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Pennstateclj1

I would also look into the following insurances if you don't have them-
Umbrella liability
Long term disability

Pennstateclj1

I'd keep it simple and go 50/50 stocks bonds, you could leave it that way for a few years, that's more conservative than either of those target retirement funds. Remember defense is more important the older you get, you have less time to ride the ups and more importantly the downs- With your 35k- (a...

Pennstateclj1

So you can max out your 401k pre-tax to reduce your tax bill. It should be $23,000 you can contribute this year. If that puts you under $112,000 for MAGI you can also contribute $6,500 to a Roth IRA. As far as a taxable account, you are in a high bracket so a tax-exempt bond fund would be appropriat...

Pennstateclj1

Welcome to the forum and thanks for serving, Question 1- Steer clear of Dave Ramsey's investing advice as you noted. I started investing with American Funds when I was 18, and what a scam that was. Front load of 5.75%, you don't need the ELP advisor, RUN away from that guy. Go with Vanguard. Questio...

Pennstateclj1

Welcome to the forum! Without listing your Expense Ratios for each account, it's hard to tell, but I'll go out on a limb and say the Vanguard funds would be the cheapest. What's your Asset Allocation or stock/bond ratio? Without your desired asset allocation we can't give percentage advice. Are you ...

Pennstateclj1

chemeng wrote:Fortunately, my company offers a good amount of options for 401k

Lots of options doesn't necessarily mean low cost. We prefer index funds or low cost active funds, something in the .2% expense ratio range or preferably lower.

Pennstateclj1

An important item you left out is marginal tax brackets for fed/state, that's another important factor.

Pennstateclj1

Welcome to the forum, Owed: $120,426 Appraised value in March 2012: $126,000 You might have a problem here, because of the lack of equity, you'll most likely have to use some of that cash. Have you considered just paying it off completely with the inheritance money so you have no mortgage? You're pr...

Pennstateclj1

Watty wrote:They also have a five year home equity loan at 1.99% that should have low or no closing costs.https://www.penfed.org/home-equity-loan/

This. No closing costs as long as you don't pay it off in 2 years or something, it's in the fine print at the bottom. Then max all retirement accounts and taxable with leftover.

Pennstateclj1

FB01 wrote:Pennstateclj1,

Do you reinvest the dividend in VWITX which you have for emergency ?

Yes

Pennstateclj1

lmpmd wrote:She pushes index funds here. That seems wise:
http://finance.yahoo.com/blogs/daily-ti ... 54956.html

I was waiting for her to plug Bogleheads the whole time, sadly it never happened.

Pennstateclj1

Maybe statewide there is, but it doesn't mean each municipality that the bond was issued to got their act together. CA inter term tax-exempt has 1008 bonds, all concentrated in CA, 20% of the bonds can be AMT bonds. https://personal.vanguard.com/us/funds/snapshot?FundId=0100&FundIntExt=INT#tab=2...

Pennstateclj1

The general, VWiTX. I don't want to concentrate my risk to CA especially given current budget shortfalls and such.

Pennstateclj1

For one tier of our emergency fund, we use Vanguard Intermediate tax-exempt bonds. Hold more in the fund if you're worried about -10% fluctuations. $25,000 emergency fund with 10% cushion = $27,500.

Pennstateclj1

I enjoyed it too, I'm finally above average at something.

Pennstateclj1

If you use their car buying service, you can get their low rates. This is in addition to any dealer incentives. If you go the other way through the dealer, you might only get to take $1000 cash back, but get a higher interest rate. Or $0 cash back, and a 0% rate but pay a higher up front price for t...

Pennstateclj1

The base Kia Forte through the Penfed auto buying service is $15,516 for the 4 dr automatic.

The base Corolla 4 dr automatic is $16,200 through the same service.

.49% financing for 48 months.

Pennstateclj1

We have a sufficient emergency fund if you consider our savings account balances and what we've contributed to our Roths. I might just hold onto $1k in savings, plus what's in the Roths as backup and put the rest of the cash towards the CC's. You'll never win paying interest. Yes, we are contributi...

