Bogleheads.org

Just to add clarification, you can subscribe to YouTube Premium directly through Google. Or you can subscribe through Apple so that it shows up as a subscription in Settings. You appear to have done the former but are addressing it as if you have done the latter.

I believe your understanding is accurate.

COLAs are applied to benefits whether that benefit has been claimed or not.

Not the question you asked, but are you sure you want to move everything to Merrill Edge? I have an ME account. I am glad it is not my primary brokerage.

Line 4a reports the gross distribution out of an IRA. You had a transfer of $22,186 out of an IRA.

Line 5a reports the gross distribution out of a retirement plan. You had a transfer of $22,186 from a 401k to an IRA.

Lines 4b and 5b report the taxable amounts, respectively. Since all money was rolled over, these will be zero.

I do not understand why you are describing 4a, 5a, 4b and 5b as you are. Your description does not seem to match the wording on the tax form. This is why some others are suggesting you read the form.

jebmke wrote: ↑Wed Mar 22, 2023 2:08 pm

9-5 Suited wrote: ↑Wed Mar 22, 2023 1:20 pm I always love when I meet up with someone from Europe and they just are in disbelief about how insane the pervasiveness of tipping culture is here. It’s like they walked into something that boggles their mind.

That's because the compensation system is different

Exactly, the servers are paid a decent wage and have healthcare. Neither are guaranteed with a service job in the US.

* Due to advantage of lower standard deduction and claim medical deductions, they will file MFS (Married Filing Separately) what do you mean by this? obviously you're itemizing if it's more advantageous than taking the standard deduction but if you itemize for one and file MFS you have to itemize for the other. That could wind up with a much lower deduction for the one who isn't claiming the medical expenses. You sure MFS is the right way to go? I did not know TaxSlayer could override the Standard Deduction when it is higher than the Itemized total? Anyone can can choose to use itemized deductions even when they are lower than the standardized deductions. If you are MFS and one spouse itemizes then the other must as well. In the section of...

teelainen wrote: ↑Wed Mar 22, 2023 1:11 am
Why is it that when we take our car to get our wheels aligned for $89, they always tell us that we need an additional $500-$1,200 in repairs?

How often do you need a wheel alignment? How many times is always? Is this the same vehicle? Have you had an independent mechanic confirm that you did not need any suspension work? Are they able to adjust the vehicle within specs? Have the told you the work was needed for the car to be safe?

Do you just have more than $250k or do you actually haves funds not covered by FDIC insurance? My spouse and I have more than $250k at Ally. I am not worried because it is still all covered by FDIC insurance. I am worried that Ally will go down and I will lose my 4.75% rate on the No Penalty CD.

Was the contribution for the 2021 tax year or for the 2022 tax year? In February of 2022, you could have made either.

lakpr wrote: ↑Mon Mar 20, 2023 7:33 pm I believe you must dispute the charge in writing rather than over the phone, to preserve your rights...

Dispute in writing. Also add any information that would make it clear it was not your charge. For instance, was the charge in a geographic location that you were not?

Hah! You want hard... do them the old fashioned way... with paper and pencil and a calculator. They are not that hard but may be confusing at times. I have never, never, trusted tax preparation software. I tried it once ages ago... didn't understand what the software was doing or the results. Why have two black-boxes involved? Get you forms and instructions, understand your forms and which you need and fill the boxes in and do the simple math. SImple. Some of the form interdependencies can be confusing but not really if you follow the instructions. However, each year the forms seems to get more complicated... which schedule do I need: 1, 2, 3, 4, ... N? Hah! It is a challenge. My method: Do them fairly early... let them marinade for a few ...

retired recently wrote: ↑Mon Mar 20, 2023 3:59 pm I will ask him to send a follow up email to HR to ask if it is a Roth. Presumably, if not a Roth, then it should be able to be rolled over into a Traditional IRA.

You often do not need HR. Start with the W-2. Is box 1, 3 and 5 the same? Is there an amount in box 12 or 14? Does he have, or can look up, his last pay statement for 2022? What about a statement for the retirement plan? And often the plan details are available online. Honestly, it would be good to have your son start to understand all these things right now at the start of his career.

