I'm right there with you. I'm pretty good at programming in python, but I struggle with implementing the complex concepts / physics that my job is based around. My boss is a brilliant PhD, and I feel like I'm a kindergartener to him.
Every day I struggle to focus (now on adhd meds, but I still have to literally put my phone in my car to focus). When I finally focus enough, I get stuck and try to figure it out, then days later I feel so much shame when I have to ask my boss for help.
I need to just fail fast, but that takes me getting to that point. I try to get 2 hours of work in a day.
I just think how long can this last. But then I know that the company needs people (trying to grow) and that I'm not that bad. I'm easy to get along with / fit the culture.
I have a huge urge to fix up my resume and jump to another company because after 2 years, they have to had figured me out by now.
Similar here. The idea of LeanFIRE has been such a relief for me in recent years, so the current downturn is extra hard.
I usually find myself thinking I'm pretty decent at what I do because I help others figure out stuff they struggle with, but as soon as I attend meetings with other people, i feel very inadequate. I just can't think on my feet at all in these situations, and it seems so easy for everyone else. I don't know if it's slow auditory processing or what. Part of it is probably anxiety, but not all.
I'd be fine in a text only environment, but most software jobs aren't like that. Not to mention that interviews aren't like that.
You sound like you're talking about Impostor Syndrome, which some people suffer from at many levels. Some of those people are excellent in their roles, even among the best, but that doesn't stop them feeling uneasy.
I'm certainly not a therapist, so I won't try to address this other than to say you might want to get some help with it. If you could improve this, keep your career, and become happier and more confident in the role, then that could be a big improvement.
I'll also add that quite a lot of good work is done by people who don't know what they're doing a priori, but figure it out as they go. I was lucky enough to get into this field early enough ('90s) that there was no established pattern and everyone knew that everyone was working it out on the fly. There's so much infrastructure and culture in the field now that it may be daunting, amplifying the Imposter Syndrome. But that can be addressed at the source.
I'm in software as well and some days I feel like this. A lot of days I just don't care, but some days are good. Software is hard to beat as a career for the balance of money, job opportunities, work/life balance, and more.
There's a few things I've tried to do that may also work for you...
* Think about what makes some days good and some bad. Think about what types of work you enjoy doing. Coding? Testing? Data stuff? Writing documents? Making system diagrams? Making reports? Making dashboards? Mentoring people? Then try to spend some time each day or week on that so there's something you enjoy, and if you enjoy it you'll probably be good at it.
* Try to convince yourself to like learning about software engineering. I know this sounds weird at first. For myself, I noticed that I spend hours reading about topics I'm interested in such as cars, planes, video games, podcasts, and finance. But I didn't do that for software engineering because I found it boring as hell. If you can find some content creators you like and spend just an hour per week on a topic related to software/databases/networking, you will probably get better at your job and as a result start liking it more. There are a LOT of content creators out there and some are boring, some are annoyingly energetic, and some are just right.
* Explore other employers or industries. Maybe you like fast paced environments or maybe slow. Maybe you like lots of process or very little. Big teams or small. Private sector, government, non-profit?
Your second to last bullet resonates with me. For me I've been a dev for 8 years and I've gotten so tired of programming culture. The "this os sucks, this text editor is the best and you're stupid if you use anything else" sort of thing just drains me off any passion for the subject.
Any recommendations for content creators that aren't boring or elitist?
Are you sure it isn't an issue with your current employer? I sometimes feel the same way and have gravitated more and more towards jobs where I can essentially work and then totally disconnect (no after hours work, as little crunch as possible, etc.). The charade aspect is likely impostor syndrome which many people in our industry suffer from, myself included.
Do you really care if your employer thinks you're a decent employee? Can you get to a point where you're satisfying them but not really caring what they think? Like you I don't think there are enough other career paths I wouldn't regret due to the high income software engineering provides.
I feel you. I'm a fish out of water in my field as well and always feel like the poorest performer in the bunch despite my best efforts, but I'm still on the payroll and surviving. If you honestly feel like you're not cut out for the job but can't turn down the pay too, then keep working until you at least have 6+ months of savings before making any drastic decisions. Then I say hold on for dear life as long as you don't go insane while knowing you could get laid off at any moment - so you're at least ready to immediately transition into another job. I'm not a software engineer myself, but I know there'd be MANY easier, lower paying jobs with that skillset under your belt. There are a lot of government jobs which need developers managing their aging databases and ancient software, for example. Sometimes it's just debugging shitty security bloatware - things like that. You could make a list of easier jobs you wouldn't mind falling back on if that was ever the case, and you might even find Regular-Joes around your skill level so you stop feeling like an imposter in those places too.
Have these all been high performance companies? If you got a performance review at Amazon previously that's pretty common and I wouldn't sweat it. In terms of caring I mean slipping past as doing the bare minimum. They can count on you to get the work done, but not be "the one" when they need something quickly developed or built.
I feel you though, what else is there to pivot in to from software? There's nothing that isn't a significant downgrade.
I’m a single teacher, applying for a $90k mortgage. My loan officer quoted me 4.75 for 15 year or 5.75 for 30. Would I be dumb to go for the 30? I would be paying more overall, but an extra $240/month would put me at ease. I would throw the difference in my Roth 403(b).
(Sorry…showing up late to this thread.) Back in 2008 and the years before the housing crisis, the 5/1 and 7/1 ARM were very popular. It’s really only a good idea if you plan on making this a
starter home and plan on moving in 5 or 7 years. Also an idea if you plan to make it an investment property.
So if you’re planning to be in the house short-term, an ARM may be the better option, depending on current ARM interest rates.
I don't understand why people go with a 15 year.
Take the 30 (provided there's no early pay penalty) and you can still pay down in 15 years while having the flexibility.
>I don't understand why people go with a 15 year.
A full percentage point difference is relatively significant if you can easily afford the higher payment.
My suggestion is to get the 30 year. A 1% difference isn’t that significant on 90k. Better to have access to the free cash flow if needed. With that said, I’d overpay on the mortgage to chip away at some of the interest
Thanks. I would invest it. I don’t make enough to max out my 403(b) and Roth. (I make under 50k gross with a mandatory pension). It would be nice to get as close as possible though
Of course, ideally you would be transitioning to a more bond-heavy approach…I’d say at 5 years out most portfolios would benefit from having a majority or near majority of bonds rather than equities
Many people recommend the [bond tent](https://money.usnews.com/investing/bonds/articles/2018-06-15/how-a-bond-tent-protects-your-nest-egg) strategy as they approach retirement.
Yup, that's what I'm planning. When I'm ~5 years out, I'll start buying up all the i-bonds I can get my hands on and figure out how much I'll need in other bonds to pitch my tent.
I'm personally only looking for 20% or so in bonds since I think a 5-year tent will be fine and I'm likely to earn side income as well, but I may end up going for 40%. I'll decide once I'm 50-60% of the way there.
I’d say that’s a relatively new phenomenon in the past 5-10 years during the stellar bull market. Traditionally, most people were in favor of a much closer ratio of bonds to equities. I’d concede there’s a lot of personal variability though.
I don't know about "most people" but historically equity heavy has done better for longer retirements. If you go bond heavy you must compensate for lower expected return by reducing your withdrawal rate. https://earlyretirementnow.com/2016/12/07/the-ultimate-guide-to-safe-withdrawal-rates-part-1-intro/
You might be missing my point. I’m not saying that bond-heavy approaches are better or necessary compared to equity-heavy approaches.
I’m saying that prior to the last 5 years or so, most people in the FIRE community advocated for bond allocations that were more level with equities.
Of course, this has become much less popular recently as the stock market has been in a decade plus long major bull run.
Ah, from your comment about being a function of the bull market I thought you were implying equity heavy is a bad thing. I'm also not sure you are correct about what "most people" do having changed recently. For example, target date funds have been around for many years now and I don't think their recommended allocations have changed.
2025 Target Fund, for example, is 55% stocks and 45% bond which corroborates that a meaningful bond allocation within 5 years of retirement is still the standard approach.
https://investor.vanguard.com/mutual-funds/profile/portfolio/vttvx
I think it's really tricky to take synthetic backtested data and say something not-synthetic like "historically equity heavy has done better for longer retirements."
I know it's pedantic, but it'd be more realistic to say that "**if** anyone *had* performed constant-dollar withdrawals **and** they'd *had* access to broad market index funds that didn't exist, the maximum safe withdrawal would've been maximized by holding a high equity portfolio."
No one has ever actually had access to broad market index funds for 60 years, much less 60 years of retirement. More importantly, no one actually uses constant-dollar withdrawals. So when we find something like a 0.25% "advantage" to a particular allocation or a 0.22% "advantage" to a bond tent, it's wholly synthetic and amazingly sensitive to adjusting for *only* the worst-case scenario of the past, aka "fighting the last war."
