When it's hard enough to cut back on saving but this market makes it even harder

[JBME]

I suspect you don't know but you need to know your income for the year. I'm generally comfortable converting/contributing to Roth as long as I don't get...

[JBME]

if your HH income is in the 32%+ marginal bracket (which I believe yours is) then I would stick with pre-tax contributions in all 457/401k/403b accounts....

[JBME]

you gave the right advice. Does your son have student loans?

Be aware just because there is a match after one year doesn't mean your son...

[JBME]

yes, I would lump sum it now. stocks only go 20%+ down, on average, once every 3 years I believe

[JBME]

Good point! Only changing the plan due to the itch to "time the market" as it happens we have a bear only, on average, once every 3 years. And...

[JBME]

I agree tax diversification is key. Would you not max out a tax-deferred account and contribute to taxable instead all in the name of diversification...

[JBME]

Right. I don't want to get to be older and have little flexibility b/c all money is in tax-advantaged accounts. I know about SEPP and you can always use...

[JBME]

right, we're contributing less in order to spend more (or make less income) rather than fund a taxable account.

your comment gets at a question...

[JBME]

On the one hand I'm surprised by the responses being all focused on not maxing a 401k. On the other hand, I suppose I shouldn't be surprised. I suspect...

[JBME]

We are doing a combination of trying to intentionally increasing spending on vacations and cutting back a little to .9 fte. We’re dual income each with...

[JBME]

I'm curious to know if anyone else has gone through this experience in the last few years. First, did you make a specific plan to cut back you savings...

[JBME]

I think this is my answer too. And we refinanced during the super low rate period in 2021 and have 2.5%. I'm not pushing extra towards the mortgage now...

[JBME]

you should quit. This is what FIRE is for

[JBME]

what do you mean you opened "a roth account" at your employer? Do you mean a Roth 403b? Because you can't open a Roth IRA through your employer....

[JBME]

How old is mom? You can use an example of $1 buys one share of stock x and stock y is currently $2 so if she sells stock x she’ll buy 1/2 share of stock...

[JBME]

yes but will it be kicked down the road permanently? Because yes there's always another election coming around. If they kick the can down the road again...

[JBME]

payments were set to resume this August but with the midterms I'm 99% sure there will be yet another delay and resumption of payments will begin ~January...

[JBME]

Good post. If a lot of us here already understand the ups and downs of the market and won't sell low and are at least 10-15 years from retirement, can...

[JBME]

When you look at a brokerage account it legally says past performance is not indicative of future performance. Same pertains to housing. If you feel you...

[JBME]

It’s a no brainer. Convert the whole thing tomorrow....

[JBME]

you also need to include, if applicable, an employer match into your percentage saving but that amount goes in the numerator and the denominator

[JBME]

https://awealthofcommonsense.com/202...-40-portfolio/

not at all. A 6% average annual return for the next...

[JBME]

https://www.whitecoatinvestor.com/ho...nal-statement/

[JBME]

on the one hand, I'm a bit bummed out because we've had a "sustained" drop of almost 6 months now and my account balances looks depressing though...

[JBME]

you should do what you think is right. Most of the regulars on this forum are comfortable with close to 100% equities for a variety of reasons, but probably...

[JBME]

You need a student loan plan and it sounds like you don’t have one. What is your salary going to be? Is the job pslf qualified? Yes get disability insurance...

[JBME]

just writing to tell you my thinking but other more knowledgeable people will hopefully help, especially spiritrider. You said this is a 401a. That means...

[JBME]

ideally you do a 401k and not a SIMPLE

[JBME]

you should list out for us what the expense ratios are for those funds, but generally the lower the expense ratio the better. If anything is under .3...

[JBME]

yeah, you don't need to get rid of the private investigator (weird term for you to use, BTW) because your balance is so relatively low but I think it's...

[JBME]

good points above. Government spending can lead to inflation, but so can Federal Reserve policies. So can other external factors, especially with globalization....

[JBME]

Schwab in general is one of the "good guys" in the financial services space but you might want to look into the fees the advice guy is charging...

[JBME]

Vesting means you have to work somewhere for a certain amount of time before the
money your employer matches is truly yours. They also won’t 100%...

[JBME]

You can only fund those accounts when your spouse is working there. It sounds like she's about to leave. You could have funded each one $20,500 this year...

