Our Ethan Allen furniture from mid-2017 has held up fairly well. It was not cheap, though.
We purchased from Haverty's in 2014 at what we thought were fairly good prices, and by 2017 a table and a couch were donation-worthy.
Search found 4395 matches
- Tue Mar 19, 2024 2:24 pm
- Forum: Personal Consumer Issues
- Topic: Ethan Allen Furniture
- Replies: 32
- Views: 3652
- Mon Mar 18, 2024 10:07 am
- Forum: Personal Consumer Issues
- Topic: Realtor has ideas and a buyer
- Replies: 24
- Views: 2197
Re: Realtor has ideas and a buyer
Why did your friend simply believe the realtor? In either case?
The "I know a buyer" thing might actually be believable if realtor were willing to significantly reduce commissions (since she doesn't have to prep, photo, list, do showings, get feedback, etc.). But if I'm paying 'full price' then I'm going to want to see what the market says.
Realtors are vastly overpaid and mostly of very limited value but your friend was in the driver seat the entire time.
The "I know a buyer" thing might actually be believable if realtor were willing to significantly reduce commissions (since she doesn't have to prep, photo, list, do showings, get feedback, etc.). But if I'm paying 'full price' then I'm going to want to see what the market says.
Realtors are vastly overpaid and mostly of very limited value but your friend was in the driver seat the entire time.
- Wed Mar 13, 2024 5:40 pm
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: Charles Schwab cannot overnight a replacement debit card
- Replies: 87
- Views: 6419
Re: Charles Schwab cannot overnight a replacement debit card
This must be a new policy. I have had a Schwab debit card overnighted to me in Germany. This was in 2013.
That’s an unfortunate development if this is a new policy and not just an uninformed rep or some temporary disruption on the part of their card manufacturer or something.
It would certainly cause me to reconsider where my seven-figure balance was. With the spread between their bank rates and the market risk-free rate at several percentage points and their lack of branches, they should be able to afford overnighting a well-heeled customer a debit card.
That’s an unfortunate development if this is a new policy and not just an uninformed rep or some temporary disruption on the part of their card manufacturer or something.
It would certainly cause me to reconsider where my seven-figure balance was. With the spread between their bank rates and the market risk-free rate at several percentage points and their lack of branches, they should be able to afford overnighting a well-heeled customer a debit card.
- Fri Mar 08, 2024 6:02 am
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: Putting in two weeks notice same day as bonus payment
- Replies: 25
- Views: 2871
Re: Putting in two weeks notice same day as bonus payment
If you see it in your account, it is safe to resign. There would be no basis for them to attempt to reverse the deposit unless it is some type of signing bonus for which you agreed to a term. A typical annual bonus is earned once received, and usually the policy is either you are an active employee at the end of the year, or you are an active employee on the date the bonus is paid.
- Wed Mar 06, 2024 7:29 am
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: Giving (unequal) money to adult children
- Replies: 90
- Views: 8413
Re: Giving (unequal) money to adult children
While this isn't exactly an estate question, I keep thinking about how common it is for someone to find a reason to be unhappy with an estate settlement - no matter how well intentioned and reasoned the bequests might have been. As such, I think one might as well just go with whatever they think is best and let the chips fall where they may. In a case like this one, the child who isn't doing well might feel that the estate shouldn't be distributed equally because the other siblings don't need the money. Whether that thinking is reasonable or not seems at least somewhat irrelevant since the net result may still be a lot of hurt feelings and/or family dysfunction. I think a key distinction is that if a child feels unhappy with receiving an a...
- Wed Mar 06, 2024 5:41 am
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: Giving (unequal) money to adult children
- Replies: 90
- Views: 8413
Re: Giving (unequal) money to adult children
That isn’t a stipulation I would recommend accepting in a situation where you have multiple children and only one is asking for money.BarbBrooklyn wrote: ↑Tue Mar 05, 2024 8:18 pm "
With regard to transparency, when my SIL asked me to be guarantor, he asked explicitly for me not to tell other family members. So I can't exactly tell my other kids that I'm paying off a loan without breaking that confidence.