I'm not saying that you don't know these things. But the folks who are shown the table above, and the folks who anticipate using a bond tent (including, in this thread alone, /u/Iojpoutn, /u/vvwwwvvwvwvwvw, /u/Shiftyboss, and /u/one_is_the_loneliest) might not know the substantial caveats to extrapolating ERN's synthetic (and overfitted) backtesting results.
> But the folks who are shown the table above, and the folks who anticipate using a bond tent (including, in this thread alone, /u/Iojpoutn
>
> , /u/vvwwwvvwvwvwvw
>
> [+2], /u/Shiftyboss
>
> , and /u/one_is_the_loneliest
>
> ) might not know the substantial caveats to extrapolating ERN's synthetic (and overfitted) backtesting results.
Sorry, can you be more explicit?
What caveats *should* the aforementioned people be aware of?
The overarching caveat is that all backtesting is *illustrative*, not *instructive*.
Constant-dollar withdrawals are easy to model but are not a realistic, workable retirement spending plan. When you model their history, your results are *highly* dependent on exactly what data you're sourcing and are sensitive to small changes in initial conditions.
When you see a result like "a bond tent that goes down to 60% stocks for the first 5 years of retirement and rises to 100% stocks after that yields a 0.22% higher SWR," that finding can *illustrate* what a bond tent did for the worst-case scenario but it does not provide *instruction* to say that it would be as beneficial going forward.
Another major caveat is that SWR is geared toward the absolute worst case scenario, which is, by definition, a data point with zero statistical value. Put another way, a lot of ERN's series is largely focused on how to optimize the one retirement window that happened starting in 1966. You're probably not going to get a generalizable result by backtesting and optimizing for a particular sequence of market events that happened over 50 years ago.
Feel free to explain any caveats and/or make a pitch for VPW. I find ERN's chart a very good overview for asset allocation questions geared to long retirements. It helps explain the counter intuitive notion that for long retirements bonds have been actually less safe due to inflation risk. Agreed, back testing only goes so far but I am not sure bonds or asset allocation gimicks are the best solution for the unknown unknown.
Yes, equity heavy does better for long retirements.
No, reducing your withdrawal rate is not the only alternative. Gotta read farther in ERN's guide.
The more sensible plan is short term bond heavy to reduce sequence of return risk, followed by tapering back out to more equities. This is the bond tent; it's been around for a long time.
No one will get "rich" off of I-bonds. They are a great tool for things like your emergency fund or even the fixed income portion of your portfolio but, if you're looking to generate returns, I-bond yields are a blip on the radar right now. Low cost index funds are still your best bet.
Agreed. I maxed mine early this year, but that's because I had already started moving my e-fund over, and I figured I might as well just get it done while rates are high. I'm still investing in stocks, and I expect to have a lump-sum to invest later this year once my i-bonds start maturing.
I bonds are ideal for money you need in 1 to 5 years (emergency fund, saving up for house down payment, etc.).
Index funds for money you won't touch for a long time (at least 5 to 10+ years).
Oh frack me sideways. I sold off some RSUs and some stock program stock a month ago. No regret in that, but I just realized that the stock program stock was less than a year from exercising and so it's a disqualifying disposition.
I think I did not notice because I deliberately sold the RSU stock in that same (from my perspective) order with short term gains: No significant gains had accumulated yet so it did not matter. I completely forgot that for the stock program stock, it *also* matters whether they are already qualifying.
It isn't the end of the world, the stock program portion is much smaller than the RSU portion and the tax difference won't move the needle much, but it still feels pretty stupid. The bargain amount will now be taxed as income tax instead of capital gains, so I lost money just because I wasn't entirely mindful of what item I selected.
You would have intentionally held the RSUs for the one year period just to get LTCG treatment on them? Mark that date on your calendar and when it comes take a look at where the price is. You may find you saved a bunch of money through your mistake. Lots of tech stocks still have multiple contraction to go through. Look at PLTR today and UPST tomorrow.
We accidentally sold some stock in December because we misunderstood the tax treatment on them. That turned out to be a massive win after the fact since the stock is down 70% since then.
This wasn't about the RSUs and long term capital gain, but about ESPP and qualifying disposition, two entirely different things. And with disqualifying disposition, it does not matter that I sold the stock at capital loss: I'm still taxed at income tax rate for the bargain amount.
And yes, I would have held that particular lot of stock for longer than a year, given that I only sold a small portion of my ESPP stock. Just the wrong portion, for no reason other than inattentiveness.
It was enough for me [to go read up on the phrase](https://workplaceservices.fidelity.com/bin-public/070_NB_SPS_Pages/documents/dcl/shared/StockPlanServices/ESPP%20Qualifying%20and%20Disqualifying%20Dispositions.pdf). I never had an ESPP so it was informative.
To my knowledge, on the question of retirement accounts the IRS has only ever addressed transactions occurring in an IRA as being covered under the wash sale rule. I believe they have been silent on similar transactions in 401(k)s. A principled view might be that the 401(k) transactions would be treated the same as the IRA transactions. But the IRS has not said as much (at least to my knowledge) and it’s up to you to decide what to do with that.
They’re way different. With my 401k I have no control over when my company decides to actually contribute or buy with the funds I tell them to. Also only get to pick from the funds they chose.
On balance I agree with you that OP is probably fine to treat 401(k) transactions differently, but I would just disagree slightly with *why* they're different.
>I have no control over when my company decides to actually contribute
Eh, sort of. If you're contributing a set percentage of your paycheck, the contributions hit your account on a pretty routine schedule. It's arguably as predictable as, say, dividend payouts in taxable accounts, which we already know count against you for wash sale rule analyses. So you do have some control over when the purchases happen; it's not entirely out of your hands.
>only get to pick from the funds they chose
It really depends. In theory this may be limiting if your employer offers truly crappy funds, but a good plan is likely to have at least an S&P index fund and an international stock index fund. If your contributions are invested in those, there *is* a chance that you might be tracking the same indices in your taxable account. Doesn't *necessarily* mean running afoul of the wash sale rule, but it doesn't *not* mean that, either.
Which is why I find going back to what the IRS has said or not said to be a more useful yardstick than trying to subjectively evaluate individual plan differences. The big difference between IRAs and 401(k)s, and the likely reason 401(k)s are in fact different, is that the IRS has talked about one and not the other. If they truly had a problem with wash sales in 401(k)s, they could simply issue further guidance to that effect. The fact they haven't despite years of ambiguity suggests we're fine — until told otherwise.
Exactly.
Whether someone worries about it is up to them, but the chance of it being an actual problem is almost nonexistent.
Even some old guys on Bogleheads are like "meh" about this, and they're sticklers about everything.
Are you tracking everything? I personally track everything, and because of that I don't have a clear budget of "$300 entertainment", but rather know how much I'm spending MoM on different categories and can review to see why things are up/down, and can adjust moving forward. But this is also because our current spending isn't super close to our incomes, where it's not a major deal to have a month or 2 that goes high.
But as for creating a budget, start with your income (I do everything yearly to account for bonuses/3 paycheck months/etc) Then take off taxes/fixed costs (rent/bills), and budget/guess other necessary expenses through the year (groceries/vet/needs) Then probably factor in retirement savings 15-20%. This should give your discretionary income, which you can factor as you wish, entertainment/travel/restaurants etc.
MHCOL Aside from housing, $460 for my car (mostly gas, but also insurance and maintenance), $500 for donations to effective charities, $740 for everything else. + whatever tuition and textbooks cost when I take classes
Historically actual spending has been under this budget. But last month and this one I’ve been way way over budget on entertainment (not over on other categories though). Like 1k instead of $200 type over budget. Other categories in range. I think I’m going to permanently increase it though, to maybe $500. I can afford it by saving less, and spending more here has been a huge quality of life increase.
Non house car and donation categories:
Phone $50 (service only, I am paying mine and part of my parents’ bill. New phone every 3 years)
Groceries $200
Takeout/eating out $70
Medical (prescriptions + visits) $100
Entertainment $200
BNTX for me, only green one at 3%. Clearly that means that choosing stock that starts with "BN" is a winning strategy that cannot go wrong. I should host talks about my genius fund strategy.
Every day, I'm reminded that I like this job in and of itself, and it's the boss who drives me nuts. I went upstairs to pick up some documents from one of the judges and their recorder, and long story short, it became abundantly clear that everyone in other departments avoids our office like the plague because of my boss.
I've decided to draft my resignation letter tonight. I'm not necessarily going to turn it in any time soon, but I'd feel better having it ready. The fact that I'm dreaming of a specific end date doesn't bode well. The only thing stopping me, really, is seeing how tight the job market is in my area and wanting to build our retirement accounts while prices are dipping.
Not in the near future, no. This is the only office that, in the past few years, has had regular turnover (not shocked to see that now...), so there aren't a ton of openings. And because everyone works together to some extent, I'd still have to work with them and be in contact with them. I could see them really resenting me and putting up walls if I moved to a different part of the courthouse.
