Personal Investments • Projections of qualifed vs non-qual dividends
Even it is likely a pointless exercise, I do like to project ahead to determine tax liability in the future. One of the factors is the amount of taxable distributions from Stocks. I have some cash but...
View ArticleInvesting - Theory, News & General • Bond Ladder and purchasing power and...
Suppose you have a fix expense like a mortgage for 10 years, you can create a 10 year bond ladder to pay for each of those year. Because a mortgage is fixed, purchasing power is not a factor in the...
View ArticlePersonal Finance (Not Investing) • Changing Estate Documents in California
I wanted to update some of the names / contact information in my spouse and I's estate planning documents for executor, guardians, emergency contacts, etc. No other substantive changes — just updated...
View ArticlePersonal Finance (Not Investing) • Use HSA Proceeds to Make Solo 401(k)...
I’m self-employed and have a solo 401(k) plan. In previous years I’ve always contributed enough to my solo 401(k) through employee and profit-sharing contributions to push my taxable income down to...
View ArticlePersonal Investments • Simplifying Portfolio- Getting away from Managed Accounts
Hi, requesting input- I have part of my Rollover IRA professionally managed and paying a % based fee with 100% stocks. I signed up not realizing the fee amount (have been paying about $1200 annually)....
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Personal Finance (Not Investing) • Help with Backdoor Roth and FreeTaxUSA
This year I decided to attempt to do our 2023 taxes myself as a learning exercise and hopefully build confidence to do it going forward in life after using a tax preparer for the past several years. I...
View ArticlePersonal Consumer Issues • How do you buy a mattress?
This has been a challenging area for me. There seems to be way too many brands out there. There isn't a calibrated definition of firm or plush or cooling. There seems to be so many fancy terms and...
View ArticlePersonal Investments • How far to draw down tIRA when doing Roth conversions?
I've heard it said here that when doing Roth conversions it's a good idea to leave some amount of money in the tIRA for two reasons: (1) to fill up the lower income tax brackets each year, and (2) to...
View ArticlePersonal Finance (Not Investing) • TSP Contributions Roth vs PreTax
I am a GS-13 govt employee with about 15-20 years left in the service. I will likely reach at least step 10 GS-14 so my pay has the potential to go up by 60% by the time I retire.Currently I...
View ArticlePersonal Investments • Wash sale rules in retirement accounts?
Let's say I buy stock Z in my tIRA, and sell exactly the same amount of stock Z in my Roth account, on exactly the same day, taking a loss (on paper, just based on the purchase price).Is that a wash...
View ArticlePersonal Investments • Seeking advice on annuities
I've recently done some consolidating of my accounts. I've moved most everything except my current workplace 401K and my savings/checking account to Fidelity. I've also converted my old 401K accounts...
View ArticlePersonal Finance (Not Investing) • Schwab Roth IRA Excess Contribution...
Hello,I have a somewhat nuanced situation with several questions.2022 tax year: In 2022 I over-contributed to my Roth IRA in Schwab, realized this in early 2023 when filing taxes, and withdrew the...
View ArticlePersonal Finance (Not Investing) • Buying and running a business
Hi,My wife and I would like to start a side hustle - the goal is to own and run an independent business rather than doing a regular job. Note that we both are currently employed with adequate salary....
View ArticlePersonal Finance (Not Investing) • Fidelity Fully Paid Lending program - anyone?
Anyone have experience with Fidelity’s Fully Paid Lending program? You allow them to borrow your stocks and are paid “interest” in return. It is supposedly fully collateralized and you can exit at any...
View ArticlePersonal Investments • Portfolio question
Hi,My wife and I both are employed and have our respective 401K, we max out every year. We cannot contribute directly to Roth IRA so we put money in tIRA and immediately convert it to Roth IRA. We...
View ArticlePersonal Investments • What to do with SIMPLE IRA and taxable account?
I just got a new 401k provider at work, so it seems like a good time to shuffle things around. I started out with a sensible savings/retirement plan like 10 years ago, but I’ve let it get a bit messy...
View ArticleNon-US Investing • Moving invested money in 5 years (Japan/Portugal)
Hello everybodyContext:I'm from Portugal, but have been living in Japan for about 7 years. In about 5 years me and my wife (Japanese) are planning on moving to my country, and after 1 year if she...
View ArticlePersonal Investments • Backdoor Roth IRA Question
Previously had been contributing to a Vanguard Traditional IRA brokerage and then doing the backdoor to the Vanguard Roth IRA brokerage.Recently I've been happier with Fidelity platform. I had a...
View ArticlePersonal Consumer Issues • New Laptop Questions
Want to get a new laptop ahead of the Windows 10 sunset.Currently have an 2016/2017 HP Envy with 7th generation Core i7, 16GB RAM, that is still going strong.I'm debating between a new HP Spectre x360...
View ArticlePersonal Investments • Selling to diversify or wait for eventual step-up
Looking for articles and advice on selling stock that is making me nervous and thus paying LTCG tax of 23.8% (on 96% of current value) versus instead waiting on it and letting our heirs sell after...
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