- Tue Mar 05, 2024 7:01 pm
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: Giving (unequal) money to adult children
- Replies: 90
- Views: 8413
Re: Giving (unequal) money to adult children
My dad counseled me with "Fair" is not always "Equal". Wise words I think. My feeling is that it is your money to do with as you wish. Our spending is a reflection of our desires and values. If your kids can't understand that, then maybe it would be appropriate to remind them of what your desires and values are. It is most surely the OP's money and decision. That said, I'd reference again the book I mentioned, with many interesting stories. One theme that came up several times is that when unfairness was perceived, that sometimes caused a rift between the children. Yes, one might argue, life is not fair, etc etc. Life is not fair, but children want their parents to be fair. Of course, that book was focused on estates, a...
- Tue Mar 05, 2024 2:33 pm
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: Giving (unequal) money to adult children
- Replies: 90
- Views: 8413
Re: Giving (unequal) money to adult children
I agree with being equal with your children but I am not sure I would lose a lot of sleep as a parent or a child over the fairness of lackthereof of $7,000.
Now if this is 7k after 20k after 15k after 25k after having college paid for (unlike other siblings) after a car … that a different.
But if this is the first deviation from the ledgers being equal, I guess I have to shrug.
Now if this is 7k after 20k after 15k after 25k after having college paid for (unlike other siblings) after a car … that a different.
But if this is the first deviation from the ledgers being equal, I guess I have to shrug.
- Mon Mar 04, 2024 6:29 am
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: Helping mom with finances - how do I get access?
- Replies: 48
- Views: 4012
Re: Helping mom with finances - how do I get access?
If she is still capable of handling things herself and just needs help organizing, just have her share her credentials with you. As long as you don't do anything in the accounts she isn't aware of and directing herself, there is in reality no issue. I promise you families share login credentials with each other all of the time. It isn't illegal and to the extent it might violate technically a term of service, in the real world there is no issue, apart from perhaps a soft lockout because you're in DC and she's in CA, or something like that. (In that case, try Remote Desktop or gotomypc-like stuff.) You'll need a POA at some point or another if you need to further your assistance services, at which point you can then establish your own creden...
- Sun Mar 03, 2024 9:43 am
- Forum: Personal Consumer Issues
- Topic: Best way to pay for a car in cash with Schwab
- Replies: 20
- Views: 1643
Re: Best way to pay for a car in cash with Schwab
The last few cars I’ve bought I paid for by personal check; never questioned about it. I asked one of the dealers how they know the check will be good and he told me they use a service that checks if the account is good for that amount plus they know where I live. To my knowledge there is no service that knows how much is in my checking account, that would violate my expectation of confidentiality with my bank. Besides, the amount changes everyday. https://www.securepaymentsystems.com/early-warning-services Many services integrate with EWS, which does keep near real time information on your balances at reporting banks. BTW, your bank can basically share whatever they want about you with others if they deem it necessary in the servicing or ...
- Sun Mar 03, 2024 8:44 am
- Forum: Personal Investments
- Topic: OK to pay down large chunk of mortgage?
- Replies: 35
- Views: 2848
Re: OK to pay down large chunk of mortgage?
It’s absolutely wrong to pay down (but not off) a 2.375% mortgage, unless perhaps you can recast it. Otherwise you get no cash flow benefit, as you still have a mortgage, but you have lost liquidity which could have been earning you a premium. I would go further and say it’s wrong to accelerate any payment on a mortgage under 3% when risk-free rates are above 5%, but folks will disagree for emotional reasons. That’s fine but recognize those reasons are emotional and not fact- or reason-based. You’ll get nice sound bites like “the grass feels different” and “wealthy people don’t use debt” neither of which are actually true. The argument from a poster above that it should be paid down like it is harming your family is ridiculous. If anything ...