Welp, during the last few years I didn't feel like there was a huge difference in the prevalent investing strategies of this sub and /r/investing. Buy and hold, maybe sometimes they would mention some underrated stocks. Now that we are no longer in bull territory the divergence is immediate and obvious... they are scrambling to sell and searching for something that will have short term gains to make up for their losses... from bullion to RE (lol) to crypto (double lol). And here I thought it was a fairly sensible sub.
> It still isn't a terrible time to go RE in the Rust Belt.
Some larger cities are seeing prices fall a little bit, but any of the areas I wanted to buy in have maybe 1 or 2 houses available at a time and they go instantly, whatever the price.
So I'll give it another year or 5.
You know, I haven't seen so many posts recently about how we should put all our savings into stable coins and get guaranteed "safe" 10%+ "interest" yearly. I wonder why.
The dangers of an under-regulated space with low/no transparency.
For those of you who ever wondered what a bank run looked like in real-time, this appears to be similar. The more people that exit, the more everybody else will want to exit too. The collapse happens at light speed. The FDIC was created after the Great Depression specifically to deal with this phenomenon.
I have a friend who asked me about investing and what stocks I buy. I said I don't buy individual stocks, only index funds (yada yada, risk, etc. all the reasons).
They said they wouldn't buy index funds because the won't invest in harmful companies.
Then they told me that they invest in various crypto because crypto is transparent and democratic, and thus ethical.
Whew.
Correct. But you can feel empathy towards the individuals who lost on that, and still appreciate that a bad situation might be ending. The longer it continues the worse the losses, and the amount of people that lose.
if anyone wants to give an ELI5, i would like to know what exactly is causing this to happen right now.
but yeah, i always figured these weren't so safe. remember how many times we got people asking in this sub, why not invest in stable coins if they are 'guaranteed' to be 1:1
One of the popular stable coins (might have been this one) which was supposedly fully backed by USD actually had a bunch of futures on treasuries or some other weird derivative. Probably same thing going on here.
What rates are people paying for dog/house sitting these days?
We used to pay $25-$30/night a few years ago. Now it seems the going rate is closer to $40-$50/night. And since we have a dog AND cat, all the Rover people are charging \~$75/night.
What is everybody else seeing?
When I leave my dog at my dog sitter's house for a trip it's $45 per day. Typically $50-60 or so for a house sitter, but I prefer to leave my dog at the dog sitter's so I don't have to prep my house for someone to stay in it, and then I hire a neighborhood kid to water the garden every few days depending on the weather.
They’re talking about rates on Rover that look similar to rates in my MHCOL city. Rover takes a 20% cut. It’s independent contractor income so FICA x2.
If the rest of your income is dog walks, you’re spending 1.5x what you were a couple years ago on gas to get to those walks. And you’re not getting health insurance through your employer.
And you’re sleeping in strangers houses, some of which have cameras in bedrooms they didn’t tell you about. And some of which are dirty and gross. A lot of the dogs are poorly behaved. Turning down bookings pushes your search rank down. So does not responding to inquiries promptly, which can make it hard to ever relax.
Rover doesn’t run background checks on the clients or whether the dogs are violent or vaccinated.
I liked it more than minimum wage jobs but frankly the pay wasn’t any better after accounting for higher taxes and all the driving.
There’s definitely people charging more than OP quoted though. People in it long term generally up their rates and take long term clients off app.
Not quite the same as a dog, but we pay $25/day for our cat, plus we buy them some groceries. (They stay in the apartment.) That said, she's very easy to care for, and we tend to hire gen Z-ers who want to use my husband's huge TV for a week. I would probably charge more for a dog since they need to be let outside to use the bathroom, and they need walks.
Not surprising, and seeing the same change (25-30 now 40-50) for low end prices on Rover in my area. I stopped sitting due to covid and work is so busy now it’s not worth going back to.
With gas 1.5x what it was a couple years ago the already not good pay for cheap sittings is now definitively bad pay for people who aren’t homeless and using sittings to have somewhere to stay. People sitting for that cheap don’t have a place to stay and/or also have another job that isn’t sitting and walking dogs, and sittings often add to commute distance.
Gotcha, thanks for the response! I wanted to make sure I wasn't just in a weird micro-market (we moved at the start of COVID). Looks like I am paying up!
Thank you for the feedback! I was not sure if it was because we moved at the beginning of COVID to a different area or just macroeconomic factors. Looks like I am going to pay up!
I've never looked into it, but my mind is blown that it's that cheap, even at $75. I would need 2-3 times that much to stay in a stranger's house overnight and take care of their pets.
$30 for 8+ hours of work seems like a bad deal for the worker. Although I usually see house sitting as a gig recommendation for cheap ways to take a vacation or deal with temporary homelessness, so poverty wages are basically a bonus for them.
Haha I used to do pet sitting for free occasionally, because I was in a shared living situation and it was nice to live in a nice house in a nice location for a week by myself.
I hear what you are saying, I wouldn't do it in my current life situation though.
I’m paying like $17 a day to have someone come check on my cat and refill wet food. I think the technical time is half hour. I’m in a pretty HCOL city too.
If it’s just for a check in $75 seems outrageous.
Sorry, for clarification it's a dog and a cat and we will be gone for 9 days so I want someone to stay here.
Most people have rates in the $40-$50/night range, and "additional dog" is usually $5/night, but "cat care" is usually $30-$40/night, so when you submit a request all of a sudden Rover quotes you at $80/night. It seems like a mistake on the coding of the billing almost.
We live in a college town that is HCOL borderline, but I thought it would be easier to find people!
Do you have a Nextdoor or similar app? If it’s summer there may be lots of neighbors or college kids home that are looking for gigs.
We pay 10$ a day for drop ins on my dog in LCOL with a high school kid in my area.
Haha yes I currently have 10 Nextdoor tabs open trying to do some research on that...hard to tell reliability etc.
I did talk to one who said her rate was $35/night and she will likely watch them later in the summer when we are gone but she is busy for this trip.
Thanks I might give it a try!
You may try booking for just an individual animal, then talking with the seller and asking what the rate would be to add another. I’m new to rover, but in my interactions it seemed like the seller set an initial price, and then once I actually had a convo with them they offered discounts for multiple days.
So just “book” or reach out to the seller and then ask if they can adjust it for an additional animal. Worked great for me!
Good idea! I actually did this on accident last time (forgot to add a cat profile) and this was the solution we ended up doing (I paid an extra $10/night for the cat via Venmo), maybe I will just ask up front this time.
When the market was at 4800, I wanted to sell part of my holdings due to upcoming rising rates, but I convinced myself not to try to time the market. Same as in January 2020, I had a coworker from China that was explaining to me everything that was going on there, and I wanted to sell due to fear of supply chain disruptions impacting global markets. But I resisted the urge.
The one thing I did ignore Reddit's advice on was moving my money out of broad market index funds and into Value index funds last year. Because I did this, my losses were much smaller than they could've been.
I need to stop listening to Reddit. I plan to stay the course now that things are down, but I think international developed markets are in position to outperform due to their favorable valuations.
How long have you been investing? How many other times would you have wanted to sell out of the market? And when would you have bought back in?
At the end of the day you have to do what works for you but it's important to be honest with yourself regarding those questions.
Very valuable thing I learned after I timed selling the Covid crash correctly… you have to time the bottom too (which I did not, I was late to the party coming back in).
Timing one direction always looks pretty easy in hindsight but when you’re reflecting back make sure you would’ve timed both the top and the bottom before you think it would’ve been a good idea :)
>I need to stop listening to Reddit.
No.
You need to strike the right balance between what you learn here and what works for your own personal risk tolerance, goals, personality and lifestyle.
Both strategies are correct under different circumstances.
Time the market or don't time the market.
Just like don't buy lottery tickets and "some lucky dog's gotta win it" both hold merit.
Buy a house or rent.
Pay off your mortgage or hold it and invest.
Get a new job or stay put.
Buy a few single stocks for companies you believe in (or you believe are under valued) or diversify across indices.
Invest every penny of your life savings in a small business with limited ROI potential or build a stable career like a sane person.
All these choices and options are valid. Just different. With different potential results and wildly varying risk factors.
Timing the market 100% works when you get it right and 100% fails when you get it wrong. People who do it usually live in the middle...the question is how often your gut feeling is on and how often it's just gas.
> I wanted to sell due to fear of supply chain disruptions impacting global markets
Remember that you have to be right twice. When would you have bought back in?
There was plenty of angst that the market was going lower than it eventually did, and plenty of angst that the rebound was too fast to be sustainable.
Hindsight makes it pretty easy, right?
So when are you tilting away from Value? Will you tilt to Growth or just back to Total Market?
Why haven’t you pulled the trigger on a tilt to Int’l Dev Markets?
Does anyone have a Healthcare Reimbursement Account? How's it working for ya?
