Personal Finance Weekend Discussion and Victory Thread for the week of February 07, 2020 |
- Weekend Discussion and Victory Thread for the week of February 07, 2020
- I got accepted into my dream school, but my dad is about to lose his job
- How did people "lose their retirement" during the recession?
- A Financial Planner recommended my wife and I invest in Blackrock Mutual Funds with a pretty hefty upfront sales fee. Why would I not just invest in a Vanguard Mutual fund family with no upfront fee?
- I payed my monthly CC last night around 11pm, and it's due today.
- First day in /r/personalfinance, already engrossed with the flowchart
- My son's social security keeps increasing every other month. Should I be worried for some reason?
- Is getting a Bachelor’s degree in Accounting worth it?
- We are $10,000 upside down on our car loan and our car needs a new transmission. What can we do?
- I’m considering moving my savings to Ally bank for the higher interest rate. I plan on keeping $1,000 in savings in my current bank for emergencies but otherwise let savings sit with Ally. Thoughts?
- I started to make real money for the first time and I don’t know what to do with it.
- Received $94k in a dividend
- How does taking some money out of a 401k or HSA go?
- Inheriting a timeshare, very little idea on what to do with it or how they work. Is it worth it to keep it if it's already been paid off?
- Can you contribute to a 401k through your employer and open up a Roth IRA separately?
- When does it make sense to sell stock in a spin-off?
- Pay off loan vs. save
- Tax season 2020- finding filing software
- Tax preparation services (TurboTax, FreeTaxUSA, etc) optimize for federal refund, not total refund
- Help someone new with Vanguard 401k choices?
- Roth IRA Help Please
- Student Loan Refinance
- I recently turned 18 and want to get a debit card. Which bank should I use?
- Bankruptcy Time?
| Weekend Discussion and Victory Thread for the week of February 07, 2020 Posted: 07 Feb 2020 09:06 AM PST If you need help, please check the PF Wiki to see if your question might be answered there.This thread is for personal finance questions, discussions, and sharing your success stories:
A big thank you to the many PFers who take time to answer other people's questions! [link] [comments]  |
| I got accepted into my dream school, but my dad is about to lose his job Posted: 07 Feb 2020 05:54 AM PST So I currently live in Miami, Florida and I got accepted into Florida State University. I have earned Florida Bright Futures which is a scholarship that covers 100% of the tuition and even give some money for books. I have a 4.22 gpa and I got a 29 on the act. My dad broke the news to me yesterday that he is more than likely going to lose his job within a few months and I have no clue what to do as my grandma was also recently diagnosed with breast cancer and she's now living at my house and is slowly deteriorating right in front of my eyes. I really, really want to go to FSU but all signs are pointing to me having to stay in miami and going to community college, which will be free. I have looked into scholarships but the deadline to pay the deposit for enrollment is may 1st and most scholarships that I can apply for come out later. EDIT: thank you all so much for the many comments and i'm not gonna lie this is my first real reddit post and there's a lot of people asking things, so i'm going to cover the main ones that i've seen. a main one is i need to pay for room and board and a meal plan, though i don't actually need live on campus, I don't have a car so it would probably just be overall easier for me to be able to just live on campus. Then my plan has been set for about 3 years and it was to: 1. go to fsu and major in psychology with a prelaw track 2. go to law school and take out loans cause those are inevitable 3. hopefully either start my own practice or find a firm that I can join 4. practice, preferably, family law and be able to make a living to support myself and my family Another thing is if I don't go to FSU, I will be going to Miami Dade Community College, so no matter what I am going to go to college, it's just whether I go up to FSU or MDC. I will get a job at whichever college I go to so I can have money and I have about $1,000 saved up but that's not nearly enough to truly help with FSU at the moment. [link] [comments]  |