- Fri Mar 01, 2024 12:57 pm
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: Divorce and co mingling asset question
- Replies: 49
- Views: 6984
Re: Divorce and co mingling asset question
Yep. When the question is "should I take precautions?" the answer is "of course not". When the question is "I'm divorcing, am I screwed?" the answer is "you should have taken precautions". Not just this board. Everywhere. Every time. I agree with your general point though I'll argue those who have been through divorce before generally do suggest folks should be proactive in taking precautions but those who are married and have never been divorced tend to clutch their virtual pearls at the mere thought of taking precautions about a potential divorce. The latter group, particularly on Bogleheads tends to drown out the former. And I fully admit I have been on both sides of this over my time here. It is ...
- Thu Feb 29, 2024 6:26 am
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: Requesting a credit limit increase
- Replies: 23
- Views: 2660
Re: Requesting a credit limit increase
Present the most favorable picture of your income you can reasonably justify.
- Wed Feb 28, 2024 4:51 pm
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: Fidelity as a one stop shop
- Replies: 6053
- Views: 1037361
Re: Fidelity one-stop - backup option for writing checks
You can just ask Fidelity to send you a box of checks, they will. Or you can order checks from a 3rd party if you want to pay for them to get a cute logo or something. For some reason I thought they would only mail printed checks - looking into this. I think you just print out and fill out the checkwriting form, (I think it's located at https://www.fidelity.com/bin-public/060_www_fidelity_com/documents/customer-service/CHECKWRITING.pdf ) or https://scs.fidelity.com/accounts/onlineforms/onlineforms.shtml?formName=CHECKWRITING&blank=Y . Then you scan and upload it. While the form says it arrives in two weeks, it's been taking longer than three weeks recently. It's easier than that. Either call them and ask for checks or do it online. Cas...
- Wed Feb 28, 2024 10:50 am
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: Pay Over Time Plan
- Replies: 12
- Views: 1186
Re: Pay Over Time Plan
Obviously "what's in it" for Chase is that you're now aware of this option and you're intrigued enough to use it at no cost to yourself. The next time you need to stretch out a purchase, you might remember that you had a good experience with this option, and then you would put the purchase on that card and use the pay-over-time feature even at a modest cost. Not exactly sinister. Last year I had to front a significant amount of money - $6,500 or so - to an out-of-network dentist for some dental work. I would be reimbursed about 65% of that total from our dental insurance, but only 2-3 weeks after the procedure, and in order to schedule the procedure, I had to pay in full. I used a pay-over-time feature at Chase to give myself some...
- Wed Feb 28, 2024 8:53 am
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: Tech forward bank recommendations: instant transfers and decent bill pay
- Replies: 38
- Views: 2812
Re: Tech forward bank recommendations: instant transfers and decent bill pay
I have come to the conclusion that one being afraid of Zelle is 100% a reflection of one’s confidence in themselves. You have to work at it to send money to a scammer. If you don’t trust yourself to not do it, then I can understand being scared of it. I don’t care what Clark Howard says.
- Sat Feb 24, 2024 1:54 pm
- Forum: Personal Investments
- Topic: Fidelity CMA overdraft
- Replies: 66
- Views: 9367
- Sat Feb 24, 2024 10:03 am
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: Can a employer-covered 401(k) charge be charged to me?
- Replies: 27
- Views: 2050
Re: Can a employer-covered 401(k) charge be charged to me?
I sympathize with wanting to get to the bottom of this, believe me, but from a career perspective, knocking on HR/exec doors over less than a buck in your 401k may cost you much more in the long run.I_Am_Not_A_Doctor wrote: ↑Sat Feb 24, 2024 9:44 amLess than a $1.00, which is why this feels like a mistake versus something I initiated (I don't do much with the account at this point other than contribute and wait/watch).
But it prompted questions and now it's the part where no one is explaining what the fee is for that's bothering me at this point.