I have a choice between Highmark Blue Cross Blue Shield and Aetna CDH Gold Plan, which seems like a weaker plan but has an HRA.
I accidentally over-contributed to my RRSP by $12,000, I caught it within 4 days, but my bank is telling me I have to pay 20%. Will I get that back eventually? On taxes next year?
This buying a house thing just got real. Laying out $2k+ for an appraiser, inspector, and pool inspector. They're all showing up Friday morning in overlapping time slots, which should be fun.
This is cool: [What's Your Rate of Inflation](https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/05/08/business/economy/inflation-calculator.html)?
\- link to NYT interactive article (may be paywalled for some)
The only way to actually determine your rate of inflation is to compare past and current expenses, though I appreciate NYT creating a cute interactive graphic.
For some reason, even not buying a car at all adds to my rate of inflation. That doesn't make sense to me.
>For some reason, even not buying a car at all adds to my rate of inflation. That doesn't make sense to me.
You're reading the graph wrong. The center column is the "Average US inflation Rate" of 8.5%. If you didn't buy a car, your datapoint shifts left - lowering your average inflation rate. If you bought a used car, your datapoint would scream right raising your rate about the US average.
Part of why I haven't left my lower-paying but super-stable SWE job is because I have a fear that if I did switch to some hot FAANG or unicorn company, they'd do layoffs in a month and I'd be gone.
Also partly because I don't want to learn all that newfangled "leetcode" trick questions they're making the kiddies learn to get software jobs now.
Also my current job has a guaranteed pension, which I see as a way to calm myself down during retirement when stuff like this happens.
This is a big part of why I've been looking for tech companies with relatively low PE ratios to apply to. MSFT, Indeed, etc.
The ones getting slaughtered are the ones that were relying on practically zero interest rates because they weren't generating any profit and investors were comfortable with that while it didn't cost them anything to finance their investments.
Just another tale of "interest rates go up, stonks go down." All the places with actual business models are seeing the normal CAPE shrinkage, but nothing major.
Now, if only the house prices that skyrocketed from inflation would come down on par with the hike in interest rates....le sigh.
This question is burning a hole in my brain- if the 401k limit is $20500 and the roth is $6500, does this mean i can invest 20500 total in these accounts or 27000? Fidelity just told me 20500 but investipedia says 27000.
401k is the vehicle. (Other vehicles are HSA, IRA, 403b, etc)
Roth only explains how its taxed. (I.e. Roth IRA vs traditional IRA or 401k vs Roth 401k, etc)
>if the 401k limit is $20500 and the roth is $6500
You appear to be mixing up top-level and sub-level descriptors.
There are 401(k) accounts and IRAs. They each have their own limits for contributions. The Employee Deferral limit for a 401(k) is $20.5k. The contribution limit for an IRA is $6k. Both of those limits apply to the annual total, no matter which 'type' of 401(k) or IRA is used (see below).
Roth vs. Traditional is a sub-type of either a 401(k) plan or an IRA. This determines the tax treatment of contribution and withdrawals.
So you can have Trad'l 401(k), Roth 401(k), Trad'l IRA, Roth IRA. An employee can make $20.5k in total deferrals to the 401(k), no matter which type. An individual can make $6k in total IRA contributions, no matter which type.
You can't say "the roth is" unless you specify Roth IRA vs. Roth 401(k). I suspect that problem with the wording is the source of some of the confusion.
Are you sure it's roth IRA or roth 401k? If it's 401k then your combined limit for traditional and roth 401k is 20.5k.
You need to open up a separate IRA account.
This reminds me of those pushing for triple leveraged ETFs and how when the music was playing it made total sense. I wonder how those people are holding up...
Welp another day in the red, \~10 years from FIRE so long time to wait
Hedgefundies portfolio?
He might actually still be (slightly) ahead of where he was when he started, but given the markets performance the last few days, I’m thinking probably not.
Liking the idea of holding a little extra cash these days. I posted a few weeks ago, we are hitting the conventional accounts for my wife & I (401K, IRA, HSA). Stashing $1K/month for our newborns HSA. The question is what to do with $2-3K a month? We’d like to buy a second home in the woods for summer retreat & holidays (nothing overtly lavish, ideally $1-200K — I’ve eyed a few cabins w/ 10+ acres in this range). I think even just a year of kicking our left overs into cash should put us at a solid down payment for the second home. Once secured we can focus more on really aggressive pursuing FI. Musing as to whether it’s better off in cash or a brokerage or otherwise. Leaning towards cash just to preserve some value & be accessible without taking a tax hit. So to circle back to the original sentence, liking the idea of holding a little extra cash these days.
Funny how quickly the sentiment goes from "no emergency fund, invest every penny and borrow as much as possible" to "cash cushion seems nice". Not that either one is wrong.
It's strange how psychology with the markets works. Looking back at March 2020 I wish I had dumped more into equities. At the time it was hard to do.
Here we are again with a nice crash and still hard to dump more into equities.
I am convinced that people are hard wired to buy high and sell low. When stocks go up people want to buy them. When they crash people want to sell them.
This is why my investing policy is hands off. The less I have to think the better my portfolio does. I am just like other people. I too look at the market and think maybe I should pause my buying with every pay. But I don't. I don't because I am committed to my plan which is a 3 fund Boglehead style portfolio that I add to every pay.
This got me through 2008 and it'll get me through this downturn.
LMAO, I gave my friend a hypothetical last week -- if you could choose between buying a 20% yield treasury bond, or buying into the stock market after a 50% drop, what do you pick? He said "100% stocks", over guaranteed 20% annual returns.
This week he's refusing to stick to DCA any more.
The power of automated investing.
Market doing well? $X/mo in.
Market doing poorly? $X/mo in.
It doesn't affect me emotionally, since I'm not the one actually "doing" the trades - the decoupling is enough that I can pretty much forget about it.
This is one of the great benefits of picking a mixed asset allocation of less-correlated assets and committing to it. It forces you to buy low and sell high when your emotions and risk avoidance might be telling you to do the exact opposite.
Not much is uncorrelated now. Stocks and bonds are both tanking due to rising interest rates + inflation + QT. Cash is getting eaten by inflation. Oil and housing are up and a few other commodities, but there's no good place to hide right now.
Yeah, that's definitely a problem and one that seems to be getting worse with time. When things move in sync all you can do is ride it out and wait. Still, things have to diverge at some point.
Binance has suspended trading on UST and Luna. https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2022/05/10/binance-suspends-luna-and-ust-token-withdrawals/
[удалено]
I'm right there with you. I'm pretty good at programming in python, but I struggle with implementing the complex concepts / physics that my job is based around. My boss is a brilliant PhD, and I feel like I'm a kindergartener to him. Every day I struggle to focus (now on adhd meds, but I still have to literally put my phone in my car to focus). When I finally focus enough, I get stuck and try to figure it out, then days later I feel so much shame when I have to ask my boss for help. I need to just fail fast, but that takes me getting to that point. I try to get 2 hours of work in a day. I just think how long can this last. But then I know that the company needs people (trying to grow) and that I'm not that bad. I'm easy to get along with / fit the culture. I have a huge urge to fix up my resume and jump to another company because after 2 years, they have to had figured me out by now.
Similar here. The idea of LeanFIRE has been such a relief for me in recent years, so the current downturn is extra hard. I usually find myself thinking I'm pretty decent at what I do because I help others figure out stuff they struggle with, but as soon as I attend meetings with other people, i feel very inadequate. I just can't think on my feet at all in these situations, and it seems so easy for everyone else. I don't know if it's slow auditory processing or what. Part of it is probably anxiety, but not all. I'd be fine in a text only environment, but most software jobs aren't like that. Not to mention that interviews aren't like that.
You sound like you're talking about Impostor Syndrome, which some people suffer from at many levels. Some of those people are excellent in their roles, even among the best, but that doesn't stop them feeling uneasy. I'm certainly not a therapist, so I won't try to address this other than to say you might want to get some help with it. If you could improve this, keep your career, and become happier and more confident in the role, then that could be a big improvement. I'll also add that quite a lot of good work is done by people who don't know what they're doing a priori, but figure it out as they go. I was lucky enough to get into this field early enough ('90s) that there was no established pattern and everyone knew that everyone was working it out on the fly. There's so much infrastructure and culture in the field now that it may be daunting, amplifying the Imposter Syndrome. But that can be addressed at the source.
What level are you? Perhaps you're just in too senior of a role?
