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Safe and Secure! posted:On that note, how feasible is it to live cheap in these cities and save over half of your pay? I want to find a software engineering job in NYC or the SF Bay area as a graduate with a few months of experience, since my current job kind of blows. In NYC at least, rent will be your biggest expense by like, a factor of three. It is doable with roommates or if you make a whole lot. I would probably stick it out for at least a year though, unless it is like, a failing startup. I can't imagine companies would be too eager to hire someone leaving after a few months without a good reason. I suppose you could leave them off your resume and say you were travelling, up to you. The same definitely holds true in the bay area, there's a premium for living in the city, the suburbs have lower rent. If you live near a caltrain station you can probably survive without a car, depending on where exactly you live.
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Oct 18, 2013 05:28
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Do you hold yourself to the same standards in terms of making budget? Presumably your wife knows that you have savings that you aren't planning on spending. When she asks for something expensive can't you just say "we don't have room in the budget for that"? If she knows you have savings as well and just hasn't gotten around to checking it you are in the clear, if she doesn't and assumes you saying "we can't afford it" means "we actually do not have this much money" then that is not okay at all. There's no specific frequency at which you have to inform her of your savings levels as long as she knows it exists, has access and can check it.
Jeffrey of YOSPOS fucked around with this message at 20:27 on Oct 23, 2013 |
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Oct 23, 2013 20:24
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The actually frugal option is to not have kids. Once you do you are obligated to provide for them within your means. It is especially cruel to not pay for school if you file for them as a dependent, since they'll miss out on all sorts of financial aid that way. I know I would have not gone to the school I did if I had to pay my own way, and that's despite the fact that I've since earned back enough to pay for the tuition. I think my life would have been measurably worse if my parents hadn't covered school, and I can't imagine electing to stop working sooner at the expense of my (hypothetical) kids. Of course, it would be something I'd budget for as part of planning for having kids, not something I'd wait to worry about when it comes up.
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Nov 3, 2013 21:09
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No Wave posted:Ok, this is hideous. God drat. Did she ever do that in front of you? I would be pretty tempted to, in a friendly, non-combative manner, laugh and reveal the truth as if you thought she were kidding.
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Nov 4, 2013 23:38
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Orange_Lazarus posted:I'm not really big on donating money to charity but if I was truly financially independent I would definitely volunteer my time in some way. Habitat for Humanity for example. This doesn't really make sense, there are plenty of people who are happy to throw their time at charity, I'm pretty sure most charitable action is bound by money not volunteer-hours. It's be one thing if you had a special in-demand skill that you could give to a charity on the cheap, but if you're FI chances are you could do much more good by working and donating your salary than you could by spending time on it.
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Nov 5, 2013 14:49
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enthe0s posted:So my friend brought up a good question that I didn't have an answer for regarding early retirement. If all of my money is essentially locked away in a 401k and Roth IRA, how do I survive until I hit 60? I know you can take out the money you contribute from your Roth IRA before 60 penatly-free, but I feel like you don't want to do that to let your money grow right? Save money in investments that aren't retirement accounts. I don't know how much you make but you should be probably saving more than the 401k/IRA annual contribution limits anyway.
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Nov 6, 2013 17:10
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enthe0s posted:So I'm only 23 and I just started my first job 6 months ago, so I'm fairly new to all this. I'm currently working on saving enough money for a 6month emergency fund which I plan to just keep in a savings/checking account and paying off my student loans (which were a modest 7k). Once I've got those 2 things done, where are some places I can put my money where it will still grow at a good rate but is liquid enough to pull from? Just buy index funds and pull from/replenish that emergency fund that you keep in cash, no reason to sell investments and eat fees for quick cash. If you are constantly pulling from it, revise your spending or make your budget more realistic.
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Nov 6, 2013 17:16
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enthe0s posted:So would I do this through Vanguard I assume? Just open a general savings account? Err, keep your emergency fund in a regular bank account wherever, it doesn't matter much which one since it is purely for giving you access to cash quickly. Keep any additional savings in index funds/bonds through Vanguard(others are also more qualified to be more specific here).
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Nov 6, 2013 17:43
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No Wave posted:Oh, wow - this looks like it was designed for early retirement... cool.
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Nov 6, 2013 18:09
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Harry posted:You can kiss that money goodbye if someone gets ahold of your account number. Are you suggesting it is a bad idea to have a checking account at all? That is a weird post. EDIT: I guess I assumed "keep it in your checking account" to be shorthand for "keep it in a regular bank account with some portion in checking and some in savings", and move some to checking if it gets low. The key part is the regular bank account part, I assumed the poster could figure it out from there. Jeffrey of YOSPOS fucked around with this message at 19:37 on Nov 6, 2013 |
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Nov 6, 2013 19:00
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SlightlyMadman posted:I might be paranoid, but I'm personally more worried about theft. If somebody gains access to my account in some way (forged check, lifted debit number and pin, or even in person with a gun and a ride to an ATM), I want my emergency fund to be safe. In fact, something happening where my checking account got cleared out is one of the specific emergencies I'd think an emergency fund would be useful for. Even if you get the money back, it would likely take some time and I don't want to miss a mortgage payment over it. A debit limit serves to help this as well. Also you should probably be even more worried about identity theft and malware on your PC getting your online banking/investment passwords than you are about whatever is in your savings/checking accounts.