- Sat Feb 24, 2024 8:17 am
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: Handling Inheritance In A Marriage
- Replies: 49
- Views: 5655
Re: Handling Inheritance In A Marriage
26 year stable marriage...always co-mingled in the past...one child 24...just put the inheritances in you joint account. Terrible advice IMO even for stable long marriages. You should NOT pool the funds nor have each other be sole beneficiaries. If you want to ensure the money goes to your daughter then you'll want to set up an appropriate estate plan. You die, your wife remarries, daughter doesn't get along with new guy, wife dies without an estate plan, new husband had a will/trust leaving all of his assents to his kids. This applies to all their assets though. There is nothing particularly unique about the inheritance. The right answer is proper estate planning for everything* *IANAL so discount what I say appropriately What’s unique ab...
- Fri Feb 23, 2024 1:57 pm
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: Handling Inheritance In A Marriage
- Replies: 49
- Views: 5655
Re: Handling Inheritance In A Marriage
Even in California, inheritances are separate property up until the point they are commingled.
Given you don't need either inheritance, why not leave both of them separate? You can't undo the commingling; once it's done, it's done. If you end up needing some of the money, it's easy enough to commingle just a portion.
Given you don't need either inheritance, why not leave both of them separate? You can't undo the commingling; once it's done, it's done. If you end up needing some of the money, it's easy enough to commingle just a portion.
- Fri Feb 23, 2024 12:49 pm
- Forum: Personal Consumer Issues
- Topic: Best place to buy personal domain? Best place to host it? (for email)
- Replies: 53
- Views: 5481
Re: Best place to buy personal domain? Best place to host it? (for email)
I buy domains at pair Domains, host DNS at AWS, ... This may be more "techie" than most are interested in, but curious why you use a separate service for DNS hosting. I've found DNS customizability (if one is interested in that for, say, setting SPF records) to be pretty good at Pair. Just to add: I discovered Pair Domains (formerly PairNIC) many years ago because a semi-famous computer nerd named JWZ registered his domain there (he still does), so I figured they must be techie-friendly (and I've found them to be so). I liked the distributed nature of DNS hosting at AWS (they replicate to a zillion different nameservers around the world) and it is cheap enough. I think I am billed around a buck a month. In truth it is overkill. P...
- Fri Feb 23, 2024 11:36 am
- Forum: Personal Consumer Issues
- Topic: Best place to buy personal domain? Best place to host it? (for email)
- Replies: 53
- Views: 5481
Re: Best place to buy personal domain? Best place to host it? (for email)
I buy domains at pair Domains, host DNS at AWS, and run my own email server. (I used to use Google Workspace but when they wanted to charge for the previously-free account types last year, I decided I was going back out on my own.) I set up a little box in my office running Postfix and Dovecot. It is not for the feint of heart, but it works, and I can do whatever I want with it.
- Fri Feb 23, 2024 10:47 am
- Forum: Personal Consumer Issues
- Topic: College cheating, what would you do?
- Replies: 64
- Views: 4453
Re: College cheating, what would you do?
I saw the worse cheating in the Greek system, where they’d keep old tests for folks to study. Makes me less willing to hire someone that was in a fraternity or sorority. Why is this cheating? If the instructors handed back graded tests to the students, the test questions are in the public now, unless the instructor explicitly forbade students to share such questions. If a fraternity/sorority somehow got the old tests via some other ways. For example, if the instructor does not return the graded exam and a student purposely took two during the exam so that he/she could "smuggle" one out, then I see your point. I encourage my students to look at old exams. Unless the instructor simply recycle questions, this is not an issue. Using ...
- Fri Feb 23, 2024 10:42 am
- Forum: Personal Consumer Issues
- Topic: College cheating, what would you do?
- Replies: 64
- Views: 4453
Re: College cheating, what would you do?