| How did people "lose their retirement" during the recession? Posted: 07 Feb 2020 09:12 AM PST Long story short my wife and I have recently paid off all of our debt, saved a six month emergency fund, saved a down payment for a house we'd like to buy in the next year, and have maxed out our 401ks and HSA's. We would now like to start investing. After our fairly comfortable lifestyle we have about $3,000 per month that we could save and/or invest with an additional $10,000 we could use upfront to start our accounts. Our question is, as young adults who were in high school/college during the financial crisis of 2008 and on you heard a lot about people "losing their retirements" how exactly did people lose the money they had invested? If the market crashed, couldn't they have just waited until it came back up and by now, twelve years later, would have had even more money? We understand the power of compounding interest and know that if we buy mutual funds now we would be set when it comes to retirement in 30 or so years. These horror stories are the only things that make us nervous about investing so aggressively. Thanks [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 07 Feb 2020 05:06 AM PST This is the tiered fee up front fee schedule If my wife and I went all in we would be at the 2% sales range or around $10,000 in a sales fee. I don't understand why my planner would recommend this over say BlackRock's ishares funds where there is no upfront huge fee or even vanguard where the expense ratios are like .05. Am I missing something here? Are class A shares of blackrock worth the upfront fee? You can't guarantee results so apples to apples why wouldn't I pick the cheaper version? [link] [comments]  |
| I payed my monthly CC last night around 11pm, and it's due today. Posted: 07 Feb 2020 06:08 PM PST The money hasn't been removed from my bank yet, and I'm worried this will count as a late payment. I use a Discover student card if that matters. [link] [comments]  |
| First day in /r/personalfinance, already engrossed with the flowchart Posted: 07 Feb 2020 07:55 AM PST Hey guys, it's my first day here. First thing I did was to go to the sidebar. The flowchart caught my eye. I'm a person who does flowchart design for a living (well, it's one of my many responsibilities in my day job). I've gotten inspiration from The Flowchart and immediately spend the last few hours creating my own version to help me understand the process better. Here it is. https://i.imgur.com/OC81hLT.jpg The thing is, I'm not even in the US to use it. I did it to understand the steps so I can make one for the country I'm living in. Hope the new flowchart helps a few redditors so at least my time spent is worthwhile. edit: Changed the color of the arrow to black, it's easier to see. [link] [comments]  |
| My son's social security keeps increasing every other month. Should I be worried for some reason? Posted: 07 Feb 2020 03:29 PM PST I have a 3-year-old son who has been diagnosed with autism. We receive social security every month to pay for daycare and other needs. About every other month you get a letter stating that his monthly payments are increasing by 20 or 30 bucks. Now I'm not complaining, but it's happening so frequently that it just kind of feels weird. Should I be worried? I know that sounds like a dumb thing to ask, but I'm just not very financially savvy. [link] [comments]  |
| Is getting a Bachelor’s degree in Accounting worth it? Posted: 07 Feb 2020 04:03 PM PST Do you have student loans while getting the degree? If so, are you having a hard time paying it back? How long did it take you to get a job after graduating? I have an associate's degree in business administration but I don't think I'll be able to land a high paying job with just that so I'm thinking about getting a bachelor's in accounting. The thing that's holding me back is that I'm gonna be paying more than 25k in debt. [link] [comments]  |
| We are $10,000 upside down on our car loan and our car needs a new transmission. What can we do? Posted: 07 Feb 2020 02:03 PM PST So after spending $800 to fix our engine light, the dealer informed us that we will need to have our transmission rebuilt which was quoted at $5200. We have a 2014 Dodge Grand Caravan with 107,000 miles on it, so the car wouldn't even be worth repairing. We owe $10,500 on the vehicle. What should we do? This is our only vehicle. We need another vehicle and we will have to finance one. [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 07 Feb 2020 05:35 PM PST |
| I started to make real money for the first time and I don’t know what to do with it. Posted: 07 Feb 2020 10:56 AM PST I'll start by saying that I grew up poor. My parents are immigrants. They tried their best to impart some of their limited knowledge in finance but they've never been where I am and they can't really guide me. I'm one of the first in my family to go to college and earn "good" money. I'm a recently barred lawyer. I don't make crazy money or anything. Just a lot more than I've ever had and I simply don't know what to do about it. I watched some pretty remedial personal finance videos and my plan has been as follows: Out of each biweekly paycheck, about 40% goes directly into savings. I've contributed the maximum amount to my 401k and that's been strong. I was able to bank 20k into my 401k after a year of work. I've saved about 45k so far. My money is sitting in a savings account and it's pretty stagnant. I'd love to invest some of it, but I am a bit intimidated to do anything with my money. Right now, my parents have been really cool about me staying at hone. I pay the mortgage for our family home (about half of what rent would be in any shitty apartment in LA). My short term financial goal is to own property. I desperately need a tax shelter. No dependents. No liabilities (other than student loans). Is this goal good to have early in my career? Am I skipping over other priorities? Are there good, safe ways to make money with the money I already have? What tips do you all have for a newly paid 28 year old with virtually no knowledge of personal finance? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 07 Feb 2020 11:56 AM PST Hi Guys, Got a weird situation, my Dad set aside a bunch of stock for my siblings and I from a company he started. He no longer has any stake in it but the company has gone on to do well and we all received a dividend of $94k each this year. I currently have a job and no debt and just live off my salary. My area is very expensive so I won't be buying any property. (Housing starts at $1.5M for a small apartment) To be honest I'm not really sure what to do with the money. I had about $40k in the Schwab robotrader already and I spoke to a relative who works for Morgan Stanley and they said, with that amount of money, it doesn't make sense to work with a wealth management agency. Obviously I'll be paying a chunk to taxes this year. Curious what you guys would do? [link] [comments]  |
| How does taking some money out of a 401k or HSA go? Posted: 07 Feb 2020 06:04 PM PST Hey there, If I wanted to take some money out of my 401k or Health Savings Account for spending money on a vacation, lets say $500, how much would I pay in taxes, fees, etc? I know this isn't something you're supposed to do, but what would trying to do this look like? Thanks! [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 07 Feb 2020 08:49 AM PST I don't really know how timeshares work besides some quick googling and apparently everyone thinks they are a dumb idea. My sister wants to keep the timeshare which would be split between us somehow or used to take joint vacations. Are they worthwhile to keep if they have been paid for? What are some problems with owning one that we may not know? Edit: This seems to be some sort of wyndam plan, i don't know what the terms of the contract are, my sister has them right now. I'm happy to let her have all of it if she wants it, but I'm just trying to see if I should dissuade her. [link] [comments]  |
| Can you contribute to a 401k through your employer and open up a Roth IRA separately? Posted: 07 Feb 2020 05:19 PM PST So I'm making 65.5k a year and contribute 10% of my salary to my employer matched 401k (Vanguard). They match 4.5% up to the first 6%. Someone at work told me to open up a Roth IRA separately outside of work. I talked to my dad and he seems pretty adamant that you can't do both. I looked it up and it said you can contribute up to $19,500 to your 401k per year and $6,000 to IRA's. Is there something I'm missing or can I do both? [link] [comments]  |
| When does it make sense to sell stock in a spin-off? Posted: 07 Feb 2020 05:17 PM PST Especially if you only own shares of the parent company before and after the ex. Does it make sense to sell the parent stock before the spinoff? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 07 Feb 2020 01:56 PM PST For the first time in my life, I actually have a good amount in savings ($21,000) and I have one student loan left of $11,000. I am paying much extra on the loan than the minimum each month, but should I just pay it off or keep saving? Also, I've found that the field I work in pays essentially nothing and am considering going back to school for a much higher paying job (per bls.gov, would double my annual salary for only two years more of school plus 5 undergrad prereqs). What does everyone think? [link] [comments]  |
| Tax season 2020- finding filing software Posted: 07 Feb 2020 06:28 PM PST Here is a good, quick guide to the different filing options out there. There are so many to choose from, hopefully this is helpful. What do y'all like to use? [link] [comments]  |
| Tax preparation services (TurboTax, FreeTaxUSA, etc) optimize for federal refund, not total refund Posted: 07 Feb 2020 06:25 AM PST TL;DR - tax preparation software optimizes for federal refund not total refund and by switching between itemized and standard deductions, pick the one that gives you the largest refund. I discovered this while preparing my taxes last year. I noticed that my state refund was considerably lower than it was the year prior. After digging, I found that because I had taken the standard deduction for my federal taxes, my state had done the same. My understanding is that they must be the same for both federal and state. This is true in Virginia at least, maybe elsewhere. Anyway, my itemized deductions were close to the standard deduction so I switched over to itemized and my federal refund went down but my state went up, for a net gain of a couple hundred dollars in refund. This was also true this year, where my itemized deductions were a couple thousand shy of the standard deduction. Double bonus was that I did not have to include my state refund as taxable income this year because I had taken a lower federal refund than if I had chosen the standard deduction. I am unaware of a negative side effect of this, but if there is please let me know. Otherwise, check it out, you may get some more cash back than you were expecting! [link] [comments]  |