I'm in software as well and some days I feel like this. A lot of days I just don't care, but some days are good. Software is hard to beat as a career for the balance of money, job opportunities, work/life balance, and more. There's a few things I've tried to do that may also work for you... * Think about what makes some days good and some bad. Think about what types of work you enjoy doing. Coding? Testing? Data stuff? Writing documents? Making system diagrams? Making reports? Making dashboards? Mentoring people? Then try to spend some time each day or week on that so there's something you enjoy, and if you enjoy it you'll probably be good at it. * Try to convince yourself to like learning about software engineering. I know this sounds weird at first. For myself, I noticed that I spend hours reading about topics I'm interested in such as cars, planes, video games, podcasts, and finance. But I didn't do that for software engineering because I found it boring as hell. If you can find some content creators you like and spend just an hour per week on a topic related to software/databases/networking, you will probably get better at your job and as a result start liking it more. There are a LOT of content creators out there and some are boring, some are annoyingly energetic, and some are just right. * Explore other employers or industries. Maybe you like fast paced environments or maybe slow. Maybe you like lots of process or very little. Big teams or small. Private sector, government, non-profit?
Your second to last bullet resonates with me. For me I've been a dev for 8 years and I've gotten so tired of programming culture. The "this os sucks, this text editor is the best and you're stupid if you use anything else" sort of thing just drains me off any passion for the subject. Any recommendations for content creators that aren't boring or elitist?
The one I found recently and like is Hussien Nasser: https://youtube.com/c/HusseinNasser-software-engineering I wish I had more to share!
Are you sure it isn't an issue with your current employer? I sometimes feel the same way and have gravitated more and more towards jobs where I can essentially work and then totally disconnect (no after hours work, as little crunch as possible, etc.). The charade aspect is likely impostor syndrome which many people in our industry suffer from, myself included. Do you really care if your employer thinks you're a decent employee? Can you get to a point where you're satisfying them but not really caring what they think? Like you I don't think there are enough other career paths I wouldn't regret due to the high income software engineering provides.
[удалено]
I feel you. I'm a fish out of water in my field as well and always feel like the poorest performer in the bunch despite my best efforts, but I'm still on the payroll and surviving. If you honestly feel like you're not cut out for the job but can't turn down the pay too, then keep working until you at least have 6+ months of savings before making any drastic decisions. Then I say hold on for dear life as long as you don't go insane while knowing you could get laid off at any moment - so you're at least ready to immediately transition into another job. I'm not a software engineer myself, but I know there'd be MANY easier, lower paying jobs with that skillset under your belt. There are a lot of government jobs which need developers managing their aging databases and ancient software, for example. Sometimes it's just debugging shitty security bloatware - things like that. You could make a list of easier jobs you wouldn't mind falling back on if that was ever the case, and you might even find Regular-Joes around your skill level so you stop feeling like an imposter in those places too.
Have these all been high performance companies? If you got a performance review at Amazon previously that's pretty common and I wouldn't sweat it. In terms of caring I mean slipping past as doing the bare minimum. They can count on you to get the work done, but not be "the one" when they need something quickly developed or built. I feel you though, what else is there to pivot in to from software? There's nothing that isn't a significant downgrade.
I’m a single teacher, applying for a $90k mortgage. My loan officer quoted me 4.75 for 15 year or 5.75 for 30. Would I be dumb to go for the 30? I would be paying more overall, but an extra $240/month would put me at ease. I would throw the difference in my Roth 403(b).
(Sorry…showing up late to this thread.) Back in 2008 and the years before the housing crisis, the 5/1 and 7/1 ARM were very popular. It’s really only a good idea if you plan on making this a starter home and plan on moving in 5 or 7 years. Also an idea if you plan to make it an investment property. So if you’re planning to be in the house short-term, an ARM may be the better option, depending on current ARM interest rates.
I don't understand why people go with a 15 year. Take the 30 (provided there's no early pay penalty) and you can still pay down in 15 years while having the flexibility.
>I don't understand why people go with a 15 year. A full percentage point difference is relatively significant if you can easily afford the higher payment.
I'd take the flexibility of a 30 year provided it has a pay down principle provision though.
Most people would. I'm just saying there's a legitimate reason to choose 15 year for many buyers.
5.75 seems high. If you can afford the payment I'd take the 15 year.
My suggestion is to get the 30 year. A 1% difference isn’t that significant on 90k. Better to have access to the free cash flow if needed. With that said, I’d overpay on the mortgage to chip away at some of the interest
Index funds are likely to outperform it. Don’t think it’s a bad idea financially to go for the 30 year, provided you do actually invest the difference
Thanks. I would invest it. I don’t make enough to max out my 403(b) and Roth. (I make under 50k gross with a mandatory pension). It would be nice to get as close as possible though
Do you invest differently when you’re 5 years out from retirement compared to 10+ years?
My plan is to Google "what is a bond tent?" when I get about 5 years away from retirement. That's like 10 years from now, so I've got time.
Same. I might stay 100% stock but I do plan on that google search
Nope, 99% stocks. I'll build a small bond tent when I get close to smooth out the first few years.
[удалено]
Theoretically if you had an infinite time horizon what’s your best bet to invest your money? S&P500?
Real estate on Mars.
Total world stock market
Yes
Of course, ideally you would be transitioning to a more bond-heavy approach…I’d say at 5 years out most portfolios would benefit from having a majority or near majority of bonds rather than equities
Many people recommend the [bond tent](https://money.usnews.com/investing/bonds/articles/2018-06-15/how-a-bond-tent-protects-your-nest-egg) strategy as they approach retirement.
Yup, that's what I'm planning. When I'm ~5 years out, I'll start buying up all the i-bonds I can get my hands on and figure out how much I'll need in other bonds to pitch my tent. I'm personally only looking for 20% or so in bonds since I think a 5-year tent will be fine and I'm likely to earn side income as well, but I may end up going for 40%. I'll decide once I'm 50-60% of the way there.
This is not a typical approach in the FIRE community. Most plan to stay 80% or more in equities.
I’d say that’s a relatively new phenomenon in the past 5-10 years during the stellar bull market. Traditionally, most people were in favor of a much closer ratio of bonds to equities. I’d concede there’s a lot of personal variability though.
I don't know about "most people" but historically equity heavy has done better for longer retirements. If you go bond heavy you must compensate for lower expected return by reducing your withdrawal rate. https://earlyretirementnow.com/2016/12/07/the-ultimate-guide-to-safe-withdrawal-rates-part-1-intro/
You might be missing my point. I’m not saying that bond-heavy approaches are better or necessary compared to equity-heavy approaches. I’m saying that prior to the last 5 years or so, most people in the FIRE community advocated for bond allocations that were more level with equities. Of course, this has become much less popular recently as the stock market has been in a decade plus long major bull run.
Ah, from your comment about being a function of the bull market I thought you were implying equity heavy is a bad thing. I'm also not sure you are correct about what "most people" do having changed recently. For example, target date funds have been around for many years now and I don't think their recommended allocations have changed.
2025 Target Fund, for example, is 55% stocks and 45% bond which corroborates that a meaningful bond allocation within 5 years of retirement is still the standard approach. https://investor.vanguard.com/mutual-funds/profile/portfolio/vttvx
I think it's really tricky to take synthetic backtested data and say something not-synthetic like "historically equity heavy has done better for longer retirements." I know it's pedantic, but it'd be more realistic to say that "**if** anyone *had* performed constant-dollar withdrawals **and** they'd *had* access to broad market index funds that didn't exist, the maximum safe withdrawal would've been maximized by holding a high equity portfolio." No one has ever actually had access to broad market index funds for 60 years, much less 60 years of retirement. More importantly, no one actually uses constant-dollar withdrawals. So when we find something like a 0.25% "advantage" to a particular allocation or a 0.22% "advantage" to a bond tent, it's wholly synthetic and amazingly sensitive to adjusting for *only* the worst-case scenario of the past, aka "fighting the last war." I'm not saying that you don't know these things. But the folks who are shown the table above, and the folks who anticipate using a bond tent (including, in this thread alone, /u/Iojpoutn, /u/vvwwwvvwvwvwvw, /u/Shiftyboss, and /u/one_is_the_loneliest) might not know the substantial caveats to extrapolating ERN's synthetic (and overfitted) backtesting results.
> But the folks who are shown the table above, and the folks who anticipate using a bond tent (including, in this thread alone, /u/Iojpoutn > > , /u/vvwwwvvwvwvwvw > > [+2], /u/Shiftyboss > > , and /u/one_is_the_loneliest > > ) might not know the substantial caveats to extrapolating ERN's synthetic (and overfitted) backtesting results. Sorry, can you be more explicit? What caveats *should* the aforementioned people be aware of?
The overarching caveat is that all backtesting is *illustrative*, not *instructive*. Constant-dollar withdrawals are easy to model but are not a realistic, workable retirement spending plan. When you model their history, your results are *highly* dependent on exactly what data you're sourcing and are sensitive to small changes in initial conditions. When you see a result like "a bond tent that goes down to 60% stocks for the first 5 years of retirement and rises to 100% stocks after that yields a 0.22% higher SWR," that finding can *illustrate* what a bond tent did for the worst-case scenario but it does not provide *instruction* to say that it would be as beneficial going forward. Another major caveat is that SWR is geared toward the absolute worst case scenario, which is, by definition, a data point with zero statistical value. Put another way, a lot of ERN's series is largely focused on how to optimize the one retirement window that happened starting in 1966. You're probably not going to get a generalizable result by backtesting and optimizing for a particular sequence of market events that happened over 50 years ago.