In this specific case it appears that the OP's daughter is mostly concerned because she feels her accomplishment is not as valuable due to someone else cheating. That's concerning because their will always be someone who gets promoted faster or the larger raise raise even though we think they don't deserve it. What happens in that future? Does she focus on what she can control and have a conversation with the boss focused on how she can improve? OR does she go to the boss and complain that so-and-so got the raise/promotion and didn't deserved or decide working hard is not the way to success? 100%. This case as posed seems a pivotal moment for developing OP's daughter's sense of self and her relationship with the world. Is she always compar...
- Fri Feb 23, 2024 10:06 am
- Forum: Personal Consumer Issues
- Topic: College cheating, what would you do?
- Replies: 64
- Views: 4453
Re: College cheating, what would you do?
The only correct answer here is to mind her own business. Life will be full of people who irritate her; an important life lesson will be understanding how to find contentment in oneself and not worry about how others get by. Another important life lesson will be that one person's definition of cheating in a certain context is another person's definition of working smartly and productively in another context. A third life lesson will be to understand that when your daughter inevitably makes a mistake or a misjudgment in life, now or in the future, she may well appreciate not having a close associate waiting to tattle on her.
- Fri Feb 23, 2024 5:31 am
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: What does Schwab do better than Fidelity?
- Replies: 305
- Views: 50299
Re: What does Schwab do better than Fidelity?
i'm genuinely surprised how many people hate Zelle. i've been using it for years with no problems. the fact that transfers are instant means i can send money to myself between bank accounts instantly, which gives me tons of flexibility. without it, ACH takes at best one business day. every single scam with Zelle requires an explicit action done by the victim. Precisely. Zelle poses zero risk to anyone who doesn’t purposefully initiate a payment to someone else. If one is scared of Zelle then they either don’t understand it or they don’t trust themselves to use it. The latter may well be an astute self-judgment but it should not reflect on the service as a whole. In terms of dealing with scams, if people learned to delete or ignore texts or...
- Thu Feb 22, 2024 9:08 am
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: Maximum ACH transfer?
- Replies: 25
- Views: 2758
Re: Maximum ACH transfer?
A wire is quick, secure, and well worth any small fee.
- Sat Feb 17, 2024 1:10 pm
- Forum: Personal Consumer Issues
- Topic: [On-going Scams - Post them here]
- Replies: 1375
- Views: 167079
Re: [On-going Scams - Post them here]
Haven’t seen this posted yet so I thought I’d share a sad and sobering, but also highly engaging and educational story about a recent scam perpetrated on an established financial columnist for $50,000 cash. We all think we would catch on to the obvious red flags, but do we really know how we would respond under stress, and fear of physical harm? These are targeted attacks where the scammers not only know your information but are also local and have people nearby to facilitate the scam (in this case, to drive a car to victim’s house to pick up the cash). In this case, they also certainly knew she had at least 50k in cash in her bank account. The gist of the story is that victim gets call from Amazon informing her she is victim of identity t...
- Fri Feb 16, 2024 1:00 pm
- Forum: Investing - Theory, News & General
- Topic: Vanguard Cash Plus Account
- Replies: 511
- Views: 69552
Re: VG Cash Plus - Payment Challenge with IRS
Yes, Target Red Card and Bank of America are also other problematic institutions in terms of recognizing the Cash Plus account. It has made it worthless for me.
- Fri Feb 16, 2024 12:55 pm
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: 14%+ Used Car Loan
- Replies: 44
- Views: 3544
Re: 14%+ Used Car Loang
I’d investigate whether being a cosigner on the loan would lower his rate sufficiently to make it worthwhile to take the small risk associated with a $10,000 loan. If it's worthwhile to cosign, it's probably even more worthwhile to just provide the loan yourself and charge 8 or 10% interest. If you are going to take the risk on yourself, atleast get some return on your risk. I agree with this. Or if you qualify for special dealer financing, grab that, pay the loan yourself, charge your son 5% interest, and add him as an authorized user on your credit card (don't give him the card; just open the additional card and stash it away yourself). Then he inherits a good tradeline to assist with future credit needs, pays a reasonable rate of intere...
