Bogleheads.org

czeckers

Buy the smallest house that you can live with. Expenses and maintenance seem to increase exponentially with house size. The key to happiness is keeping fixed expenses as low as possible.

czeckers

I very much regret getting a smartphone for my children at 12 yo. There are no parental controls that they can't defeat and the OS makers (Apple and Android) don't seem to be trying very hard to make it easy for parents to control access. By giving them a phone you give them unfettered access to por...

czeckers

Basic level calculus is usually required. Statistics not always required but very very useful for understanding research articles and/or doing research.

In practice, I use basic algebra.

czeckers

I'm curious why you write "distilled" water with the quotation marks? I sense a bias. Tap water tends to have minerals which, over time can build up in the CPAP machine causing problems. As mentioned above, water from the dehumidifier can pick up mold, bacteria and other contaminants from the air (a...

czeckers

My recollection is that socially responsible investing tends to lag the broader markets.

czeckers

I would start off by having someone look at the bikes you have. If they've been neglected for a while, most places will offer a tune up that replaces tubes/tires and brake/shifter cables and cleans/lubricates moving parts. That should certainly be cheaper than buying a new bike. Bike frames, rims, a...

czeckers

Property taxes as charitable contributions. Hahaha.

czeckers

The primary usefulness of backtesting is to look at the performance of a specific portfolio under various market conditions. For example, look at the inflationary period of 1972-1980, deflation 1930-1933 and prosperity of the 1990's. If you have a portfolio that behaves reasonably well under all of ...

czeckers

not4me wrote: ↑
Thu Mar 29, 2018 3:51 pm

What is your objection to the permanent portfolio....not solely gold?

No objection. I'm aiming for the "Golden Butterfly" variation of the PP. I was just trying to steer the discussion away from the pros/cons of the PP.

czeckers

The Merk Fund. It invest in physical gold that is held in Perth Australia. But that's an ETF, right? OP needs a Mutual Fund. I don't think you are going to get a mutual fund. I don't think it would meet the diversification test that a mutual fund has to meet by law. That's a good point.

czeckers

The OLEDs are spectacular.

czeckers

Events that make the value of your corporate stocks go down, may affect their ability to make payments on their bond issues. It is for this reason that I prefer a treasury bond fund for diversification of my stock-heavy portfolio.

czeckers

Limited choice of funds. There is a brokerage window for mutual funds but not ETFs.

czeckers

I would love to use the ETFs. Unfortunately I only have access to Mutual Funds, not ETFs. I bet you can fix that... I'm fortunate to have access to a lot of tax-deferred space through my employer-based retirement accounts. Unfortunately, the brokerage window is limited to mutual funds only. The dec...

czeckers

The Touqueville Fund is the only one I've been able to find. Unfortunately, looking at the fund info, it appears to be primarily an active Precious Metals Mining Fund that happens to hold 15% of it's assets in physical Gold. They also seem to use leverage. The ER is a cringeworthy 1.39% Investment S...

czeckers

MP123 wrote: ↑
Wed Mar 28, 2018 12:00 pm
Do you have an objection to the ETF vs. Mutual Fund structure for holding physical gold? They would seem to be quite similar from a practical standpoint.

I would love to use the ETFs. Unfortunately I only have access to Mutual Funds, not ETFs.

czeckers

We support a family of 11 on a food budget of $2,000/month. We buy all of our meat and much of our produce directly from the farms around us. Most other groceries from Aldi's, a discount grocer in our area. Eating healthy can mean a lot of things. Strictly speaking, limiting foods that have added su...

czeckers

Are there any reasonable mutual fund alternatives to GLD or IAU (Gold ETFs)?

Ideally, the fund would buy physical gold rather than gold mining stocks, have a reasonable ER, and have no load.

Thank you.

czeckers

My regular job is a 30 min commute which didn't feel all that bad until I started working within walking distance of home on a few days. You quickly realize how much that extra hour in the car every day sucks the life out of you.

czeckers

Bad things can happen... very bad things.

czeckers

I'm a relatively young investor. I'm about to turn 30 and I've only been investing since 2010 so I still consider myself relatively new to the "game". Historically I've just invested in low expense ratio index funds that stratagize to match the market. I'm talking about assets like DIA, QQQ, VOO, e...

czeckers

Mathematically speaking, the advice that you should just remain invested in the market and ignore the noise will probably be correct. However, there is a school of thought that novice investors should be invested fairly conservatively until they've tested their risk tolerance in a bear market. Theor...

czeckers

Since you can withdraw the principal from a Roth penalty free, this might work on a smaller scale where the amount might be $5,000 or less. However, with $1M, there is no way to contribute such a large amount into a Roth or any other tax-deferred vehicle. I also wouldn't use a 10-year treasury to fu...

czeckers

The best 5 year CD I could find on bankrate.com is 2.65% On a $1M amount, the excess 0.65% would earn you almost $33,000. However, the total interest on the CD would total almost $140,000. So if your taxes on the $140,000 would be less than $33,000, then you come out ahead. Otherwise, the differenti...

czeckers

I keep a quarter in my car for the shopping cart at Aldi's. I went there the other day and couldn't find my quarter.