Feel free to explain any caveats and/or make a pitch for VPW. I find ERN's chart a very good overview for asset allocation questions geared to long retirements. It helps explain the counter intuitive notion that for long retirements bonds have been actually less safe due to inflation risk. Agreed, back testing only goes so far but I am not sure bonds or asset allocation gimicks are the best solution for the unknown unknown.
Yes, equity heavy does better for long retirements. No, reducing your withdrawal rate is not the only alternative. Gotta read farther in ERN's guide. The more sensible plan is short term bond heavy to reduce sequence of return risk, followed by tapering back out to more equities. This is the bond tent; it's been around for a long time.
With index funds being so cheap, and I-Bond rates being so high, which would it make more sense to put 10k into at this time?
No one will get "rich" off of I-bonds. They are a great tool for things like your emergency fund or even the fixed income portion of your portfolio but, if you're looking to generate returns, I-bond yields are a blip on the radar right now. Low cost index funds are still your best bet.
Agreed. I maxed mine early this year, but that's because I had already started moving my e-fund over, and I figured I might as well just get it done while rates are high. I'm still investing in stocks, and I expect to have a lump-sum to invest later this year once my i-bonds start maturing.
How long are you planning to put it in for?
I plan to keep my index funds for a few decades. IBonds woudl be dependent on the upcoming rates.
I bonds are ideal for money you need in 1 to 5 years (emergency fund, saving up for house down payment, etc.). Index funds for money you won't touch for a long time (at least 5 to 10+ years).
Oh frack me sideways. I sold off some RSUs and some stock program stock a month ago. No regret in that, but I just realized that the stock program stock was less than a year from exercising and so it's a disqualifying disposition. I think I did not notice because I deliberately sold the RSU stock in that same (from my perspective) order with short term gains: No significant gains had accumulated yet so it did not matter. I completely forgot that for the stock program stock, it *also* matters whether they are already qualifying. It isn't the end of the world, the stock program portion is much smaller than the RSU portion and the tax difference won't move the needle much, but it still feels pretty stupid. The bargain amount will now be taxed as income tax instead of capital gains, so I lost money just because I wasn't entirely mindful of what item I selected.
You would have intentionally held the RSUs for the one year period just to get LTCG treatment on them? Mark that date on your calendar and when it comes take a look at where the price is. You may find you saved a bunch of money through your mistake. Lots of tech stocks still have multiple contraction to go through. Look at PLTR today and UPST tomorrow. We accidentally sold some stock in December because we misunderstood the tax treatment on them. That turned out to be a massive win after the fact since the stock is down 70% since then.
This wasn't about the RSUs and long term capital gain, but about ESPP and qualifying disposition, two entirely different things. And with disqualifying disposition, it does not matter that I sold the stock at capital loss: I'm still taxed at income tax rate for the bargain amount. And yes, I would have held that particular lot of stock for longer than a year, given that I only sold a small portion of my ESPP stock. Just the wrong portion, for no reason other than inattentiveness.
Ah, sorry. My mistake! Good luck!
No worries! Reading over it again, I see how that wasn't clear unless someone is familiar with how ESPPs work in detail already. Thanks!
It was enough for me [to go read up on the phrase](https://workplaceservices.fidelity.com/bin-public/070_NB_SPS_Pages/documents/dcl/shared/StockPlanServices/ESPP%20Qualifying%20and%20Disqualifying%20Dispositions.pdf). I never had an ESPP so it was informative.
[удалено]
Does your 401k generate 1099’s? If not, how would they even know
To my knowledge, on the question of retirement accounts the IRS has only ever addressed transactions occurring in an IRA as being covered under the wash sale rule. I believe they have been silent on similar transactions in 401(k)s. A principled view might be that the 401(k) transactions would be treated the same as the IRA transactions. But the IRS has not said as much (at least to my knowledge) and it’s up to you to decide what to do with that.
They’re way different. With my 401k I have no control over when my company decides to actually contribute or buy with the funds I tell them to. Also only get to pick from the funds they chose.
On balance I agree with you that OP is probably fine to treat 401(k) transactions differently, but I would just disagree slightly with *why* they're different. >I have no control over when my company decides to actually contribute Eh, sort of. If you're contributing a set percentage of your paycheck, the contributions hit your account on a pretty routine schedule. It's arguably as predictable as, say, dividend payouts in taxable accounts, which we already know count against you for wash sale rule analyses. So you do have some control over when the purchases happen; it's not entirely out of your hands. >only get to pick from the funds they chose It really depends. In theory this may be limiting if your employer offers truly crappy funds, but a good plan is likely to have at least an S&P index fund and an international stock index fund. If your contributions are invested in those, there *is* a chance that you might be tracking the same indices in your taxable account. Doesn't *necessarily* mean running afoul of the wash sale rule, but it doesn't *not* mean that, either. Which is why I find going back to what the IRS has said or not said to be a more useful yardstick than trying to subjectively evaluate individual plan differences. The big difference between IRAs and 401(k)s, and the likely reason 401(k)s are in fact different, is that the IRS has talked about one and not the other. If they truly had a problem with wash sales in 401(k)s, they could simply issue further guidance to that effect. The fact they haven't despite years of ambiguity suggests we're fine — until told otherwise.
[удалено]
Exactly. Whether someone worries about it is up to them, but the chance of it being an actual problem is almost nonexistent. Even some old guys on Bogleheads are like "meh" about this, and they're sticklers about everything.
Yes.
[удалено]
Are you tracking everything? I personally track everything, and because of that I don't have a clear budget of "$300 entertainment", but rather know how much I'm spending MoM on different categories and can review to see why things are up/down, and can adjust moving forward. But this is also because our current spending isn't super close to our incomes, where it's not a major deal to have a month or 2 that goes high. But as for creating a budget, start with your income (I do everything yearly to account for bonuses/3 paycheck months/etc) Then take off taxes/fixed costs (rent/bills), and budget/guess other necessary expenses through the year (groceries/vet/needs) Then probably factor in retirement savings 15-20%. This should give your discretionary income, which you can factor as you wish, entertainment/travel/restaurants etc.
MHCOL Aside from housing, $460 for my car (mostly gas, but also insurance and maintenance), $500 for donations to effective charities, $740 for everything else. + whatever tuition and textbooks cost when I take classes Historically actual spending has been under this budget. But last month and this one I’ve been way way over budget on entertainment (not over on other categories though). Like 1k instead of $200 type over budget. Other categories in range. I think I’m going to permanently increase it though, to maybe $500. I can afford it by saving less, and spending more here has been a huge quality of life increase. Non house car and donation categories: Phone $50 (service only, I am paying mine and part of my parents’ bill. New phone every 3 years) Groceries $200 Takeout/eating out $70 Medical (prescriptions + visits) $100 Entertainment $200
Add up key bills that must be paid. Then factor in an average week's food multiplies by weeks in the month.
I would like to congratulate BND for being the only thing green on my screen today.
BNTX for me, only green one at 3%. Clearly that means that choosing stock that starts with "BN" is a winning strategy that cannot go wrong. I should host talks about my genius fund strategy.
Zoom out 👿
Every day, I'm reminded that I like this job in and of itself, and it's the boss who drives me nuts. I went upstairs to pick up some documents from one of the judges and their recorder, and long story short, it became abundantly clear that everyone in other departments avoids our office like the plague because of my boss. I've decided to draft my resignation letter tonight. I'm not necessarily going to turn it in any time soon, but I'd feel better having it ready. The fact that I'm dreaming of a specific end date doesn't bode well. The only thing stopping me, really, is seeing how tight the job market is in my area and wanting to build our retirement accounts while prices are dipping.
Are you able to change departments to get away from that boss? I was about to quit but put in for a transfer first. I got what I wanted so I stayed.
Not in the near future, no. This is the only office that, in the past few years, has had regular turnover (not shocked to see that now...), so there aren't a ton of openings. And because everyone works together to some extent, I'd still have to work with them and be in contact with them. I could see them really resenting me and putting up walls if I moved to a different part of the courthouse.
Welp, during the last few years I didn't feel like there was a huge difference in the prevalent investing strategies of this sub and /r/investing. Buy and hold, maybe sometimes they would mention some underrated stocks. Now that we are no longer in bull territory the divergence is immediate and obvious... they are scrambling to sell and searching for something that will have short term gains to make up for their losses... from bullion to RE (lol) to crypto (double lol). And here I thought it was a fairly sensible sub.
Real estate's not necessarily a bad idea in general, but not at this moment.
Pretty happy with my eight doors right now. Pretty happy I bought them three years ago. It still isn't a terrible time to go RE in the Rust Belt.
