New Subforum- Beginners Helping Beginners!

[The White Coat Investor]

By popular demand, we now have a forum for those feeling intimidated by the high level of knowledge and success generally shown by forum participants. This new forum will be a place where "beginners" are encouraged to post their "stupid questions" and in turn to lend their expertise (everybody has some) and support to others. There is no question too dumb.

And for those of you gurus, bloggers, millionaires, and professionals who feel a need to respond to every thread posted on the forum, lay off this one a bit and let the threads run a few days before posting your thoughts.

A VERY high level of kindness and understanding will be expected and enforced by the moderators in this subforum.

[DMFA]

Cool.  Wish I'd had this when I was a beginner.  Great idea.

[VagabondMD]

So what you are saying is that this will not be the forum to discuss the optimal SWR to three decimal places?

[The White Coat Investor]

Vagabond MD wrote:

So what you are saying is that this will not be the forum to discuss the optimal SWR to three decimal places?

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It's probably not even a forum you should be posting in. But if no one else is responding after a few days, then feel free.

[q-school]

Yes we also need a forum for "Enders" helping "Enders".
For the crotchety who want people to stay off their lawn!

[MochaDoc]

How about a "Case study" sub forum?"

[Hatton]

I have been concerned for some time that new people were being intimidated.  I think the sub-forum is a good idea.  I hope someone will be allowed to post with the intent to help them.  I also like the idea of a case study sub-form as suggested by Mocha-doc.  I guess sign me up for the ender forum.  In all honesty I really have not paid much attention to what forum something is posted in.  I just look at who posted it and the topic.

[Donnie]

The beginner sub-forum is a good idea, but I agree with hatton that I do not really notice the sub-forum.  I like that this forum is organized such that posts from all sub-forums show up in a single place organized by date of last post, but it causes me not to pay attention to the sub-forum, especially on my phone.  Other forums I have seen do not have this feature, so topics in sub-forums can end up neglected.

[The White Coat Investor]

Apparently there isn't all that much pent-up demand for it. 24 hours and no threads yet. We'll leave it for a month or two and see what happens.

[notadoc]

Don't know if you would want to do this or not.  How about a email to your email subscribers about the new forum as a way to promote it?  Or I guess you could mention it in the monthly email.

[JWeb]

The White Coat Investor wrote:

A VERY high level of kindness and understanding will be expected and enforced by the moderators in this subforum.

Click to expand...

You already do this on your regular threads.  You really want "Experts helping Beginners" anyway. Why have someone who doesn't know very much also help someone who doesn't know very much?

Allow your top ten posters (POF, JFox, Zaphod, Hatton, vagabond, WCI, etc) to answer the questions privately for the person. They can summarize the question and advice with the beginner's permission publicly later for everyone's education.

Ironically, an "Experts Forum for Beginners" is what you really need. . .

[The White Coat Investor]

JWeb wrote:

The White Coat Investor wrote:

A VERY high level of kindness and understanding will be expected and enforced by the moderators in this subforum. 

Click to expand…

You already do this on your regular threads.  You really want “Experts helping Beginners” anyway. Why have someone who doesn’t know very much also help someone who doesn’t know very much?

Allow your top ten posters (POF, JFox, Zaphod, Hatton, vagabond, WCI, etc) to answer the questions privately for the person. They can summarize the question and advice with the beginner’s permission publicly later for everyone’s education.

Ironically, an “Experts Forum for Beginners” is what you really need. . .

Click to expand...

Well, if no one uses it, it won't be around long anyway. We're trying to encourage participation by more people, which makes the forum better in the long run.

[gniziale]

All the experts here including the WCI appear have some rosey expectations regarding their expected annual returns from the stock market. Given the extended growth streak over the past decade, arn't we "due" for a market correction. I know the general advise is that attempting to time the market is just as likely to miss out on a period of growth but at some point we know we will see a crash. Does anyone else feel that converting stock market gains to cash in anticipation of such crash might be a good idea given some of the irrational exuberance thats being expressed.

[q-school]

gniziale wrote:

All the experts here including the WCI appear have some rosey expectations regarding their expected annual returns from the stock market. Given the extended growth streak over the past decade, arn’t we “due” for a market correction. I know the general advise is that attempting to time the market is just as likely to miss out on a period of growth but at some point we know we will see a crash. Does anyone else feel that converting stock market gains to cash in anticipation of such crash might be a good idea given some of the irrational exuberance thats being expressed.

Click to expand...

yes but hard to know when.  we heard that prior to the Donald's election and stock market has steam rolled along.  you also give up potential profits when you do that.  if the time frame is long, which for beginners presumably it would be, then they should ride it out.

if the 'enders' want to try and anticipate, that may be reasonable.  especially if you are already in retirement and worried about Sequence of return risk more than eaking out marginal profits.  I'm not sure what to do if you are vagabond or hatton1 wealthy and already in escape velocity.  you probably split the difference and try to wait for the downturn to have buying opportunities.

probably most of us wait for the crash and then convert to roth ira?

 

 

[Hatton]

gniziale wrote:

All the experts here including the WCI appear have some rosey expectations regarding their expected annual returns from the stock market. Given the extended growth streak over the past decade, arn’t we “due” for a market correction. I know the general advise is that attempting to time the market is just as likely to miss out on a period of growth but at some point we know we will see a crash. Does anyone else feel that converting stock market gains to cash in anticipation of such crash might be a good idea given some of the irrational exuberance thats being expressed.

Click to expand...

q-school wrote:

gniziale wrote:

All the experts here including the WCI appear have some rosey expectations regarding their expected annual returns from the stock market. Given the extended growth streak over the past decade, arn’t we “due” for a market correction. I know the general advise is that attempting to time the market is just as likely to miss out on a period of growth but at some point we know we will see a crash. Does anyone else feel that converting stock market gains to cash in anticipation of such crash might be a good idea given some of the irrational exuberance thats being expressed.

Click to expand…

yes but hard to know when.  we heard that prior to the Donald’s election and stock market has steam rolled along.  you also give up potential profits when you do that.  if the time frame is long, which for beginners presumably it would be, then they should ride it out.

if the ‘enders’ want to try and anticipate, that may be reasonable.  especially if you are already in retirement and worried about Sequence of return risk more than eaking out marginal profits.  I’m not sure what to do if you are vagabond or hatton1 wealthy and already in escape velocity.  you probably split the difference and try to wait for the downturn to have buying opportunities.

probably most of us wait for the crash and then convert to roth ira?

 

 

Click to expand...

There will always be another crash.  If you have cash please deploy it.  People get paralyzed and do nothing waiting on the next crash.  I would stick with your plan. I may have escape velocity but other than keeping a couple years worth of of cash equivalents and 35% bonds I am not doing anything different.  If we do get a sizable crash I will do another Roth conversion. That is my plan.