| Help someone new with Vanguard 401k choices? Posted: 07 Feb 2020 04:38 PM PST Hi All, I'm just getting started on my knowledge on investment and correct allocation. I'm 37 years old and have been reading JL Collins stock series and want to invest in Vanguard. I wanted to set my 401k to a 83/17 stock/bond split to start while obtaining as much knowledge as possible and then tweak if needed. Essentially i want to get as close to 83% in VTSAX and 17% in VBTLX as possible, unfortunately the funds available to me aren't those. Could you give me advice on the two closest funds below that would match those? Again, i'm new to this so i'm still a little confused on similar funds etc Below is the fund name, code and gross expense ratio for each of my options in my 401k for Vanguard. Thanks for all the help in advance! and if you need more info let me kmow. Stock Vanguard Equity Income Fund Admiral Shares - VEIRX - 0.18% Vanguard Extended Market Index Fund Institutional Shares - VIEIX - 0.06% Vanguard Institutional Index Fund Institutional Shares - VINIX - 0.03% Vanguard Total International Stock Index Fund Institutional Shares - VTSNX - 0.08% Bonds Vanguard Total Bond Market Index Fund Institutional Shares - VBTIX - 0.03% [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 07 Feb 2020 08:18 PM PST So I'm 18 years old and I saved 3000$ from work and I wanted to put in a Vanguard Target Retirement fund because I'd like it to do all the work for me but the problem is that the latest year that Vanguard has is 2065 and I will be 63 years old by then, but I want to retire at 70 years old which is 2072 which they don't offer yet. Will this impact my retirement savings reward? Should I wait for the 2072 fund to be available? Or do you recommend I pick another fund that has a bigger reward? [link] [comments]  |
| Posted: 07 Feb 2020 02:20 PM PST I've been getting a lot of stuff in the mail about refinancing student loans. I currently owe 59k with 58k of that being principal. So I've paid off nearly all of my interest. Not sure if I was supposed to do it that way, but there's no going back so here we are. The current average rate that I have is 5.3%. My question is would it be beneficial for me to refinance my loans with the interest already being paid off? [link] [comments]  |
| I recently turned 18 and want to get a debit card. Which bank should I use? Posted: 07 Feb 2020 08:08 PM PST |
| Posted: 07 Feb 2020 08:02 PM PST I am a single parent of three and slowly realizing my finances may be more than I can handle. Nothing is in collections or at risk at the moment, but I am only able to meet the minimum payments and roughly half my income goes straight to repaying credit cards. I am realizing at this rate I have absolutely no future, and if I could just catch a break my kids could have a better life. The credit card debt was not incurred due to lavish living, but mostly went to fixing the house and normal life expenses post divorce, compounded over years. I have 2 special needs children, and have held a full time job (or more) since the early 2000s. I am trying everything I can to avoid bankruptcy, but I can't get out of this endless cycle. I owe about $25k in credit cards and make $47k working 2 jobs (including $3600 per year in child support). I bought a car about a year ago and owe about $7k on it. I own a mobile home free and clear, but pay lot rent for my space. I need to keep both the house and the car for survival. I just want help with the credit cards. The part that I'm scared of in seeking bankruptcy (aside from the immense blow to my pride), is that I lied about my income. Originally, it wasn't intentional. I made a typo years ago and didn't catch it (meant to put $57k, but put $75k). One of the credit cards gave me a decent sized line of credit, and I used it to escape a domestic abuse situation that lasted for years. At the time, it felt like a blessing. I should have corrected the mistake when I realized it, and I regret it now. Whenever the credit card company asked for an updated income, I stuck with that because I was scared of the consequences. How much trouble can I get in, and how likely is it that the creditor would pursue action against me if I go through bankruptcy? If there are legit alternatives, I'm all ears. I want to give my kids better lives, and feel desperate for an opportunity. [link] [comments]  |
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