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Nov 6, 2013 21:01
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Your presence there is probably still a net benefit right? We can accept that there is going to be some maximum acceptable pollution floor and after a point mitigating it hurts more than it helps.(Not saying we are close to this now.) If you work at a job like that and don't ever let things slide, the world is better than if someone else has the job and does let things slide. After all, can't it be about doing good and not feeling good? You can agitate for reform at the same time if you want to try and help further. I would only not do it if it made you so miserable that it impacted your life outside of work and you aren't able to perform because of it. (I guess you should make an e/n thread if you want to continue this, no worries either way.)
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Nov 7, 2013 18:38
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Yeah reading the blog isn't very useful me any more, he's written plenty more words than are necessary. His case studies are still good when they happen. (PS don't ever click on the forums there, christ.) The most useful thing he's done for me is make me think vaguely of mustaches when I'm considering taking a cab home for no reason.
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Jan 23, 2014 18:18
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I think you're going to have to lower costs as well, 50k each year post-tax is a lot depending on where you live. College for four kids is a whole other ballgame though. I say just invest in SPY+REITs since rental property is more all-in on real estate, but other people can give better investing advice than me. Hustling for more income now(yesterday) in addition to cutting costs is probably your best plan but you are right it will definitely be tough. Jeffrey of YOSPOS fucked around with this message at 22:46 on Feb 1, 2014 |
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Feb 1, 2014 22:43
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Harry posted:I would be careful with private REITs. There's a lot of fly by night ones popping up now, that basically round up investor and ream them with fees. vvv A fair point. Jeffrey of YOSPOS fucked around with this message at 03:50 on Feb 2, 2014 |
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Feb 2, 2014 03:41
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Is there any reason to put money into a 401k with no matching? It is treated as such common knowledge that I feel like I'm missing something. I'm happy to buy and hold index funds myself, saving me the the fees. I get that I can take money out at a lower tax bracket when I'm 65+, but it's kind of hard to estimate what percentage of my income I will need to save for pre-65 but post-retirement years. That also assumes that marginal tax rates will not go up in the next 40 years, which I'm not sure I want to bet on.
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Mar 6, 2014 21:43
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No Wave posted:If you're not planning on having other sources of income you can feel pretty safe that at the very least your first 35K of income post-retirement will have a pretty low taxation rate even if tax rates go up. So I'd contribute at least enough to expect that from your retirement accounts (given reasonable expectations). This is assuming that you're making over 40K right now. You don't pay capital gains tax on interest earned in a 401k? I thought you paid tax on all the money you withdraw from a retirement account, if not that's a huge win.
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Mar 6, 2014 21:55
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No Wave posted:All trad 401k withdrawals are treated as standard income, so you'll be paying income tax on the increased amount. EDIT: Have to think more
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Mar 6, 2014 22:00
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No Wave posted:Yeah this is a big one! It didn't really click for me until I read about Roth 401ks and realized that Roth 401ks strictly dominate standard savings and yet were somewhat comparable to trad 401k in terms of tax benefit. Yeah, okay, sounds like a reasonable mix of 401k contributions, self-directed roth ira, and traditional savings is in order. Gotta figure out the fees on my new company's 401k as well. I save around 50% right now but I have no idea what the end result will be. Right now my money is taxed at a pretty high rate, but it is still a low rate historically speaking. I still have to estimate what percentage of my savings I will need to access before I'm in my sixties, anyone have advice there? It's hard to generalize from current spending to future retirement spending, due to weird job perks. (Work pays for all meals during the week, I live in a high-rent area where I don't need a car, so compromising on rent after-retirement might mean car costs.) Jeffrey of YOSPOS fucked around with this message at 22:26 on Mar 6, 2014 |
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Mar 6, 2014 22:22
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Yeah I would think timing the housing market in the general case would be just as hard as timing the stock market. If you live or want to live an an area with particularly inflated house prices(relative to other areas, not in an absolute sense) then they may depress disproportionately more when the stock market goes down, but judging that is hard.
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Mar 20, 2014 22:15
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My apartment doesn't have heat control so it is always on. When opening the window isn't enough I gotta turn on the AC and run both.
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Apr 4, 2014 19:28
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semicolonsrock posted:I don't know, I think that I would rather volunteer than donate money. It seems more satisfying to me, and given the disconnect between one's salary and the actual value of one's skills it seems like it's arguably more helpful if you're doing work you're good at. There are a lot more people willing to volunteer their time or work for nonprofits than there is money to pay them. It's fine to volunteer if you want to and it makes you feel good, but it's probably not actually the best way to help people. If you have a specialized trade, like you are a lawyer or doctor or something, you might be right, but outside of that I think you can do more good by working + donating. I'm planning on end of life donation rather than incremental donation - I don't think we're in any danger of world hunger/disease ending before I die. I don't have company matching though, so cool if you can take advantage of that.
