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I have a "how BWM is this?" question: I'm currently employed, but started seriously looking for a new job about 2 weeks ago. The house I live in is provided by my employer, so getting a new job will also mean getting a new place. My wife and I started looking to see what was out there in our price range, and pretty unexpectedly found one that hit most of the items on our list: fenced-in backyard, dog friendly, garage (with a heated workspace!), back deck, kitchen island, and super close to her job. However, getting it would mean committing to paying rent (starting in December) on a place we don't actually need yet. We can make it work, and it's less than a quarter of our current take-home, but I'm worried about the chance of not finding a new job for a few months and wasting 2/3 grand on an empty apartment. I know this really borders on E/N, but am I being an idiot? In my shoes, would you commit ahead of time on a place you really like?
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Oct 31, 2019 19:21
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WithoutTheFezOn posted:Because there’s a cap on benefits, is the technically correct answer. I don't think there is actually an explicit cap on benefits in the formula, it's just the de facto result of a lifetime worth of caps on annual taxed income for everybody. So if you want to convince stupid poor people to leave the cap in place, you can point out that if you didn't have a cap all the rich city folk would be getting $50k per month social security checks. I can see the fox news commercials now....
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Oct 31, 2019 19:33
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Baronash posted:I have a "how BWM is this?" question: As a very rough rule of thumb, if you just happen to find exactly what you want shortly after you start looking, similar things probably come on the market on a regular basis.
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Oct 31, 2019 19:44
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Ralith posted:As a very rough rule of thumb, if you just happen to find exactly what you want shortly after you start looking, similar things probably come on the market on a regular basis. kind of all depends - if this is like, Vermillion SD and stocks are more limited, that's not necessarily true
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Oct 31, 2019 20:10
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Baronash posted:I have a "how BWM is this?" question: You don't know where your new job will be. Suppose you found a massively well-paid that solely consisted of eating donuts and farting for market research purposes and it was a 3 hours drive from this place? Ralith posted:As a very rough rule of thumb, if you just happen to find exactly what you want shortly after you start looking, similar things probably come on the market on a regular basis.
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Oct 31, 2019 20:24
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Shut up Meg posted:You don't know where your new job will be. My wife is a teacher in the area and we're not looking to make a big move right now, so I wouldn't take it even without a place lined up.
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Oct 31, 2019 20:32
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Beach Bum posted:Sanity Check: Looks like I'm going to be up around $1700 over my average monthly net worth increase what with the three paychecks and spending less than I make (whoohoo! Go Go YNAB Budget!). Progressive's fee on monthly EFT is a mere 0.61% of the total premium, totally throwing this at the credit card (duh). Beach Bum fucked around with this message at 15:59 on Nov 1, 2019 |
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Nov 1, 2019 15:38
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Baronash posted:My wife is a teacher in the area and we're not looking to make a big move right now, so I wouldn't take it even without a place lined up. You haven't given numbers, but is it fair to say that you wife's salary alone could allow you to live comfortably in the new place if you were unemployed? Is your current place from your employer rent-free? No option for money in lieu of that?
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Nov 1, 2019 15:53
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Shut up Meg posted:You haven't given numbers, but is it fair to say that you wife's salary alone could allow you to live comfortably in the new place if you were unemployed? No, we would both need to be working. Shut up Meg posted:Is your current place from your employer rent-free? No option for money in lieu of that?
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Nov 1, 2019 16:12
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Baronash posted:No, we would both need to be working. Personally, I would skip it. Make a really serious effort to job hunt and you might get lucky and find something good before that place goes. But if you don't, there's bound to be something that ticks most of those boxes - and with the exception of the dog aspect, most of them are 'desirable', rather then 'essential' features. Yes, it could be disappointing to miss out on this place, but there is a potentially a huge downside: suppose you can't find a new job for 12 months? You'll have this big albatross around your neck and as well as the daily financial pressure, you'll be pressured into accepting a poo poo job, just because it pays quite a lot more than your current one. E: another thing: you would now be limiting your new job to one that is within commuting distance of your wife's job. If you had the flexibility for your home location, you could double that distance (I.e, you commute in opposite directions) and massively increase the geography of new job locations. Shut up Meg fucked around with this message at 01:54 on Nov 2, 2019 |
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Nov 1, 2019 17:00
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How does the backdoor ROTH contribution work for spouses? She has a pension, so doesn't pay into a retirement account, I have a Vanguard 401(k) and have been using the backdoor ROTH method for the last few years. Can we just open another IRA in her name to do the conversion? Can we have joint names on the existing ROTH IRA so the limit goes to $12k instead of $6k? Just trying to figure out how best to start taking advantage of the fact that there are 2 of us (even though I'm like 4 years behind on that).