Pennstateclj1

Loan initiated in May 2006 Current principal: $116k @5.375% Monthly payment breakdown P&I: 743.73, Tax: 57.74, Insurance: 98.40, PMI/MIP :49.88 My questions are: 1) If we were to refi the loan at a lower rate, would that negate our FHA program loan agreement? (not sure of terminology) Chances a...

Pennstateclj1

Welcome to the forum, this is the investing philosophy we all try to follow: http://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Bogleheads%C2%AE_investment_philosophy To be honest, I have not strategically managed my portfolio. I have just invested some money in a bunch of mutual funds, retirement accounts and an ESP. ...

Pennstateclj1

You could also make your money back on that Volvo purchase later when you take the destruction derby scene by storm!

Pennstateclj1

At this age and these tax rates you should be contributing tax deductible 23k to both TSP. As a fellow fed, I agree with this. $23k each to TSP- $46,000 between you. $6,500 each to ROTHS- $13,000 between you. That's $59,000 before you should consider college stuff. You say they're in high school, h...

Pennstateclj1

Don't get me started on Timeshares, we have two of them waiting for us in an estate, o joy We've got 5 waiting for us someday. As for vacations- We've had the biggest issues with airlines, a big SNAFU on our honeymoon where we missed a whole day in Maui, other times with big delays and layovers (no...

Pennstateclj1

- $12,000 in student loans at 6.80% (we get a 0.25% deduction on interest for doing direct withdraw). We currently pay about $200/month the minimum payment). All extra money to this, your e-fund is good for now. - Roth IRA for me (invested in Vanguard target date fund - 0.19% ER) - Roth IRA for my ...

Pennstateclj1

I would surely recommend Nissan, for several reasons... 1. Hondas n Toyotas are always in great demand making them expensive. 2. Nissans (Altima, Maxima) about 6-7yrs old would fit in your budget range and their better models came out around that time. 3. They still hold their value decently and ar...

Pennstateclj1

kgingras wrote:Emergency funds: 9-12 months of living expenses.

What if you start changing these out to I- bonds? Tax-deferred, currently paying 1.76%
http://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/I_bonds
http://www.treasurydirect.gov/indiv/research/indepth/ibonds/res_ibonds_ibuy.htm

Pennstateclj1

Debt: Mortgage $96,000 @ 4.125%. I can't recall what kind of mortgage this is (balloon?) but even though it is ammortized over 30 yearsit will have to be paid off in 4 years or refinanced again. House is currently worth $210,000. I have no other debt. This doesn't sound ideal. I would refinance to ...

Pennstateclj1

Oh I get it now, all funds toward each item until its completion. Then you're correct that you can't take risk. I assumed you were doing some of these concurrently.

Pennstateclj1

3) Take out small loan and buy new car for the wife ($10,000 or so from PenFed or somewhere cheap) - Buy car in Summer of 2013 and pay off by December of 2013 I wouldn't be in a hurry to pay off a low interest rate car loan. You're saying you wouldn't beat 1.49% (at the highest) investing by choosi...

Pennstateclj1

Sorry this got lost in the shuffle somehow, I think you have a good plan to pay off the 6% unsubsidized loan, it's unclear how much more the Army is going to pay on each loan. Can you breakdown what you're responsible for and what they will pay in each loan? Anyway, I would target them in this order...

Pennstateclj1

illcrx wrote:
illcrx wrote:[Commercial website promotion removed by admin LadyGeek]

Where can I get your newsletter? How much is it?

Pennstateclj1

How about just keeping it simple in taxable- you can rebalance in the IRA or Solo401k- whichever you go with. 150k split 3 ways- Total Stock Index Total International Index- foreign tax credit Intermediate term tax-exempt (you have painful tax rates, this fund has no AMT bonds I believe.) http://www...

Pennstateclj1

Great. We'll look to start moving some of our Emergency Fund (currently in a savings account with FNBO Direct) into a fund within her Roth. In the wiki, it talks about doing a money market within the IRA. I feel my FDIC insured savings account will do better. What do you think about something like ...

Pennstateclj1

In the TSP (govts 401k) and in my wife's Fidelity 401k rebalancing is as easy as setting your percentages back to your target amounts. The TSP uses interfund transers to do it, Fidelity has a rebalance option right on the account info. The funds will skew throughout the year because they will all gr...