- Fri Feb 16, 2024 7:34 am
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: employer throwing me into the meat grinder - need to be talked off the ledge
- Replies: 146
- Views: 24394
- Thu Feb 15, 2024 1:50 pm
- Forum: Personal Consumer Issues
- Topic: Pay cleaning lady for snow day?
- Replies: 119
- Views: 10294
Re: Pay cleaning lady for snow day?
So now not only are we paying for services not performed but we're also paying more money on top? I can understand, even if I don't agree with, the argument for paying the regular amount but for the life of me I can't wrap my head around paying even more than that in case she had a bad day.
- Wed Feb 14, 2024 9:52 am
- Forum: Personal Consumer Issues
- Topic: Pay cleaning lady for snow day?
- Replies: 119
- Views: 10294
Re: Pay cleaning lady for snow day?
This swings it for me. If she is so booked she can't make up the service, then her business is doing fine, and you don't need to pay for a service you did not receive. If she would prefer more free time, she can choose to raise her rates to shake out some customers, and then she'd have more flexibility to make up services she didn't perform if she expects to get paid for them.
- Wed Feb 14, 2024 7:24 am
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: [Using PayPal to pay bills and earn 5% on credit cards]
- Replies: 603
- Views: 90428
Re: [Using PayPal to pay bills and earn 5% on credit cards]
On February 1 I paid FirstServices Residential (our HOA management firm, at least for now) our annual HOA dues via PayPal bill pay on my cash back rewards card. My PayPal account is so old it still has an ING Direct savings account attached that has long since been closed. The payment was credited to my HOA account on February 6. All rewards appear properly credited on the card side. This is one of the only payments I make this way but it has worked for several years and I am glad it continues to as well.
- Wed Feb 14, 2024 6:48 am
- Forum: Personal Consumer Issues
- Topic: Pay cleaning lady for snow day?
- Replies: 119
- Views: 10294
Re: Pay cleaning lady for snow day?
What “power differential?” So we all need to compare balance sheets with our service providers before deciding to pay for services not received?
- Wed Feb 14, 2024 6:06 am
- Forum: Personal Consumer Issues
- Topic: Pay cleaning lady for snow day?
- Replies: 119
- Views: 10294
Re: Pay cleaning lady for snow day?
I’d welcome the opportunity to reschedule the missed cleaning but I would not pay for service not performed.
We have had the same cleaner since fall 2017. When she comes she gets paid. When she doesn’t she doesn’t. We in fact have just “promoted” her to weekly - they come every Friday. This has doubled her receipts from us on an annual basis. But we still would not pay for services not received.
At the holidays I give one “paycheck” extra as a bonus. That’s the extent of my paying extra. (I suppose this year we will double that.)
We have had the same cleaner since fall 2017. When she comes she gets paid. When she doesn’t she doesn’t. We in fact have just “promoted” her to weekly - they come every Friday. This has doubled her receipts from us on an annual basis. But we still would not pay for services not received.
At the holidays I give one “paycheck” extra as a bonus. That’s the extent of my paying extra. (I suppose this year we will double that.)
- Tue Feb 13, 2024 6:49 am
- Forum: Personal Investments
- Topic: should i pay off a car at 1.9% or invest in a cd at 5.5%
- Replies: 67
- Views: 6387
Re: should i pay off a car at 1.9% or invest in a cd at 5.5%
This type of sound bite response isn’t terribly helpful for OP. It’s not even true anyway. Many wealthy people lease their cars, which, gasp, is an expensive way of financing a depreciating asset.Squirrel208 wrote: ↑Mon Feb 12, 2024 8:21 pmWealthy people don't get that way by financing the purchase of depreciating assets. <shrugs>
The correct move here given the existence of the loan and the purchase of the car having already been made is to invest in the CD that pays more than 300 basis points over the note in question.
It isn’t going to be a huge amount of money but there is a correct answer.