Does she have beneficiaries listed? You might not be aware that this affects FDIC coverage. With the right combination of accounts with and without beneficiaries, the coverage can far exceed $250k. See the calculator at https://edie.fdic.gov/.

I have seen the suggestion to leave $1 in the traditional IRA if you want to retain the basis.

There should not be a short term stock on M1 in the category of uncovered, basis not reported to IRS. There should be a very good reason the basis is zero. It probably is not. What is being sold anyway? P500 sounds odd to me. You should track this down now. The extra couple dollars in tax is not the issue. You need to identify the problem before you know how significant the root cause might be. I always need to add to or tweak a brokerage import. Read all the errors with 1099-B forms posted to this forum in the last month. M1 uses Apex Clearing house, I believe. I spent a month getting my basis fixed with them. Plenty others have had issues with Apex and tax reporting info. Have you signed up for an Apex account so that you can see “behind ...

TexasPE wrote: ↑Sat Mar 18, 2023 5:59 pm

beyou wrote: ↑Sat Mar 18, 2023 4:49 pm ... wondering if we must now start keeping her personal non-trust statements every month and produce them all in 5+ years ?

Check with an eldercare attorney https://www.naela.org/findlawyer
I am aware of a family attorney who cost a friend's aunt $100,000+ by not understanding the spend-down requirements and exemptions in Texas.

I am not sure an elder care attorney would be the right person. Mom has no assets and is already medicare/medicaid dual eligible. Unless there are pieces missing in this story, the types of things that an elder care attorney typically does is not relevant here.

Talk to every 50 to 65 year old that you know. There will be a good chance that some have been part of the process with a parent. I have experience with a nursing home that will only accept private pay or direct from hospital transfers but then keeps you in the same room after you transition to medicaid. Another relative was in a perfectly acceptable facility which accepted patients regardless of the type of payment and all were treated equally. Another facility had two wings and I was shocked when I wandered in to the medicaid wing. I am not suggesting neglect but it was dismal compared to the other side of the building. And then there are just a couple facilities where I have witnessed truly poor care. There seems to be only a loose conne...

Macawi wrote: ↑Sat Mar 18, 2023 4:11 pm 5) My employer chose not to inform those who were in the fund that they may want to review their investment given this clause

Are you sure it was not in your documents describing the transition? My spouse has been involved in three retirees plan changes that included these kind of quirks. One transition specifically included a stable value fund. There was a footnote in the plain english transition documents which made it clear that any funds in the stable value fund would remain behind for one year. Did you get something which mapped how the investments in the old plan would be invested in the new plan? I would have thought this would all be requirements not niceties.

See if they would be willing to put some of the cash into US Treasury I-bonds. $10k each plus $10k each as gifts for the next 4 years. Result would be $100k in I-bonds that capture the current 9.62% and then keep up with inflation subsequently. Better than keeping it in cash. Brainstorm: they could also buy each of you I-bond gifts for the next 5 years. Getting the total in I-bonds up to $200k. Thank you, this is a good idea. They asked about this as well but we havent given it serious thought. Since we buy $10k each per year for ourselves they wouldn't be able to transfer the gifts to us until we stop. Could you not stop buying the i Bond for yourself immediately? Take your $20,000 and put it in VTI or wherever you wish you could put the ...

Are you subject to the 3.8% NIIT? It applies if your MAGI is over $200k if single or $250k if married. For instance, a married couple with an AGI of $300k would pay 27.8% on each additional dollar of interest. There are also different credits that are phased out as income rising. The additional tax plus the loss of a credit will mean that each dollar of interest results in a greater loss of refund than just predicted by the marginal tax bracket.

Shooting4Sixty wrote: ↑Fri Mar 17, 2023 2:15 pm

This is the breakdown I got from Fidelity
Domestic Stock 52%
Foreign Stock 24%
Bonds 17%
Short Term 6%

The last jones statement shows a return of ~5.5% over the last 5 years while the SP500 returned ~9.5% I'm not sure how to get back more than 5 years on my account history from jones but it seems like I should be doing closer to the index.

Thank you!