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May 8, 2014 15:00
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PS I highly recommend researching charities to see how well they spend money. This is a cool site that rates charities based on how many lives they can effectively save per dollar donated. http://www.givewell.org/
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May 8, 2014 22:55
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Be sure to compare amazon to your local stores for non-food items like shampoo, toothpaste, etc. I realize that sounds ridiculous but I've now saved a lot by buying things on amazon and having them shipped to my house than I would have paid buying them locally.
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May 12, 2014 21:52
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I don't know anything about that but $6330 + $6550 does not equal $9850, sorry for not being actually helpful.
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May 20, 2014 14:43
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tuyop posted:It's practically useless unless you have a very specific skillset and ideals. If you're a knowledge worker who needs to help people face-to-face (think social workers, teachers, any medical professional) in order to feel worthwhile - which is most people in my experience - then outsourcing your life in order to satisfy your hedonistic desires will really not make you happy. This sounds like typical mind fallacy and I don't think it's true of most careers that people choose.
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May 30, 2014 17:16
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GoGoGadgetChris posted:Mr Money Mustache is getting trolled by a fake non-reader right now and doesn't seem to realize it. Got a link? I don't see anything obvious on the front page, hopefully it wasn't removed. EDIT: nevermind found it, http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2014/07/17/is-mr-money-mustache-ruining-your-marriage/
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Jul 18, 2014 17:38
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silvergoose posted:Read that as Designated Hitler and it made just as much sense in your sentence. glad i'm no longer alone
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Jul 18, 2014 18:47
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Franz called in sick and will be out today, leaving us without our lead actor, this is an emergency, has someone called the designated hitler? In short, I agree with Cicero.
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Jul 18, 2014 19:25
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I think he wrote most of the low-hanging fruit of things to write and now he's just posting to continue generating income or out of obligation. I'm fine reading his thoughts on whatever but it's no longer interesting enough to bother checking his site that often.
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Oct 14, 2014 00:06
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TLG James posted:I still never thought I'd be reading climate change deniers still loving talking about climategate on the MMM message board. Yeah I read their equivalent of "post people bad with money" for awhile and geez I'm never going back to that forum.
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Oct 14, 2014 06:35
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If you have to buy computer equipment, a (second) monitor is one of the most reasonable in terms of quality of life improvement. I think only the chair is more important. "True black" is a silly reason but it makes more sense to me than "new gpu 9000".
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Nov 27, 2014 03:53
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Counting 401k contributions pre-tax is kind of bogus, personally I don't count them at all.
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Nov 28, 2014 01:17
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District Selectman posted:I dunno dude, I can see discounting it in some way, but like how can I not count $17.5k in retirement savings as savings in any way? Am I a better saver by not using a tax advantaged retirement vehicle? It's going to be so long before I can touch them that I basically don't have them - I'd like to be FI 20+ years before I can take from them without penalty. There probably is a point where you putting more in delays your retirement, depending on income. Definitely should be post tax and post-matching though. I'm not too caught up in my percentage though.
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Nov 28, 2014 02:12
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Vilgan posted:I essentially use (increase in net worth due to my saving) / (How much I earned less taxes, including employer match) It's definitely inaccurate to count it pre-tax, estimating taxes on it is what I recommended.
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Nov 28, 2014 18:23
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How much marginal CO2 will go unreleased by your friend taking a train somewhere and getting arrested? Do you think the alberta bitumen will go unburned, keystone or not? I really doubt his efforts will have any positive effect and probably caused more carbon emissions than they prevented, unlike MMM who genuinely influences others to personally reduce their carbon footprint.
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Mar 3, 2015 20:37
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Dangit Ronpaul posted:For a certain type of person there's actually a strange logic in that. If you're in a job where you spend most of the day posting on the forums, and you're the sort who'd be doing that at home all day if you didn't work, you'd be an idiot not to take somebody's money for doing it. at work I can't post in my underwear, checkmate
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Mar 4, 2015 22:18
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I always hated that joke because both would probably agree with something like "don't make a career out of picking up $100 bills unless you have a statistical model for where they are about to fall". It's me I'm the joke sperg.
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Mar 5, 2015 21:15
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70k is a whole lot - equivalent to a low six figure salary. (Remember it's post-tax) If you have a decent six figure salary already it might not be unreasonable to save that but it's a big number for a lot of years. Depending on where you live, you can live quite well on a good bit less than that.
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Mar 8, 2015 05:39
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KingFisher posted:I live in Seattle (like within the actual city) so 70k doesn't go very far, its only 5k over our median income. I live on ~50k after taxes in Manhattan, I'm guessing you can do it in Seattle unless I've been greatly misled. I eat out for most meals and am frugal other than that and rent. Obviously our lives are different, if you want advice on budgets, I'm sure people here would be happy to help.
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Mar 8, 2015 12:24
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