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John151

Thanks!

John151

My stock investments are all in taxable accounts, so I can’t rebalance within accounts that are tax-advantaged. Currently my stocks are about five percentage points above my target, but rebalancing by selling shares would cost me a hefty amount in capital gains taxes. So I’ve decided not to sell. I’...

John151

When I opened an account with Tax-Managed International back in 2011, all of my dividends were qualified. But now that the fund has morphed into Developed Markets Index, only 71% of my dividends are qualified, and the foreign tax credit has dropped as well. So I’m paying more in taxes than I was pay...

John151

I handle it somewhat differently. My preferred asset allocation is 5% in cash, 60% in bonds, and 35% in stocks. My cash allocation is my emergency fund. It’s invested in a money market fund, and it’s enough for me to live on for several years. It isn’t paying very much, but I like knowing that it’s ...

John151

Vanguard offers a couple of inflation-linked bond funds: Vanguard Short Term Inflation Protected Securities (duration of 2.8 years) and Vanguard Inflation Protected Securities (duration of 7.8 years). Their net asset values fluctuate and are reported each weekday. I Bonds are more like a stable valu...

John151

I’ve had a TD account for fifteen years, and I’ve never had a problem with it. The maximum purchase for I Bonds is $10,000 a year per social security number, and I’d invest more than that if I could.

John151

I’m very fortunate in that my pension covers all of my usual living expenses. If I need to buy something major, like a new car, I can draw on my investments, but I seldom need to do that.

John151

Now that Vanguard’s Prime Money Market Fund is paying around two percent, is there any reason to invest in savings accounts with online banks? Ally Bank’s online savings account is paying 1.80 percent.

John151

I think of my Vanguard money market fund as my emergency fund. My dividends are reinvested in it, and dividends from my tax-exempt bond fund and my two stock index funds are paid into it as well.

John151

I haven’t sold any stocks, but I’ve directed my investment income and any new money into a tax-exempt bond fund. This keeps me within my allocation bands.

John151

I’ve been investing with Vanguard for over thirty years, and I’ve never had a problem. Vanguard service, for me, has been great.

John151

sport wrote: ↑
Fri Jul 27, 2018 3:13 pm
I love Vanguard. However, when it comes to "staying the course", that is something they tell others to do, but do not follow themselves. I am still unhappy about the change to what used to be the Tax Managed International Fund. It is no longer tax managed, but I am locked in.

Me too.

John151

I’m a conservative retiree in my seventies. For many years I kept about 5% of my investments in cash, defined as my checking account and a money market fund. Then came the Great Recession. When the yield on my money market fund dropped to almost zero, I responded by moving money that I could have ke...

John151

I followed the “age in bonds” rule of thumb for many years, and that’s where I was when I retired. But with the huge run up in stocks, at seventy I now have 35% in stocks, and selling down to 30% would trigger major capital gains taxes. So I’ve decided to leave my stocks alone. My pension is more th...

John151

Condo board members are usually well intentioned but often ill informed. My condo association’s primary governing document is called the Declaration. It’s forty pages long, and in the thirty years I’ve lived in my association, I may be the only unit owner who’s actually read it. The board members si...

John151

I prefer Treasury Direct’s authentication method: they send you a one-time passcode via email. But Vanguard’s authentication method isn’t too bad. They offer you a choice: you can have them require authentication every time you login to your account, or just when you’re logging in from a different c...

John151

A Vanguard money market fund. For backup, I have a tax-exempt bond fund.

John151

When I was working, I usually went to bed around 11 p.m. and got up at 7 a.m. Now that I’ve retired, I stay up until 3 a.m. and get up around 11 a.m. I’ve never been a morning person, so I sleep through most of it. Sleeping late is one of the best things about being retired.

John151

A Vanguard money market fund and a Vanguard international stock fund: about 5% in each.

John151

Today at noon Central Time I was able to login and see my bond values. I didn’t try to buy or sell anything.

John151

At 8:52 pm Central Time, I entered my account number, my one-time passcode, and my password. TD then wanted me to verify my contact information. I did so. Then ten or fifteen seconds later, I got the “Treasury Direct is unavailable” message. I tried again ten minutes later with the same result.

John151

My Illinois condo is taxed at about 2% of estimated market value. There’s no cap on how high it can go. This year’s tax went up 12% to pay for improvements in local schools. State and local sales taxes are 9%. State income tax is 4.95%. Last year I spent more on federal, state, and local taxes than ...

John151

My international stock index fund has almost doubled in value, and my domestic stock index fund has more than tripled, so about 50% of my investments in taxable accounts are unrealized capital gains. I don’t expect to sell any of my stock investments. My pension and investment income more than cover...

John151

If your overriding goal is safety of principal, go for it. You’ll save a bit on taxes, since Treasury income generally isn’t subject to state income taxes. But I’d recommend that you keep your TIPS in a tax-advantaged account, because otherwise you’d have to pay federal income taxes each year on “ph...

John151

I usually login to Bogleheads around ten in the morning, and then again around ten in the evening. In the morning, I usually find ten or twelve posts that I want to read, but only two or three in the evening. Have you had a similar experience? Is it because most posts are posted in the morning? Or i...