I took the standard Vanguard three fund portfolio in the proportions shown in your break down in put it into Portfolio Visualizer. The corresponding CAGR was 5.55% so your results while at Edward Jones were consistent. The S&P 500 did get close to 10% during the last five years, but Vanguard Total International returned less than 2% CAGR and Total Bond was essentially 0.

Aguilar wrote: ↑Sat Mar 11, 2023 4:06 pm I think I figured this out.

I had $9023 in realized losses. $4957 in long term losses. $4066 in short term losses. No cap gains. Software now shows I have a short-term capital loss carryover of $2,566 and a long-term capital loss carryover of $4,957 from 2022 to 2023.

Schedule D line 21 says 1500. It's in parentheses but there's no negative symbol. I'm filing married filing separately (our divorce was just finalized in Jan 2023) so I think that's why it shows 1500, not 3000.

So does this mean a $1500 loss is applied to my taxable income in 2022 and the rest of the losses carry over to 2023?

Yes.

This should have been disclosed somewhere in the documentation you received before the transition. It sounds like you would have been able to move the funds out of the stable value account at that time to avoid this situation. I know that I have transferred funds within a retirement account before a change in the record keeper because of differences in how they would be handled in the transition.

The deduction on the state is from the increased federal AGI to get your state back to where it was. You only deduct the state refund on the state tax if:
1) the state uses a calculation that starts with federal AGI; and
2) that federal AGI includes an amount attributable to the state refund.

I'm thinking about setting up a 5 year CD since that will be the only thing generating income and this can help me limit how frequently I need to file tax returns for the trust. How will this help you limit the frequency of a tax return? A bank CD will still pay interest every year even if it is a 5 year CD. A CD must be 1 year or less to hold the interest payment to maturity. Well gosh, I definitely thought I could find one that would pay at maturity, not monthly or annually. Is that not the case anywhere? Pretty sure the IRS requires a 1099-INT to be issued each year for any CD with a maturity of longer than 12 months. It is not up to the bank. Our tax guy told me it would be $800 for a trust return (so it really only makes sense if the ...

In the detailed section, I see a table with the heading "Total Interest Income Not Included in Box 3 (Box 1)" and then it listed all my t-bill interest income, with a notation of CORR (meaning correction). I guess this can be interpreted in two ways. Interpretation 1: They are listing these as ADDITIONAL interest income that are not reported in Box 3 and the word CORR on each entry indicates that this is a new entry in the amended form. Interpretation 2: "Total Interest Income Not Included in Box 3 (Box 1)" indicates that the listed items were not included in Box 3 (Box 1) PREVIOUSLY and the word CORR on each entry indicates that it is corrected now. I hope Interpretation 2 is the correct one. I found an additional erro...

nfs wrote: ↑Sat Mar 11, 2023 11:07 pmI'm thinking about setting up a 5 year CD since that will be the only thing generating income and this can help me limit how frequently I need to file tax returns for the trust.

How will this help you limit the frequency of a tax return? A bank CD will still pay interest every year even if it is a 5 year CD. A CD must be 1 year or less to hold the interest payment to maturity.

^Sound like BS. The OID table is not used for short-term government obligations, which is what T bills are. The instructions on reporting OID for TIPS is in IRS pub 540, and is pretty clear. You should refer them to that. I've done multiple tax returns for family and friends with TIPS in taxable at Vanguard, and the OID was reported correctly on 1099-OID for every one of them. Kevin Thanks again for replying. I received an amended form today. The numbers in the 1099-INT form are correct now. However, I see some oddities/incorrect information in the detailed section. Do I have to worry about the "stuff" in the detailed section as long as all the numbers in the boxes in 1099-INT are correct? Thanks. Usually, you are the only one wh...

Fin In wrote: ↑Fri Mar 10, 2023 12:35 am I converted the money into existing funds. In hindsight I should have converted into a new fund.

In case, you did not realize it from the other answers, it is not relevant which destination fund that you used.The movements between investments are never tracked that way in an IRA for tax purposes.

I feel that a very useful source is:
https://www.identitytheft.gov

It is operated by the Federal Trade Commission so they are not going to try to sell you anything.

They list the phone number for Experian as 1-888-397-3742. I have never needed to call myself so I have no first hand knowledge of how difficult it might be to reach a person.