Pennstateclj1

Duckie is a good portfolio designer and gave you a good sample portfolio assuming you didn't want to sell taxable. Here's the ROTH as emergency fund- http://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Roth_IRA_as_an_emergency_fund You can withdraw contributions (not growth) at any time. So you could sell the taxable, f...

Pennstateclj1

Thinking about this thread more, I would sell everything in taxable and use the proceeds to live off of so you can get all funds into tax-advantaged space. You're not even close to filling up the ROThs, no need for a taxable account. Don't make it more difficult than it needs to be. Max ROTH TSP- pi...

Pennstateclj1

Awesome, glad to hear you got that squared away. If you haven't done the car refinance yet, you can knock that down to 1.49% at Penfed.org.

Good work getting everything taken care of promptly, you'll be on track in no time.

Pennstateclj1

I have that day off for once, I might could join.

Pennstateclj1

New annual Contributions and my order of priority $5000 Roth IRA $5000 Roth TSP with no-employer match I would re-think this. In fact, I would only contribute to the ROTH TSP account until I reached the $17,500 max. The TSP expense ratio is .025%, you can't beat that with Vanguard. Your priority sh...

Pennstateclj1

Yes, I remember your screen name and I think other posters and I have given you the advice to pay off the 5.5% loan in at least 2 of your previous posts.

T'were I you, I would stop over-thinking it, and just get it paid.

Pennstateclj1

Welcome to the forum! By the looks of your assets and age, you have won the game, but if you plan to spend $200k a year and have the portfolio last 30 years maybe not? Unless you post how specific your stock risk is, i.e. 500k in 5 different stocks, we can't really give you any advice. You're asking...

Pennstateclj1

Welcome to the forum, I agree with John, just get rid of the student loans first before you get into taxable investing. Student loans will not disappear with a bankruptcy unlike most other debts, there really is no way to get rid of them but to pay them. You've cut them from 165k to 80k in just 2 ye...

Pennstateclj1

savings rate / salary multiple of savings takeoff point 10% 1.25 15% 1.875 20% 2.5 25% 3.125 30% 3.75 These numbers make sense based on what people report on this site and the book Your Money Ratios . The book is targeted at the average investor and the author urges readers to save 12%. Based on yo...

Pennstateclj1

Basically I'm worried this if I make a contribution to my Roth IRA in the months of January through May, will it be illegal because I have no personal earned income and I technically shouldn't be able to use her income as my own because we aren't married yet. Why not save yourself the worry, just p...

Pennstateclj1

Sounds like a great question for your custodian, Etrade.

If anything, it will be them that has to undo, or re-characterize what you've done, so you should give them a call.

Pennstateclj1

Welcome to the forum! I'm under the FERS system also. You've done a good job accumulating a hefty amount in the TSP. How would you feel if your $640k became $320k in a year? That's the risk you're taking by holding nothing in bonds. The TSP is your most substantial account within your portfolio, and...

Pennstateclj1

According to http://www.bogleheads.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=100863, it happens once your savings equal twice your annual pay. I started this thread, and I think the majority of responses were that 3X-4X salary was when people really noticed a difference, and the portfolio swings could be ...

Pennstateclj1

I responded to your other post too, but I'll try again- 1) For your house fund, I'd go with this- it's what we have in our taxable account. The monthly dividends aren't taxable and since you would be holding it for more than a year, any gains would be long term. It's $3,000 to open, $100 to add more...

Pennstateclj1

As Bob'sNMN noted and put it better than I did, your 2012 could look something like this if you're referring to income after deductions around $120k instead of $170k. I think you were looking at the lower phaseout. 2012- His 401k- 17k Her Traditional IRA (deductible)- 5k His Roth IRA- 5k Contributin...

Pennstateclj1

Your tax rates are confusing, I don't think you have them correct. The 25% fed bracket starts at $70,700 for married filing jointly. That would put you at least at 8% for CA for 2013. http://www.tax-brackets.org/californiataxtable Other good news is the 401k limit increased to $17,500 for 2013 so yo...

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