- Mon Feb 12, 2024 9:21 am
- Forum: Investing - Theory, News & General
- Topic: Vanguard Cash Plus Account
- Replies: 511
- Views: 69552
Re: Vanguard Cash Plus Account
Unfortunately ran into both of these this morning while doing mid-month bill payments. This account is useless for my personal workflow if I can't pay two important billers, and instead I have to transfer money to an account these payees recognize. The point for me of Cash Plus is cash in a high yield account without withdrawal restrictions, not to have some cash in a high yield account for some purposes but then other cash elsewhere for a couple of transactions a month. I don't know whose fault it is and (not trying to be rude, but) I don't really care. Back to Schwab I go.
- Sun Feb 11, 2024 7:19 pm
- Forum: Personal Consumer Issues
- Topic: Another Wells Fargo Story. What to do?
- Replies: 17
- Views: 2890
Re: Another Wells Fargo Story. What to do?
It is nonsensical to me that debits and credits do not qualify as activity yet once the account was made inactive they would presumably both be blocked. If those types of transactions are not activity, then why block them? Typical nonsense from Wells Fargo.
- Wed Feb 07, 2024 6:10 am
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: Margin Loan for Home Purchase?
- Replies: 18
- Views: 2625
Re: Margin Loan for Home Purchase?
Not very. It isn’t a realistic concern if one borrows a quarter or less of their total account value. Their account would have to lose more than half its current value before there was any trouble.placeholder wrote: ↑Tue Feb 06, 2024 10:57 pmThe person in question has about 4X the loan amount in assets so how likely is a margin call?
I wouldn’t want to carry it for years at a time but for a few months even up to a year and a half or so, I’d be fine with it.
- Wed Feb 07, 2024 6:06 am
- Forum: Personal Consumer Issues
- Topic: Paying for A Car Boglehead Style
- Replies: 64
- Views: 7185
Re: Paying for A Car Boglehead Style
Buy a new Toyota or Honda, pay cash (sell shares) unless you can get a rate under 4%. Keep for at least ten years.
- Mon Feb 05, 2024 6:31 am
- Forum: Personal Investments
- Topic: Is paying off a 2.99% mortgage always a bad idea?
- Replies: 332
- Views: 24984
Re: Is paying off a 2.99% mortgage always a bad idea?
Because he could do math?
“The winning formula for success in investing is owning the entire stock market through an index fund, and then doing nothing. Just stay the course.”
— John C. Bogle
“The two greatest enemies of the equity fund investor are expenses and emotions.”
— John C. Bogle
In the situation OP posits, he would remove money from the market, thereby not staying the course, and pay long term tax on it to satisfy an emotion. I doubt Bogle would advocate either.
- Sun Feb 04, 2024 1:01 pm
- Forum: Personal Investments
- Topic: Is paying off a 2.99% mortgage always a bad idea?
- Replies: 332
- Views: 24984
Re: Is paying off a 2.99% mortgage always a bad idea?
I am pretty confident Jack Bogle would not accelerate repayment of an existing 2.99% mortgage.HMSVictory wrote: ↑Sun Feb 04, 2024 12:22 pm
If you step back from the groupthink here on the forum and ask yourself "would Jack Bogle borrow on his house at 2.99% to invest"?
No, he would not. Simplicity > complexity.
- Fri Feb 02, 2024 8:30 am
- Forum: Personal Consumer Issues
- Topic: Mechanical Protection Plans - anyone ever benefit from them?
- Replies: 16
- Views: 1485
Re: Mechanical Protection Plans - anyone ever benefit from them?
I don't mind buying the Toyota or Honda extended protection plan separately from another dealer willing to sell it for about $1,000-$1,200 if you are going to keep a vehicle for 7-10 years. It usually works out to about $100-$120 per year which is an inexpensive price to pay to avoid several thousand dollar repair bills. I wouldn't buy a third-party warranty/service agreement and I certainly wouldn't pay the ridiculous markup on the captive plans at the dealer at the time of sale. I would avoid the store agreements for refrigerators, appliances, computers, things like that - getting them to pay out either timely or at all, or to get a repair, can be absolutely maddening. They are not worth the expense, however minimal it is. We had a refrig...