Did you go back and look at your tax year 2021, Sch A, line 7? The maximum number there is $10,000. What did you report?

Indianrock wrote: ↑Tue Mar 07, 2023 3:23 pm Unfortunately we don't itemize our taxes so I probably wouldn't be able to deduct the early withdrawal penalty

It is entered on Schedule 1, part 2, line 18. It just simply reduces your AGI.

I think the PDF should be password-protected. And it seems redundant to send by email something that I already completed on their site. I'm new to this, trying to understand and also be cautious. Waiting for their response. TY. I agree with you but then I am more concerned with email PDFs than most. I had a bank employee mail me a form complete with social security numbers just as if it was any attachment. I was not emailed a copy on my onboarding survey as far as I can remember. I also do not recall that it contained anything like social security numbers or account numbers. Most of what I remember from the survey was not the kind of detailed information that would be of interest to a criminal. But it has been a few years so my memory may ...

Will there be funeral home visitation? If so, I second the personalization aspect of it when possible. For one member of the family it was simply framing photos and decorating the room with those. I attended a funeral where the deceased made birdhouses and about a dozen of his creations were brought in. One visitation was at a funeral home outside the city and near a family member’s home. They had the grill going for a several hours.

Thank you for honoring your uncle’s wishes. Your plans sound wonderful.

Also, you'll probably be charged an account closure fee around $95 per account. Yeah, it's highway robbery but you'll be so happy you are out of EJ. Moving from EJ to Fidelity is very likely an excellent choice. But why would an account closure fee of $95 be considered highway robbery? I have used several brokerages and all of them, most who are considered a “discount” or “low cost” brokerage have had a fee of at least $75 for a full transfer. Or are you just expressing an opinion about the industry as a whole? Bogleheads: Correct me if I'm wrong, but I am under the impression that Vanguard does not charge a fee for transferring out of their funds. Best wishes. Taylor This prompted me to do some research. It seems that Vanguard, where I ha...

One thing you could do is to do Roth conversions up to the limit of your existing tax bracket. It makes no sense to me to put yourself into the next tax bracket up with a Roth conversion. You could model this with tax software, run scenarios and see how your taxes are affected. ACA subsidies is the complicating factor. We're in the 12% bracket. Let's say our expected income is $50K (family of 3)...converting $60K of Roth funds (taking income up to $110K, which is close to the top of the bracket after standard deduction), results in $8000 less in subsidies for the year. Worth it? The simplest way to look at that would be to view it as being in the 25% tax bracket. So how does that compare with your best guess for future withdrawals without ...

You have three accounts. Are all the funds in the same money market fund? Which money market fund?

radiowave wrote: ↑Sun Mar 05, 2023 8:44 am Also, you'll probably be charged an account closure fee around $95 per account. Yeah, it's highway robbery but you'll be so happy you are out of EJ.

Moving from EJ to Fidelity is very likely an excellent choice. But why would an account closure fee of $95 be considered highway robbery? I have used several brokerages and all of them, most who are considered a “discount” or “low cost” brokerage have had a fee of at least $75 for a full transfer. Or are you just expressing an opinion about the industry as a whole?

I am with the group that says she has enough assets and income. And that there are more options than in the initial post. If you do not want to own the home and MIL wants to stay, why is a reverse mortgage off the table? If you do not want to own the home and MIL decides to sell, why is her only option to move in with you? Has either party explored rentals near her current home or yours? How much interest are the credit cards charging? While it would have been better to have addressed this a year ago, a lower cost consolidation loan may be an option. Her vehicle is may still be worth over $20,000. If she is driving minimally, is there a better, and maybe safer, use of those funds? What alternatives would she have for transportation. I think...

I do not know how long the latest transponders last. But, in my experience, transponders are not forever. I think I usually need to replace between 5 and 10 years.

When my transponder has not read, there has been a simple process to enter the account information online and be credited. But I was in the same state that issued the transponder and don’t know if that works across borders.

How are they mounted? I thought the most common method was Velcro strips. You could then only put the transponder needed in place. I have used the suction cup mounts but without a lot of consistency.