That's losing money.

czeckers

You can call 800-TAX-FORM and have any form mailed to you. There is no charge for this service. I presume that this requires you to know, in advance, what specific forms you will need. But if you discover, midway through preparing your taxes, that you need another form, do you have any idea on how ...

czeckers

Have lots of children

czeckers

The ability to earn a high income.

czeckers

I always thought that meant swimming in your money vault like Scrooge McDuck.

czeckers

It sounds like the damage was discovered after you became the owner of the home. Thus, unfortunately it makes it your problem. That's why the inspection and final walk through are so important. If you're going to file a claim, it should be with your insurance company. The only way you would have any...

czeckers

People would freak out less if they tracked number of shares owned rather than the value of those shares.

czeckers

Looks like you are doing pretty well. If you are debt free and are maxing out your 401k and Roth IRA every year and are also contributing to a taxable account, that's fantastic! Here are links to some comparable data: Average Net Worth by Age The Average Net Worth for the Above Average Person

czeckers

Another option for finishing the floor is an epoxy finish. It looks good, is durable, and ok to get wet. I live in a cold climate, and having 3" of foam sprayed into the rim joist cavity all around the house made a pretty significant difference in comfort and energy costs. We paid $800 for a 1500 sq...

czeckers

If you donate directly to the charity, Network for Good will not take its commission and more money will go directly to the charity. I agree with you. Unfortunately, this is a small charity that doesn't have the staff to handle direct donations. As far as I can tell, they charge a flat 3% transacti...

czeckers

Does anyone have experience donating to a charity through the Network for Good donor management service? I'm looking to set up a recurring donation to a charity that uses them. My big question is how they handle receipts and whether they'll send out a year-end statement for tax reporting purposes. A...

czeckers

Ah the perennial quest for good wifi... We have tried Luma which I do not recommend. We had a network of 6 Lumas, 3 of which failed within two years. Also had devices getting dropped off the network periodically. Now we have a pair of Netgear Orbi's. For some reason one of our Roku devices keeps get...

czeckers

That was very informative. Thank you.

czeckers

Most of the time, this thread resurfacing is my only indicator that the markets have gone down presenting a possible buying opportunity.

czeckers

I've always wondered whether a precious metal mining fund such as VGPMX would be a workable substitute for GLD. My money is in retirement funds and I have access to mutual funds but not ETFs. So I took the chart provided by GratefulinNC substituting VGPMX instead of GLD. To my surprise I saw that VG...

czeckers

Wondering whether a precious metal mining fund such as VGPMX would be a workable substitute for GLD. My money is in retirement funds and I have access to mutual funds but not ETFs.

czeckers

Our current house has an above ground pool that was installed by the previous owner. Prior to this we never had a pool and I was generally ambivalent about them. During the summer our kids use it almost daily, though usually just for a brief dip. The pool is fairly labor intensive. Every day you hav...

czeckers

We always leave our butter out at room temp. It's much easier to spread when it's not rock hard from being in the fridge. Never had it go rancid, even in the summer without AC (though it might get very soft at that point).

czeckers

I would rather save for their grad school in you situation. My plan is saving for college and grad school for our 2 kids. Any left over money will be there for their own kids. Just like any tax advantage plank I want to see the max growth before withdrawal. Good luck. In my case, these are not mutu...

czeckers

Good luck. Please let us know how things work out.

czeckers

Even if you could why would you want to do it? One scenario: I'm paying ~$10K/year for private school right now. I'm already done saving for college. I get to deduct from my state reportable income the first $10K I contribute to my state's 529. So, in theory, I may be able to use pretax dollars ins...

czeckers

Thank you for the responses.

czeckers

To the OP: is the 27.5" from the wall to the front of the toilet? Or the depth of the toilet itself? There are probably differences between different toilets with respect to how close they sit to the back wall. Unfortunately you may not know whether a toilet will work until you try it. Toto toilets ...

czeckers

I think it is reasonable to tilt, and I do so with my portfolio. However, one has to understand that the tilts can underperform the large indexes such as the S&P500 for very long periods of time, particularly when large growth is outperforming. One has to have the conviction to stick to the tilted p...

czeckers

It can be addictive to watch the portfolio balance going up and up in a bull market. However, gut wrenching in a bear. If you can avoid looking at your balances, you'll probably be better off.

czeckers

With school age children, a fixed night shift could work out as well. You sleep while kids are at school and are home in the morning before they go to school and can have dinner with the family before going to work. Probably not a good idea with younger children unless you can find some isolated spa...

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