John151

I wouldn’t want to have all of my fixed-income investments in TIAA Traditional, because it isn’t adjusted for inflation, and it isn’t backed by the federal government. But I have all of my 403(b) account in TIAA Traditional, and it makes up about 25% of my fixed income investments. The rest is in I ...

John151

targ wrote: ↑
Mon May 14, 2018 9:59 am

Tamalak wrote: ↑
Mon May 14, 2018 9:51 am
... All the OP is asking for is for the front page to be consistent with the professionalism of the sub-form pages. ...

Then might I suggest the OP load this as his bookmarked link:
www.bogleheads.org/forum/search.php?sea ... ive_topics

+1 That's what I use.

John151

When interest rates were at rock bottom, I kept only about 1% of my investments in cash, defined as my Vanguard money market fund. I don’t own bank CD’s, and I count my I Bonds as “bonds.” Now that rates are rising, I’m working toward having 5% in cash, again in my money market fund. I consider it t...

John151

About three months’ worth of expenses. If I need more, I can draw on my Vanguard money market fund.

John151

Would that be a problem if I’m using an average cost basis and there’s a loss overall?

John151

I’ve harvested tax losses a number of times over the years. Sometimes I’ve sold all shares in a fund and then invested the proceeds in a similar but not substantially identical fund. Other times, I’ve sold all shares, put the proceeds in a money market fund, and then, thirty-one days later, reopened...

John151

On a $10,000 investment, changes in the fixed rate and the inflation rate are pretty negligible, so I buy the legal limit in January and then forget about it.

John151

I stopped buying I Bonds when the fixed rate dropped below one percent, but I’ve resumed buying them for all of the reasons listed above.

John151

I’m a conservative investor in my seventies. In the late 1990’s and early 2000’s, I routinely kept about five percent of my investments in cash, defined as my Vanguard money market fund. I don’t own any bank CD’s, and I count my I Bonds as “bonds.” When the yield on my money market fund dropped to 0...

John151

I've decided not to over-analyze it. For both I-Bonds and annual IRA contributions, I make all purchases in early January ($10,000 each for me and my husband for I-Bonds and $6,500 for each of us for IRA which is a tIRA >> Backdoor Roth). This way, I get these investments out of the way at the begi...

John151

On an investment of $10,000, changes in fixed rates and inflation rates are pretty negligible, so I buy the maximum in January and then forget about it.

John151

I’m seventy, and my equity exposure is increasing all by itself. The stock funds I’m invested in have doubled in value, and I’m currently about six percentage points above my allocation target for stocks. I could sell enough shares to get down to my target, but I’d have to pay substantial capital ga...

John151

I'd like to thank all of you for your responses. I started filing with TurboTax when I qualified for free filing through Vanguard. When Vanguard dropped that benefit, I switched to TaxAct, and when TaxAct raised its prices, I switched to FreeTaxUSA. TurboTax offered the advantage of importing my inv...

John151

I asked this question last year and the year before that, and I thought I’d ask it again this year. How did you file your income taxes? Did you calculate your taxes manually? Did you use tax preparation software? Or did you have your taxes prepared by an accountant? In February, I calculated my 201...

John151

I asked this question last year and the year before that, and I thought I’d ask it again this year. How did you file your income taxes? Did you calculate your taxes manually? Did you use tax preparation software? Or did you have your taxes prepared by an accountant? In February, I calculated my 2017...

John151

I’ve been investing with Vanguard for over thirty years, and I’ve never had a service problem, with one exception. I was invested in Vanguard’s Tax-Managed International Fund, and all of its dividends qualified for favorable tax treatment. Then Vanguard decided to merge the fund with Vanguard Develo...

John151

I consider my checking account and my Vanguard money market fund to be my emergency fund. I count them as the “cash” component of my investments, and they form about five percent of my portfolio. If I need more than that, I can draw on my Vanguard tax-exempt bond fund.

John151

I think it depends on how your tax-advantaged account is invested and on what you want to do with the proceeds. Mine’s in a stable value fund paying three percent, and I’m planning to invest my RMD in a tax-exempt bond fund. The former pays more than the latter, especially after taxes are withheld f...

John151

I’m a retiree in my seventies, with about a third of my investments in stocks. My pension covers most of my living expenses, and I have enough in bonds to see me through to the end of my days. The correction didn’t frighten me at all. My stocks could go to zero without affecting my lifestyle in the ...

John151

I filed with FreeTaxUSA this year for the first time. As has been mentioned, FreeTaxUSA doesn’t import investment information, but it was easy to copy and paste from my electronic investment statements, and the whole thing took only an hour or two. Preparing and e-filing my federal return was free. ...

John151

Here’s a reason to file early on: tax preparation services like TurboTax and TaxAct often raise their prices as the tax season progresses.

John151

I’m a retiree in my seventies. I keep about 5% of my savings in cash, defined as my checking account and a Vanguard money market fund. I don’t mind that it’s paying very little. I like knowing that it’s there if I need it.

John151

I filed on February 15 using FreeTaxUSA. The IRS says I’ll get my refund around February 26.

John151

In twenty-five years of investing with Vanguard, I’ve never gotten a corrected 1099. I filed when Form 8606 became available, on February 15. I like to get it out of the way as soon as possible, even if I’m not expecting a refund.

John151

Like FiscallyResponsible, I wish we had the option to use email for authentication. It works well enough with Treasury Direct.

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