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Nov 4, 2019 19:18
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Sab0921 posted:How does the backdoor ROTH contribution work for spouses?
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Nov 4, 2019 20:35
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Is there a thread for people to talk about doing customer support jobs, or somewhere where I can get some insight? I'm looking into job options to supply my husband's income while things are tough and I'm trying to weigh the benefits VS the soul draining of a customer service/call center job. Some input from people who've been there would be great. I know it's grueling trash tier work but I'm trying to figure out if it's too grueling for me to handle or not. I'm good at talking on the phone and being acceptably charming which is why I'm considering it in the first place.
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Nov 5, 2019 10:23
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Ritznit posted:Is there a thread for people to talk about doing customer support jobs, or somewhere where I can get some insight? I'm looking into job options to supply my husband's income while things are tough and I'm trying to weigh the benefits VS the soul draining of a customer service/call center job. Some input from people who've been there would be great. I know it's grueling trash tier work but I'm trying to figure out if it's too grueling for me to handle or not. https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3295066&pagenumber=1019#lastpost Corporate thread
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Nov 5, 2019 12:09
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Ritznit posted:Is there a thread for people to talk about doing customer support jobs, or somewhere where I can get some insight? I'm looking into job options to supply my husband's income while things are tough and I'm trying to weigh the benefits VS the soul draining of a customer service/call center job. Some input from people who've been there would be great. I know it's grueling trash tier work but I'm trying to figure out if it's too grueling for me to handle or not. Call center rant thread https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3309332
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Nov 5, 2019 16:35
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So I asked in the BWM thread and one of the suggestions I got was to post in one of the megathreads and here goes. Let me know if this should go elsewhere, etc. Background: roughly 1 year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I underwent chemotherapy at that time and am now in full remission. My MD says it's like I have diabetes...the type of cancer I have is a long term, managed condition. I may have some reduced life expectancy but not by much. Between being so sick from the cancer and so sick from the chemo both my ability to manage money and my ability to earn money both went into the toilet. We were one of those families 'just getting by' and this happened. I got behind on several bills and fell behind both in saving and managing my money. Over the last six months I have started righting the ship by saving both in cash and in my bank account. I have about $700 saved now. I am also slowly getting caught up with bills and have even paid off some entirely. This leads to last week when I came home to find a sheaf of papers from the local court tucked into my doorframe. A nationally known debt collection agency has bought the debt from a credit card I had completely forgotten about...I've made arrangements with all the others but this one got past me. There is a court date set for roughly a month from now. The amount of the debt is roughly $1500.00. My questions are as follows: 1) Do I offer to pay the full amount of the debt? I have heard on financial talk shows before that if a debt is bought by a collection agency then they have bought it for (potentially) pennies on the dollar and that it might make sense to offer a lower amount. I could probably raise the full amount between now and the court date. 2) My plan is to only communicate in writing with this collector. Is that the right way to do this? I"ve found their website and they have a phone number, etc. If I do contact them, what should I be asking for/mindful of? 3) Do I need to contact the court before the trial date? If so, what do I tell them? 4) Am I missing something?
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Nov 5, 2019 18:51
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Pershing posted:So I asked in the BWM thread and one of the suggestions I got was to post in one of the megathreads and here goes. Let me know if this should go elsewhere, etc. there's a debt collection megathread here too: https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3234974 The entire OP is full of information. The main takeaway is record literally everything and demand written copies of literally everything. If you can get proof of specific FDCPA violations you're probably going to have a great time suing the poo poo out of them. Absolutely do not miss that court date though, a default judgement is the worst thing you can have at this point. Just showing up might get the whole thing thrown out because the debt collector lawyer is probably busy enough already and doesn't want to spend the time fighting you for fifteen hundred dollars. 100 HOGS AGREE fucked around with this message at 19:03 on Nov 5, 2019 |
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Nov 5, 2019 18:59
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100 HOGS AGREE posted:there's a debt collection megathread here too: https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3234974 This times ten. Show up in court. They're there to call your name, have you not be there, and have a default judgement entered plus all their fees.