[JBME]

having 50-60% of take home pay go to housing in a HCOL area as a resident isn't unusual. You are blessed, as you said, with such a small student loan...

[JBME]

it's only 10% of your cash. If you find a house within a year then couldn't you just grind a little more or sell from taxable, or heck just borrow a little...

[JBME]

even if what he says is true, that's not an argument for 0% in international. Maybe less than the recommendation but not 0. Personally I'm between 20-25%...

[JBME]

"no culpability"-no, I don't believe they are 0% responsible, nor did I ever say that. "minimal" culpability is what I would argue,...

[JBME]

StarTrekDoc I can agree with that to some extent. Certainly it's true that what causes something bad may not be the thing that causes the bad thing to...

[JBME]

sure. The issue is there's clearly a healthy amount of pushing the scales to fit ones own ideology in figuring out what's going on. Trillions were pumped...

[JBME]

I don't want to engage or inflame further and yet I acknowledge I will. You can't say "leaving aside the politics" and then quote a bunch of...

[JBME]

Correlation does not equal causation.......

[JBME]

The age at first birth for both men and women has been going up for decades now. 45 isn't typical but the age has been doing up, and this is largely correlated...

[JBME]

why does this always need to be political? the initial COVID stimulus bills passed many, many months prior to January 2021. In fact, I think it's reasonable...

[JBME]

yeah I don't want to derail the thread and I get where you were initially coming from. I also prefer to pay less taxes. I don't know a single person who...

[JBME]

sure. I don't really disagree with this. However, I assume you and the OP and anyone here understands the rules before they start doing something. This...

[JBME]

you are concerned about paying $100k in taxes when even after taxes you profited $1m from the sale, all within less than 3 years? why not just count your...

[JBME]

if the solution to stopping school shootings is to arm teachers, then the solution to stopping hospital shootings is to arm staff, including doctors

[JBME]

mentions a lot of overtime pay. It would be helpful to know exactly how many hours per week they are working. We klnow doctors make a lot but they also...

[JBME]

there's a nice middle ground between having kids when you are 35/42 and when you're 24/27. Poor guy has already missed seeing much of his kids for the...

[JBME]

that seems like a reasonable plan to me...

[JBME]

this is hard to answer. if your federal bracket was 32%+ it's a pretty convincing answer to say it should be pre-tax because you're likely to be in a...

[JBME]

what's your current tax rate? fed + state. The issue is in retirement your income is likely to be lower than $300k so you'd actually pay less in taxes...

[JBME]

stocks are on sale. if you don't need it for at least 5-10 years dump it into the S&P500 index fund within your 403b.

[JBME]

I think it's especially relevant to people on the forum or ppl who follow WCI principals because I think the great majority of us just view SS as gravy,...

[JBME]

if you find something that is no more than 2x your gross, go for it. If you can't find something, don't feel pressure to buy just for the sake of buy...

[JBME]

My recollection is student loan payments through matching are meant to replace employer retirement matches. However I bet it’s flexible enough to allow...

[JBME]

There's a very "simple" solution to making sure you don't pay the widow tax: get married again! Probably introduces all sorts of complications...

[JBME]

Since the market is down ytd and you also clearly need a large sum of cash to sleep at night (nothing wrong with that) how about put 1/2 in the market...

[JBME]

Hey at least you had two years of no interest. Plenty of people here paid off their loans long ago when there was still interest. We actually put in our...

[JBME]

hmmm....I found the first bit about paying to lock in an interest rate interesting. It's not the same thing but when we refinanced just over a year ago...

[JBME]

your last full paragraph is key. This is gravy. You don't need it. Don't let siblings rip their relationship apart when the money doesn't matter to you...

[JBME]

lol. looks like the OP only recently discovered the Roth IRA via backdoor. not enough saved in there for sure...

[JBME]

awesome! honestly I didn't realize it was possible it wasn't an option because each employer I've been with has had this feature in the 401k. N=2 tho...

[JBME]

to put this in perspective, I don't remember exactly how old Jim is but I believe it's mid-to-late 40s. My wife and I are not nearly as financially literate...

[JBME]

obviously in a marriage each person's money is everyone's money. Two things accelerated getting to Roth IRA millionaire status: being married (double...

[JBME]

Yes that is how I understand it. Read the summary plan document. But yes someone more knowledgeable than me should answer...

[JBME]

It’s worth checking. I believe most plans let you directly roll 401k pre tax to a Roth IRA if they allow a rollover to an IRA...