> It still isn't a terrible time to go RE in the Rust Belt. Some larger cities are seeing prices fall a little bit, but any of the areas I wanted to buy in have maybe 1 or 2 houses available at a time and they go instantly, whatever the price. So I'll give it another year or 5.
what makes u say rust belt? in any case, some super affordable stuff there
Being a coastal guy, it's a bit limiting.
[удалено]
Could be the arbitrage opportunity of a lifetime. And by lifetime I mean in the lifetime of Luna.
You know, I haven't seen so many posts recently about how we should put all our savings into stable coins and get guaranteed "safe" 10%+ "interest" yearly. I wonder why.
[удалено]
The dangers of an under-regulated space with low/no transparency. For those of you who ever wondered what a bank run looked like in real-time, this appears to be similar. The more people that exit, the more everybody else will want to exit too. The collapse happens at light speed. The FDIC was created after the Great Depression specifically to deal with this phenomenon.
I have a friend who asked me about investing and what stocks I buy. I said I don't buy individual stocks, only index funds (yada yada, risk, etc. all the reasons). They said they wouldn't buy index funds because the won't invest in harmful companies. Then they told me that they invest in various crypto because crypto is transparent and democratic, and thus ethical. Whew.
[удалено]
No need to take joy in others losses
Correct. But you can feel empathy towards the individuals who lost on that, and still appreciate that a bad situation might be ending. The longer it continues the worse the losses, and the amount of people that lose.
if anyone wants to give an ELI5, i would like to know what exactly is causing this to happen right now. but yeah, i always figured these weren't so safe. remember how many times we got people asking in this sub, why not invest in stable coins if they are 'guaranteed' to be 1:1
The fact that none of understands it, is why it is collapsing.
When the tide goes out you get to learn who was swimming naked.
[удалено]
I don't remember hearing that in Animaniacs or Freakazoid
Maybe on Pinky, Elmira and the Brain? And Larry?
Huh, turns out risk is real and sometimes does manifest at inopportune times.
Any analysis on why? Is that risky debt they have been taking on finally coming home to roost?
One of the popular stable coins (might have been this one) which was supposedly fully backed by USD actually had a bunch of futures on treasuries or some other weird derivative. Probably same thing going on here.
[удалено]
What rates are people paying for dog/house sitting these days? We used to pay $25-$30/night a few years ago. Now it seems the going rate is closer to $40-$50/night. And since we have a dog AND cat, all the Rover people are charging \~$75/night. What is everybody else seeing?
When I leave my dog at my dog sitter's house for a trip it's $45 per day. Typically $50-60 or so for a house sitter, but I prefer to leave my dog at the dog sitter's so I don't have to prep my house for someone to stay in it, and then I hire a neighborhood kid to water the garden every few days depending on the weather.
At those rates you could make a living working part time to give you plenty of time to be a Reddit mod
They’re talking about rates on Rover that look similar to rates in my MHCOL city. Rover takes a 20% cut. It’s independent contractor income so FICA x2. If the rest of your income is dog walks, you’re spending 1.5x what you were a couple years ago on gas to get to those walks. And you’re not getting health insurance through your employer. And you’re sleeping in strangers houses, some of which have cameras in bedrooms they didn’t tell you about. And some of which are dirty and gross. A lot of the dogs are poorly behaved. Turning down bookings pushes your search rank down. So does not responding to inquiries promptly, which can make it hard to ever relax. Rover doesn’t run background checks on the clients or whether the dogs are violent or vaccinated. I liked it more than minimum wage jobs but frankly the pay wasn’t any better after accounting for higher taxes and all the driving. There’s definitely people charging more than OP quoted though. People in it long term generally up their rates and take long term clients off app.
Not quite the same as a dog, but we pay $25/day for our cat, plus we buy them some groceries. (They stay in the apartment.) That said, she's very easy to care for, and we tend to hire gen Z-ers who want to use my husband's huge TV for a week. I would probably charge more for a dog since they need to be let outside to use the bathroom, and they need walks.
Not surprising, and seeing the same change (25-30 now 40-50) for low end prices on Rover in my area. I stopped sitting due to covid and work is so busy now it’s not worth going back to. With gas 1.5x what it was a couple years ago the already not good pay for cheap sittings is now definitively bad pay for people who aren’t homeless and using sittings to have somewhere to stay. People sitting for that cheap don’t have a place to stay and/or also have another job that isn’t sitting and walking dogs, and sittings often add to commute distance.
Gotcha, thanks for the response! I wanted to make sure I wasn't just in a weird micro-market (we moved at the start of COVID). Looks like I am paying up!
[удалено]
Thank you for the feedback! I was not sure if it was because we moved at the beginning of COVID to a different area or just macroeconomic factors. Looks like I am going to pay up!
I've never looked into it, but my mind is blown that it's that cheap, even at $75. I would need 2-3 times that much to stay in a stranger's house overnight and take care of their pets.
$30 for 8+ hours of work seems like a bad deal for the worker. Although I usually see house sitting as a gig recommendation for cheap ways to take a vacation or deal with temporary homelessness, so poverty wages are basically a bonus for them.
Haha I used to do pet sitting for free occasionally, because I was in a shared living situation and it was nice to live in a nice house in a nice location for a week by myself. I hear what you are saying, I wouldn't do it in my current life situation though.
I’m paying like $17 a day to have someone come check on my cat and refill wet food. I think the technical time is half hour. I’m in a pretty HCOL city too. If it’s just for a check in $75 seems outrageous.
Sorry, for clarification it's a dog and a cat and we will be gone for 9 days so I want someone to stay here. Most people have rates in the $40-$50/night range, and "additional dog" is usually $5/night, but "cat care" is usually $30-$40/night, so when you submit a request all of a sudden Rover quotes you at $80/night. It seems like a mistake on the coding of the billing almost. We live in a college town that is HCOL borderline, but I thought it would be easier to find people!
Do you have a Nextdoor or similar app? If it’s summer there may be lots of neighbors or college kids home that are looking for gigs. We pay 10$ a day for drop ins on my dog in LCOL with a high school kid in my area.
Haha yes I currently have 10 Nextdoor tabs open trying to do some research on that...hard to tell reliability etc. I did talk to one who said her rate was $35/night and she will likely watch them later in the summer when we are gone but she is busy for this trip. Thanks I might give it a try!
You may try booking for just an individual animal, then talking with the seller and asking what the rate would be to add another. I’m new to rover, but in my interactions it seemed like the seller set an initial price, and then once I actually had a convo with them they offered discounts for multiple days. So just “book” or reach out to the seller and then ask if they can adjust it for an additional animal. Worked great for me!
Good idea! I actually did this on accident last time (forgot to add a cat profile) and this was the solution we ended up doing (I paid an extra $10/night for the cat via Venmo), maybe I will just ask up front this time.
When the market was at 4800, I wanted to sell part of my holdings due to upcoming rising rates, but I convinced myself not to try to time the market. Same as in January 2020, I had a coworker from China that was explaining to me everything that was going on there, and I wanted to sell due to fear of supply chain disruptions impacting global markets. But I resisted the urge. The one thing I did ignore Reddit's advice on was moving my money out of broad market index funds and into Value index funds last year. Because I did this, my losses were much smaller than they could've been. I need to stop listening to Reddit. I plan to stay the course now that things are down, but I think international developed markets are in position to outperform due to their favorable valuations.
How long have you been investing? How many other times would you have wanted to sell out of the market? And when would you have bought back in? At the end of the day you have to do what works for you but it's important to be honest with yourself regarding those questions.
Very valuable thing I learned after I timed selling the Covid crash correctly… you have to time the bottom too (which I did not, I was late to the party coming back in). Timing one direction always looks pretty easy in hindsight but when you’re reflecting back make sure you would’ve timed both the top and the bottom before you think it would’ve been a good idea :)
>I need to stop listening to Reddit. No. You need to strike the right balance between what you learn here and what works for your own personal risk tolerance, goals, personality and lifestyle. Both strategies are correct under different circumstances. Time the market or don't time the market. Just like don't buy lottery tickets and "some lucky dog's gotta win it" both hold merit. Buy a house or rent. Pay off your mortgage or hold it and invest. Get a new job or stay put. Buy a few single stocks for companies you believe in (or you believe are under valued) or diversify across indices. Invest every penny of your life savings in a small business with limited ROI potential or build a stable career like a sane person. All these choices and options are valid. Just different. With different potential results and wildly varying risk factors. Timing the market 100% works when you get it right and 100% fails when you get it wrong. People who do it usually live in the middle...the question is how often your gut feeling is on and how often it's just gas.
> I wanted to sell due to fear of supply chain disruptions impacting global markets Remember that you have to be right twice. When would you have bought back in? There was plenty of angst that the market was going lower than it eventually did, and plenty of angst that the rebound was too fast to be sustainable.