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Nov 5, 2019 19:29
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H110Hawk posted:This times ten. Show up in court. They're there to call your name, have you not be there, and have a default judgement entered plus all their fees. Thanks. I'll go ahead and repost over in the Collections thread as well.
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Nov 5, 2019 20:02
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Motronic posted:As an already-cap-hitter, I completely and totally agree. It's complete bullshit, which I assume got lobbied for by boomers. Nope, SS income tax was always capped. The wage base rises significantly faster than inflation though, think of it as repealing the cap on in the installment plan.
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Nov 5, 2019 23:47
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SlapActionJackson posted:Nope, SS income tax was always capped. The wage base rises significantly faster than inflation though, think of it as repealing the cap on in the installment plan. (The point being it never should have been capped in the first place. Even if they cap payout.)
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Nov 5, 2019 23:56
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Unfortunately, the capped tax and capped payout were necessary to fool people into thinking that it was a forced savings plan, which it emphatically is not. Live by your marketing and die by it too.
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Nov 6, 2019 00:05
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H110Hawk posted:(The point being it never should have been capped in the first place. Even if they cap payout.) This. The payout should be capped. The pay in should have never been. It is of nearly no consequence to people who hit this cap (other than shitheels living on the very edge of being potentially affluent but instead spending every dime they make and more), but of great consequence to the societal need.
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Nov 6, 2019 03:48
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Motronic posted:This. Literally the entire rest of the year the difference in my paychecks just ends up in equities anyway, so what do I care?
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Nov 6, 2019 14:34
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Are all HYSA’s APY going down? AmEx just sent me an email telling me mine is down to 1.75%. I think I t was 2.4% when I signed up just a year or so ago and has been declining ever since.
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Nov 7, 2019 17:40
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colachute posted:Are all HYSA’s APY going down? AmEx just sent me an email telling me mine is down to 1.75%. I think I t was 2.4% when I signed up just a year or so ago and has been declining ever since. They’ve all been declining since the Fed prime rate cuts started this year. Synchrony is still 1.9% for the time being.
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Nov 7, 2019 18:10
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Marcus also at 1.9% but obviously likely to go down
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Nov 8, 2019 13:05
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I recently got married and as a result changed my tax withholdings and my health insurance plan. Added my wife to my insurance, and since she has regular reoccurring health expenses due to an auto-immune disease, we went with the more expensive health care option at my work. It replaces my high deductible plan so I will no longer have a HSA that my employer contributes to. Instead I get a health reimbursement account. I still have about $3500 in my HSA. Can I roll that money over somehow into my HRA? Can I keep the HSA and pay from that then have my HRA reimburse me and just put the money back into the HSA? From what Ive read the HSA seems like the better option long term but Im not sure I can keep it with the new insurance plan.
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Nov 8, 2019 14:24
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Sock The Great posted:They’ve all been declining since the Fed prime rate cuts started this year. Synchrony is still 1.9% for the time being. KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:Marcus also at 1.9% but obviously likely to go down Yeah I figured it was across the board. Bummer. It would take them plummeting in APY substantially more than they are now for me to stash my liquid savings in anything else right?
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Nov 8, 2019 14:30
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BaseballPCHiker posted:I recently got married and as a result changed my tax withholdings and my health insurance plan. You can keep it and you can always use the money tax free to make qualified medical payments. You can start that now it anytime in the future. You cannot add money to it without a HDHP.
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Nov 8, 2019 14:43
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colachute posted:Yeah I figured it was across the board. Bummer. For a purely liquid emergency fund HYSA is still the way to go.
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Nov 8, 2019 20:53
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BaseballPCHiker posted:I recently got married and as a result changed my tax withholdings and my health insurance plan. You'd much prefer a HSA over a HRA, but if part of your benefits is that your employer puts money into the HRA to reimburse out of pocket costs, then use it for that. Only your employer can put money into it, and you can't invest the money in there or use it as a pseudo-Roth IRA in any meaningful way, so it's not really comparable to a HSA. There may also be a limit to how much you can roll over each year depending on the individual plan. It's also owned by your employer, so if you leave you can't take it with you. So I'd just use the money in there to defray out of pocket costs pretty much immediately. I'd just reimburse out of pocket costs from the HRA since that's all you can do with it, and leave the money in your HSA untouched and invested if possible. You're allowed to keep a HSA account open without being on a HDHP, you just can't contribute any more to it unless you go back onto a HDHP.