[JBME]

yes I'd get her an FA from the recommended list here...but only have an initial consultation and/or make sure she knows who to contact should you pass....

[JBME]

I did a Roth conversion back in Feb when the S&P was down 10%. I did $10k at that time. Very small amounts as I don't want to bump us out of the 24%...

[JBME]

A conversion is totally separate from a backdoor Roth contribution. You should do the backdoor Roth regardless of whether you convert anything (I assume...

[JBME]

Anyone can use a statistic to construct a narrative. You totally missed my point. Even if I believe your premise that stocks were overvalued on January...

[JBME]

Once you reach a certain limit of posts Jim sends you an automatic email with his DOB and mother's maiden name. If you reply back and say you're a nigerian...

[JBME]

if you're not close to retirement (10+ years away) I don't see how a 1000 point drop in the DJI hurts you. You are investing for the long run so we're...

[JBME]

he served alongside the current president when they were both senators from Delaware ...

[JBME]

We did this for the year we planned to set up a trust. We paid extra for our trust but it was discounted. I think in the end we paid $1k for the trust,...

[JBME]

I'll tell you why. Sales training isn't just about how to say something to get someone to buy something. There's a "rah rah rah" attitude that...

[JBME]

I like this idea. I'm hard of hearing. I think what I'll start to do is make sure after an initial "no thank you" that they clearly see me take...

[JBME]

obviously it depends on how many kids you have but you can really ruin kids if you give them too much money. You want to give them anything they want...

[JBME]

honestly from how you are responding and what you're writing I certainly feel you guys can do it and you won't have to work like a dog for 10-15 years....

[JBME]

just be careful. For many people, when you increase your spending because you (or the spouse) deserves it that becomes your new baseline. If one spends...

[JBME]

financially it doesn't make sense, especially with inflation. But why not go buy a $10m place with a 4% mortgage rate then? The math works doesn't it....

[JBME]

it's not like you've been doing nothing for the past 10 years. You have car debt and you need to get rid of that and not do it again. But you paid down...

[JBME]

no! do not use morgan stanley. If you feel you would benefit from a wealth manager (personally I'd just digest the blogs on this site for free instead...

[JBME]

are the two salaries comparable? I would challenge you to live off the lesser one.

Put 20% to retirement straight out of residency, or at...

[JBME]

the general assumption is that if you're a W2 you don't have much control. You do have more control as the employer than as the employee, I agree, but...

[JBME]

exactly. If their plan includes a change in their life to be what they want it to be, and the "it" is work, then they don't need to be FI before...

[JBME]

haven't read the whole thread but I've been interested in life expectancy and mortality as a demographer. Has anyone checked out the life tables from...

[JBME]

i only do NW calculations at the end of the year. I'm sure I'm down but not too much, due to home appreciation and we've been contributing to retirement...

[JBME]

okay I would not roll it over to a Roth IRA in your situation. You need to get more clear about your distribution options. As this is a governmental 457...

[JBME]

do you have a need for the money now? What is your 2022 expected marginal tax (fed + state)? What are your distribution options, and are you sure you...

[JBME]

Saving a higher percentage earlier in life also likely entitles you to save less than 20% (like 10-15%) later in life. If you are halfway to your FI number...

[JBME]

if you can afford it, get it now. It's cheap stuff...like $50/month (maybe less?) for a $1m umbrella

[JBME]

Go for it. Totally affordable to you. The first question I have is do you have plans to further expand the family? If so, consider that and maybe you'd...

[JBME]

roth dollars are more valuable than pre-tax dollars for sure. Tax diversification (pre-tax, tax-free, sometimes-tax (i.e. capital gains tax)) but the...

[JBME]

can't disagree with you there

[JBME]

I'm not sure it's fair mathematically to say the HH income is close to 400 but he's saving 1500/mo. That's not true. He's saving way more than $1500/month...

[JBME]

obviously everyone is entitled to their point of view but this is crazy thinking in my view. So the $20,500+$6000+employer match isn't anything? It's...

[JBME]

I'm frustrated Ally hasn't raised their rates for HYSA once the fed raised rates in March. I remember they decreased rates when they (correctly) anticipated...

[JBME]

wrt the 529s, it's a bit of both. I have 3 kids and for now I put in only the amount that gets me the state tax deduction, which is nowhere near enough...