaction s...

seed4great

What a great topic, with very useful info! But I do have a question to those who keep US home address, while living abroad and use debit card from Fidelity or Schwab for extended time: how do you notify card issuer about your location, and at the same time have US home address in their records? They...

seed4great

This might be a good idea, but please don't forget about taxes. In addition to US tax, you would need to pay local tax in every country you live. Typically, it is 183 days rule. Many countries has tax treaties with US, but tax return will get really complicated (you can check my blog at http://seed4...

seed4great

+1 for Fidelity Cash Mgmt Debit Card. No ATM fees and FX rates are very competitive. Fidelity Cash Mgmt Debit Card, charges 1% foreign transaction fee . "When used at an ATM, no foreign currency transaction fee is applied. When used for purchases (POS), the 1% foreign currency transaction fee ...

seed4great

Hangouts/Google Voice is the best, because it is free to call any land line or cellular phone in US. Others like Viber charge money to call any non-VOIP phone number.

seed4great

These are all great thoughts, and being in industry for >25 years I agree with pretty much every post. However, changing job if you are over 50 is really difficult. I assume it is even more challenging after 55. No matter, what benefits or salary raise you get.

seed4great

Did you google this? I just did: http://www.magnifymoney.com/blog/earning-cashback/best-cash-back-cards-grocery-shopping The Consumers Credit Union visa gets you 3% on groceries and $100 bonus for $1k in spending in the first month. +1 I'm using this Visa card from CC with 2% cash back on gas and 3...

seed4great

My health insurance costs went down to practically zero (BC requires a nominal payment of monthly premiums). However my income taxes went up substantially, meaning I had to pay far more out of pocket every year for the grand total cost of making the move. And this was moving from one of the highest...

seed4great

Premium: $302/month for one (employer's part is separate) Deductible: $400 per individual/$1200 family maximum Co-insurance after deductible: 10% paid by me / 90% paid by plan (in network) OOP Max: $2,000 individual / $4,000 family (100% coverage after this limit) Geography: San Jose, CA Age: 50 Den...

seed4great

I also live in a Bay Area, single and spend around $32K per year for everything, including property tax. This even include some expensive overseas trips. Unfortunately, job opportunities in my occupation are shrinking and by that reason I try to estimate what would be the net worth when I stop worry...

seed4great

Moving abroad is more and more difficult, and eventually will be almost impossible for Americans. Tax is not the most critical issue, although tax return indeed become really complicated. In order to live somewhere, you would need a bank account. You cannot even apply for residence without a bank ac...

seed4great

This is how you can go bankrupt because of medical expenses, even if you are insured and regardless of OOP limit on your insurance: there are procedures (still under research and not proven yet) which are not covered by insurance. But even if procedure is covered, deductables are already high for th...

seed4great

OK, thanks for the opinion. I'll try to find if there was an existing discussion.

seed4great

Did anyone use this tool from Schwab? It looks like a robo manager with no fees. Anything good for beginner investor? It would be nice, if anyone can share experience with it, or useful thoughts.

seed4great

Well, it depends how important health care cost for you. I believe Texas still has one of the lowest healthcare cost in the nation, along with California, Utah and NewMexico - there was a nice article about that: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/gobankingrates/10-best-and-worst-states_b_9030422.html. B...

seed4great

I am not sure why there are talk to put money into very long term CD, while interest rate is so low nowdays? Andrews CU is an exception, and I did hear it is not a place where you want to keep your money: please check ratings. Typical rates for 5yr CD at descent financial institutions is around 2%. ...

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Search found 38 matches

Re: Mega Backdoor Roth Questions

Re: HDHP vs Kaiser HMO

Re: HDHP vs Kaiser HMO

HDHP vs Kaiser HMO

Re: Mega backdoor Roth question

Re: Roth IRA: Mega-backdoor and ordinary backdoor

Re: Roth IRA: Mega-backdoor and ordinary backdoor

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Re: [Retiring before 65: How do you deal with health insurance?]

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Re: Retiring abroad. Move taxable/checking accounts to Schwab?

Re: Retiring abroad. Move taxable/checking accounts to Schwab?

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