I assume that enforcement varies by locality. It even varies by judge within the same court house here. A judge who hears criminal cases in my county takes jury duty obligations seriously. He sends a Sheriff’s Deputy to your home and place of employment if you do not show up when called. If the Deputy finds you, you can go with the Deputy, give reasonable cause for not, or be arrested. I know nothing about California.

BolderBoy wrote: ↑Fri Mar 03, 2023 9:23 am To all those who seem to be interested in this, STOP!

You can get the exact, same info, advice and how-to right here for FREE!

I have no idea who Craig Wear is or if he is inappropriately using bogleheads for self promotion.

But investing is easy, taxes are not. A majority of people are not capable of determining the best plan for Roth conversions. The analysis must take into account many factors and takes many hours to do right. Even then, a person might need a third party to act on the numbers over the emotion. The biggest issue with hiring someone is that so few financial advisors do it right.

You have previously stated that these accounts have about 3 million dollars. At 4% interest, that would be $10,000 a month. This is the ballpark of current interest rates. As others said, last year the same money market accounts were near zero.

Now that it is clear that more than half of your investments are in a taxable account, I do hope you have decided to get quality assistance to help with your tax return. It seems that you have the sale of over $1.5 million in investments to report to the IRS.

Your withholding is not only affected by your total income for the year but also how you received the income. If you get paid exactly the same in each paycheck for the whole year, your withholding will be different than if you had bonuses or a mid year salary increase/decrease.

Set up the Find My Phone app. After the perp leaves with my phone and Pin/fingertip, I just brick the phone from the nearest smartphone or computer. Your financial accounts may already be drained by then. Access to your phone will provide access to all sorts of password reset protocols and 2FA facilities. How? Even if the criminal got into my bank or brokerage account, how could they drain my account “by then.”. I am specifically referring to the scenario in the WSJ article where you know your phone has been taken. The money transferred in the article was limited to cash transfers using Venmo and such. I never have more than $1000 in the account that I link these apps. If the criminal attempted to transfer money from my brokerage or bank a...

The WSJ also posted a video on their Youtube channel yesterday which was done in conjunction with the article that is behind the paywall. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QUYODQB_2wQ Lots of good tips in this video that highlight the often overlooked but severe vulnerability introduced by your iPhone passcode. To summarize the problem: 1) thieves (often in groups) are watching you as you enter your passcode in a public place such as a bar 2) thieves steal your phone when you are distracted at the bar or restaurant and enter the passcode 3) thieves immediately change your passcode and iCloud password, locking you out of your iCloud account 4) thieves use passcode to access all of your passwords in the iPhone password keychain 5) thieves use ...

gurusw wrote: ↑Sat Feb 25, 2023 9:45 pm

Marseille07 wrote: ↑Sat Feb 25, 2023 3:13 pm I'm not an expert in COBRA but I believe you basically continue the same coverage, I don't believe you can make changes. But what's nice about it is that you can join COBRA retroactively after something actually happened, so HDHP might be just fine if nothing happens.

How does that work? If something happens in 3rd month, do I pay for first 2 months also; or does my coverage start from the day I see doctor?

Also what do you people do for dental & vision? Just bear the full cost when unemployed?

You have 60 days to sign up. And 45 days to pay after signing up. If you sign up within 60 days, the coverage is retroactive so there is no gap in coverage. You can not decide in month 3 to sign up for Cobra.

Contact Taxpayer Advocate or your local congressional rep. The taxpayer advocate is for situations where the individual has tried to get help from the IRS without out success. I would personally feel that contacting your congress person should be the same. It seems that lawman has not yet spoken to the IRS at all. I do not believe there is a dedicated helpline with live assistance for information on a prior year return. You will just need to go through the general line to get to a live person. I suspect your error is that you are going through the phone tree and making the selection that you are calling about a refund. You can not make that selection and get to a live person. You will need to choose a different option. If you do an online ...

Can you be more specific about what is on your phone that concerns you the most? It is probably best to have those things set up to only be accessible by using biometric ID or a password. For instance, If someone took my unlocked iPhone, they could not get in to my financial accounts with using FaceID or a password. If you are on ios 16, you can require a passcode to view a Note that contains sensitive information. On the other hand, if the thief wants to go on twitter as me, read me grocery list or watch a movie on my HBO account, I can live with that.