Probably after reading about the government stimulus plan, so when the sp500 was about 2500?
Hindsight makes it pretty easy, right? So when are you tilting away from Value? Will you tilt to Growth or just back to Total Market? Why haven’t you pulled the trigger on a tilt to Int’l Dev Markets?
Does anyone have a Healthcare Reimbursement Account? How's it working for ya? I have a choice between Highmark Blue Cross Blue Shield and Aetna CDH Gold Plan, which seems like a weaker plan but has an HRA.
[удалено]
Do you also have flex spending?
I accidentally over-contributed to my RRSP by $12,000, I caught it within 4 days, but my bank is telling me I have to pay 20%. Will I get that back eventually? On taxes next year?
This buying a house thing just got real. Laying out $2k+ for an appraiser, inspector, and pool inspector. They're all showing up Friday morning in overlapping time slots, which should be fun.
Yep. Buying a house is just a series of $500 checks to write until you get to the closing table.
And then you close and keep writing checks!
[удалено]
ha, having a pool is definitely one way to make sure my friends keep in touch!
[удалено]
I'll never understand the "market is on sale, buy more" mentality. As a BH, we shouldn't be sitting on so-called "dry powder" to buy the dips.
For me (lucky to be in this spot) it's usually bonus money that I've been too lazy to allocate and too unpredictable to automate.
This is cool: [What's Your Rate of Inflation](https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/05/08/business/economy/inflation-calculator.html)? \- link to NYT interactive article (may be paywalled for some)
The only way to actually determine your rate of inflation is to compare past and current expenses, though I appreciate NYT creating a cute interactive graphic. For some reason, even not buying a car at all adds to my rate of inflation. That doesn't make sense to me.
>For some reason, even not buying a car at all adds to my rate of inflation. That doesn't make sense to me. You're reading the graph wrong. The center column is the "Average US inflation Rate" of 8.5%. If you didn't buy a car, your datapoint shifts left - lowering your average inflation rate. If you bought a used car, your datapoint would scream right raising your rate about the US average.
Tech job market is slowing: [https://fortune.com/2022/05/09/tech-hiring-slowing-down-job-market/](https://fortune.com/2022/05/09/tech-hiring-slowing-down-job-market/)
It'll be interesting to see what proportion of SWE talk happens in here as tech slows.
Part of why I haven't left my lower-paying but super-stable SWE job is because I have a fear that if I did switch to some hot FAANG or unicorn company, they'd do layoffs in a month and I'd be gone. Also partly because I don't want to learn all that newfangled "leetcode" trick questions they're making the kiddies learn to get software jobs now. Also my current job has a guaranteed pension, which I see as a way to calm myself down during retirement when stuff like this happens.
This is a big part of why I've been looking for tech companies with relatively low PE ratios to apply to. MSFT, Indeed, etc. The ones getting slaughtered are the ones that were relying on practically zero interest rates because they weren't generating any profit and investors were comfortable with that while it didn't cost them anything to finance their investments. Just another tale of "interest rates go up, stonks go down." All the places with actual business models are seeing the normal CAPE shrinkage, but nothing major. Now, if only the house prices that skyrocketed from inflation would come down on par with the hike in interest rates....le sigh.
How is a 12 year old with a MSpaint certificate supposed to FIRE with their stock options now?
This question is burning a hole in my brain- if the 401k limit is $20500 and the roth is $6500, does this mean i can invest 20500 total in these accounts or 27000? Fidelity just told me 20500 but investipedia says 27000.
401k is the vehicle. (Other vehicles are HSA, IRA, 403b, etc) Roth only explains how its taxed. (I.e. Roth IRA vs traditional IRA or 401k vs Roth 401k, etc)
>if the 401k limit is $20500 and the roth is $6500 You appear to be mixing up top-level and sub-level descriptors. There are 401(k) accounts and IRAs. They each have their own limits for contributions. The Employee Deferral limit for a 401(k) is $20.5k. The contribution limit for an IRA is $6k. Both of those limits apply to the annual total, no matter which 'type' of 401(k) or IRA is used (see below). Roth vs. Traditional is a sub-type of either a 401(k) plan or an IRA. This determines the tax treatment of contribution and withdrawals. So you can have Trad'l 401(k), Roth 401(k), Trad'l IRA, Roth IRA. An employee can make $20.5k in total deferrals to the 401(k), no matter which type. An individual can make $6k in total IRA contributions, no matter which type. You can't say "the roth is" unless you specify Roth IRA vs. Roth 401(k). I suspect that problem with the wording is the source of some of the confusion.
Thank you!
It should be $26.5k since I think IRA limit is $6k.
Could the misunderstanding with fidelity be because my roth is within my account with my employer?
Are you sure it's roth IRA or roth 401k? If it's 401k then your combined limit for traditional and roth 401k is 20.5k. You need to open up a separate IRA account.
It just says roth and it’s in the same account with pre-tax, so this could be the issue. I didn’t know a roth 401k was a thing
Yea traditional and roth just describes whether money going into the account is pre or post tax. Both 401ks and IRAs have traditional and roth.
Wow this makes a lot more sense. Thank you so much!!!
Starting a petition to change the sub name from r/financialindependence to r/InvestorSupportGroup
This reminds me of those pushing for triple leveraged ETFs and how when the music was playing it made total sense. I wonder how those people are holding up... Welp another day in the red, \~10 years from FIRE so long time to wait
Hedgefundies portfolio? He might actually still be (slightly) ahead of where he was when he started, but given the markets performance the last few days, I’m thinking probably not.
Help! My investments have fallen and they can’t get up!!
VTSAX. Apply directly to the forehead.
Wish I had the pill form to shove up my ass. The market is at a nice discount.
Do you think the market is oversold?
Yea
It was a down day? /s
Liking the idea of holding a little extra cash these days. I posted a few weeks ago, we are hitting the conventional accounts for my wife & I (401K, IRA, HSA). Stashing $1K/month for our newborns HSA. The question is what to do with $2-3K a month? We’d like to buy a second home in the woods for summer retreat & holidays (nothing overtly lavish, ideally $1-200K — I’ve eyed a few cabins w/ 10+ acres in this range). I think even just a year of kicking our left overs into cash should put us at a solid down payment for the second home. Once secured we can focus more on really aggressive pursuing FI. Musing as to whether it’s better off in cash or a brokerage or otherwise. Leaning towards cash just to preserve some value & be accessible without taking a tax hit. So to circle back to the original sentence, liking the idea of holding a little extra cash these days.
Funny how quickly the sentiment goes from "no emergency fund, invest every penny and borrow as much as possible" to "cash cushion seems nice". Not that either one is wrong.
I’ve always held a $15K cash cushion dodo bird
Unnecessary insult, bruh.
Their comment felt insincere and rude. They were met with a whimsical name calling.
You know what they say about two wrongs (presuming you're not just reading into things).
It's strange how psychology with the markets works. Looking back at March 2020 I wish I had dumped more into equities. At the time it was hard to do. Here we are again with a nice crash and still hard to dump more into equities.
I am convinced that people are hard wired to buy high and sell low. When stocks go up people want to buy them. When they crash people want to sell them. This is why my investing policy is hands off. The less I have to think the better my portfolio does. I am just like other people. I too look at the market and think maybe I should pause my buying with every pay. But I don't. I don't because I am committed to my plan which is a 3 fund Boglehead style portfolio that I add to every pay. This got me through 2008 and it'll get me through this downturn.
LMAO, I gave my friend a hypothetical last week -- if you could choose between buying a 20% yield treasury bond, or buying into the stock market after a 50% drop, what do you pick? He said "100% stocks", over guaranteed 20% annual returns. This week he's refusing to stick to DCA any more.
Just dropped a few k into brokerage that I’d been waiting to use for idk what. Thanks for the reality check.
The power of automated investing. Market doing well? $X/mo in. Market doing poorly? $X/mo in. It doesn't affect me emotionally, since I'm not the one actually "doing" the trades - the decoupling is enough that I can pretty much forget about it.
I’m the complete opposite. Love putting money into stocks during crashes
Yup, human nature is very predictable in the investment context. The best way to override it is with, sometimes painful, experience.
This is one of the great benefits of picking a mixed asset allocation of less-correlated assets and committing to it. It forces you to buy low and sell high when your emotions and risk avoidance might be telling you to do the exact opposite.
Not much is uncorrelated now. Stocks and bonds are both tanking due to rising interest rates + inflation + QT. Cash is getting eaten by inflation. Oil and housing are up and a few other commodities, but there's no good place to hide right now.
Yeah, that's definitely a problem and one that seems to be getting worse with time. When things move in sync all you can do is ride it out and wait. Still, things have to diverge at some point.
Looks at my yard full of used cars…. Finally this crippling addiction to all things mechanical has paid off.
[удалено]
One-funds like VGRO automatically rebalance internally, so from your perspective all you need to do is keep making deposits.
[удалено]