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Nov 8, 2019 21:29
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Yeah Ally savings are down to 1.8% APY.
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Nov 8, 2019 22:15
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My county tax collector offers a 5% discount on my property taxes if I pay in November, declining by 1% each month until they are due in April. My property taxes are paid out of escrow by my mortgage lender. Do I have any hope of having them release the escrow and allowing me to pay the difference outright to get this 5% discount? I'm fairly certain my lender pays them in April. The other option, if my lender is disinclined to go with this plan, is to just pay them myself (feasible) and have the tax portion of the escrow refunded to me by my lender in April when it "matures". Yet another option would be to forgo the tax escrow and just start handling it myself. Do I have any hope of arranging this? I'm going to call them anyway and ask, just sounding out the idea here in case y'all might have any useful advice. Beach Bum fucked around with this message at 13:28 on Nov 16, 2019 |
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Nov 16, 2019 13:25
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Hi you guys, it's been awhile. I met with a financial adviser yesterday. Real cool dude. I like him. I'm too poor to use a guy like that, I think. I was there for my mom. My dad died a couple of weeks ago. He was a relatively wealthy man, we all knew that. He kinda kept it all close to the chest, though. Across his 401k, various investments and savings accounts and IRAs and stuff, he had just hit 2 million. My mom is still getting life insurance payouts from her parents that died earlier this year and she's getting some checks from dad, and you'd think this 2 million would be hers to live off of for the rest of her life... except she also still gets his pension, which is $7,000 per month. It's funny because she's had to cut coupons most of her life and has no idea what this money even means to her. I've been helping her figure out the day to day finances and move money around but I'm pretty sure she's set for the rest of her life. My dad did real well and it's a shame he died just a few years into retirement but he was smart with his money and set my mom up real well. Anyway, just thought I'd drop in and say hi and wish that companies still did pensions...
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Nov 16, 2019 15:28
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CornHolio posted:Hi you guys, it's been awhile. Before you sign anything, get a full disclosure of fees and charges including loads for mutual funds. I would run things by this forum or the bogleheads forum. A good number of financial advisors are parasites, especially ones who make you think you are too poor for them. TBH your mom would probably be fine using the pension as her budget, and leaving the various inheritances and accounts in some rational mixture of stocks and bonds. Not sure what a financial advisor will add.
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Nov 16, 2019 16:56
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howdoesishotweb posted:Before you sign anything, get a full disclosure of fees and charges including loads for mutual funds. I would run things by this forum or the bogleheads forum. A good number of financial advisors are parasites, especially ones who make you think you are too poor for them. She pretty much is going to use the pension as her budget. She's afraid to touch anything else right now. When we were there I asked the guy directly how he got paid. There's one account (I don't remember the name or the type of fund it was but I have the paperwork at home) that he directly manages at his discretion and he charges a fee for that one. Everything else it's based on how much they make. I don't remember the numbers or anything but the whole setup seemed reasonable. My dad was good with money and it would shock me if he allowed himself to get bamboozled.
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Nov 18, 2019 13:42
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CornHolio posted:She pretty much is going to use the pension as her budget. She's afraid to touch anything else right now. The safe withdrawal rate (4%/year) on 2 mil is 80k. She doesn’t really have to be afraid to touch that money.
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Nov 18, 2019 18:17
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Yeah, working backwards from an $84k pension and grossly simplified 4% SWR is that it's equivalent to $2.1MM in assets, not counting the separate 2 million and stuff you're talking about. And I agree that almost nothing probably makes sense for that other dudes to manage, but it's not my money.
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Nov 18, 2019 19:32
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howdoesishotweb posted:Before you sign anything, get a full disclosure of fees and charges including loads for mutual funds. I would run things by this forum or the bogleheads forum. A good number of financial advisors are parasites, especially ones who make you think you are too poor for them. Are there financial advisors who are not parasites? How would that even work?
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Nov 19, 2019 06:26
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