- Fri Feb 02, 2024 5:56 am
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: Wire Fraud in Real Estate Transaction - What Next?
- Replies: 122
- Views: 14455
Re: Wire Fraud in Real Estate Transaction - What Next?
Before you get a new lawyer, how about simply ask your current lawyer what his or her plan is to clear the lien on your property. I.e., make it clear you know that was what you hired him or her to do and that is what is going to happen, whether voluntarily or involuntarily. Unless and until you get an unsatisfactory answer to that question/demand, there is no reason to spend extra money and possibly make a bad situation even more combustible. And that is coming from a lawyer. Mistakes happen and it is human nature for people to stick their head in the sand when they do. But you don’t always need a lawyer to unstick it, and shouldn’t need to when already dealing with a lawyer that knows what the deal is. Exactly, I think people jump to hire...
- Thu Feb 01, 2024 6:31 pm
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: Children unprepared to manage our trust after our deaths.
- Replies: 67
- Views: 7954
Re: Children unprepared to manage our trust after our deaths.
I did not read the thread word-for-word but if this is all very complicated and requires tutoring and lessons and working together with far-flung siblings and it’s not even for your children and instead for your grandchildren, well, it doesn’t sound all that attractive. Cool, a chore that requires cooperation and I don’t benefit at all . Well, maybe I'm odd, but I love my step-children far more than that and I love my grandchildren even more. I would do anything to help them and have, on many occasions, accepted any chore they needed help with, despite knowing there was nothing in it for me, beyond expressing my love and helping out. Frankly, I'm getting a little shocked by some of the posts on here demonstrating a shallowness I cannot com...
- Thu Feb 01, 2024 6:01 pm
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: Children unprepared to manage our trust after our deaths.
- Replies: 67
- Views: 7954
Re: Children unprepared to manage our trust after our deaths.
I did not read the thread word-for-word but if this is all very complicated and requires tutoring and lessons and working together with far-flung siblings and it’s not even for your children and instead for your grandchildren, well, it doesn’t sound all that attractive. Cool, a chore that requires cooperation and I don’t benefit at all .
- Thu Feb 01, 2024 3:14 pm
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: Wire Fraud in Real Estate Transaction - What Next?
- Replies: 122
- Views: 14455
Re: Wire Fraud in Real Estate Transaction - What Next?
Any attorney worth any salt these days should have an E&O policy and a cyberinsurance policy. Unfortunately I suspect you are in for a bit of a struggle but I suspect you'll come out whole.
I agree with other posters that your closing attorney is no longer your attorney as they're going to suffer in making this right.
I agree with other posters that your closing attorney is no longer your attorney as they're going to suffer in making this right.
- Thu Feb 01, 2024 3:08 pm
- Forum: Personal Finance (Not Investing)
- Topic: Wire Fraud in Real Estate Transaction - What Next?
- Replies: 122
- Views: 14455
Re: Wire Fraud in Real Estate Transaction - What Next?
This would have had absolutely no effect on the case, as the error was made on the part of the attorney disbursing funds to the involved parties, not the OP wiring in money into the closing attorney's escrow account, leaving alone the fact that around here, no closing attorney will accept a cashier check for real estate transactions due to other types of fraud.
- Wed Jan 31, 2024 8:44 am
- Forum: Personal Consumer Issues
- Topic: Restaurant prices - 'I won't be back anytime soon" list
- Replies: 28
- Views: 2525
Re: Restaurant prices - 'I won't be back anytime soon" list
It's not just you, and that other type of attitude ("I don't have to sweat the small stuff") is what enables this decline.220volt wrote: ↑Wed Jan 31, 2024 8:43 amAs I said, it's not about money, but principles. I simply refuse to pay more for lesser quality. But that's just me.