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Is it better to pay an insurance deductible, or get an upgrade? | You asked for simple, and I promise you this is... it just looks a bit math-heavy to start with because we have to handle a couple of different scenarios. Bear with me :) I find the best way to deal with these kinds of questions is to put together a "Total cost" for each option, for a sensible amount of time, and see w... |
Basic questions about investing in stocks | What is a stock? A share of stock represents ownership of a portion of a corporation. In olden times, you would get a physical stock certificate (looking something like this) with your name and the number of shares on it. That certificate was the document demonstrating your ownership. Today, physical stock certificates... |
Online accounting with Stripe/PayPal transactions | Crickets here, so I'll respond with what I ended up doing. At the end of each month, I download transaction data from each of Stripe and PayPal. For each, I do the following: So it is just six entries in Wave per month plus a little spreadsheet manipulation to determine revenues and fees. Takes about 10 minutes to do... |
What are the advantages of paying off a mortgage quickly? | I used to think that paying off ahead of time made sense, but I no longer do, at least in most cases. The upside is that you can get a return on your money equal to the mortgage interest rate (it's less than that in the US, where mortgage interest is deductible, so it's roughly the mortgage interest rate * 1 - your ma... |
Mortgage interest income tax deduction during year with a principal residence change | http://www.irs.gov/publications/p936/ar02.html#en_US_2010_publink1000229891 If you still own it, you get to deduct all of it. In my taxes I did online with TaxAct, it asked if I lived there or not and it just mattered which form it filed for me. With having tenants it was a 'business' form and I assume it would be a s... |
What is a stock warrant? How do warrants work? | In Australia there are 2 type of warrants (I don't know if it is the same in the US, UK and other countries), the first are trading warrants and the second are instalment warrants. The trading warrants are exactly what it says, they are used for trading. They are similar to option and have calls and puts. As Cameron sa... |
Do I have to explain the source of *all* income on my taxes? | Appears to be a hypothetical question and not really worth answering but... Must it be explained.. no, not until audited. It's saying that for everything reported on a tax return, people have to include an explanation for everything, which you do not, unless you want to make some type of 'disclosure' which is a differe... |
What types of receipts do I need to keep for itemized tax deductions? | Businesses are only required to keep receipts over $751. However for individuals, I would throw them all in a shoebox and not worry about organizing them. There's a small chance you'll need to go through them during an audit, and you can worry about reconciling all of them and putting them in order at that point. Jus... |
Is it possible to lower the price of a stock while buying? | You can choose to place successively lower buy limit orders, but whether they get filled or not is not a given; it depends on whether sellers care to accept your bid. In your example of a 49.98 / 50.01 spread, if you place a buy with limit of 49.99, it won't get filled (if the order reaches the market while still at 49... |
How to incentivize a real-estate broker to find me a cheap house | Shop lots of houses. Find at least three you want and start by offering a low price and working your way up. Your risk is that houses you would have liked get bought by someone else while you are negotiating, that is how you discover how much you actually have to pay to get a house. Brokers only get paid if a deal ... |
The best credit card for people who pay their balance off every month | The answer for this question varies from person to person. However most cards give lousy rewards percentage-wise. Take a look at where your money is being spent each month (say with a tool like mint.com), and seek out a card that rewards you in categories where you already spend a lot of money. Many people here have s... |
Where should I invest to hedge against the stock market going down? | There are multiple ETFs which inversely track the common indices, though many of these are leveraged. For example, SDS tracks approximately -200% of the S&P 500. (Note: due to how these are structured, they are only suitable for very short term investments) You can also consider using Put options for the various indi... |
What are the reasons to get more than one credit card? | In the case of reward cards, different cards may offer different rewards for different kind of purchases. For example, in the UK, one of the Amex cards offers 1.25% cashback on all purchases, whereas one of the Santander cards offers 3% on fuel, 2% or 1% on certain other transactions, and nothing on others. Of course, ... |
Does the stock market create any sort of value? | When you own a share, you also own a vote (in most cases). That vote is your means of controlling the assets and management of the company. If you had enough votes and wanted to trade a share for an iPhone or liquidate the company entirely, you could do it. The only thing that prevents you from doing that is that compa... |
Reporting software subscriptions | Generally prepaid services should be capitalized over the period prepaid. But if it is up to a year - you can just expense them. As to the technicalities - you can contact Intuit support, but you should be able to put it in the same area where you put all your other business expenses. If you're a sole proprietor - that... |
ACH processing time of day | It depends on the bank and network. Banks are to provide outgoing data at the certain time for the processing by the central clearing house (the Federal Reserve system, for ACH), which then distributes incoming data back to the banks. All this has to be done between the closing of the business day and the opening of th... |
Is it necessary to pay tax if someone lends me money to put into my mortgage? | I can't vouch for Australian law, but in the US there is actually a recognized mechanism for "in-family loans" which ensures that it's all fully documented for tax purposes, including filing it as an official second mortgage. (Just did that recently in my own family, which is why I'm aware of it.) We're required to cha... |
What does it mean to be a “high fee” or “low fee” 401k? | Every 401(k) has managers to make the stock choices. They all have different rates. You want to see that fidelity or Vangard is handling your 401(k).(and I am sure others) If you have a mega bank managing your funds or an insurance company odds are you are paying way to high management fees. So find out, the manag... |
Are these scenarios considered as taxable income? | You can always reduce the income by the direct expenses required to earn it, and figure out whether it is ultimately a net profit or loss. The net profit is taxable income. The loss may be tax deductible if the underlying thing is tax deductible. For the book, the $50 revenue required a $100 expense, so that's a ... |
What things should I consider when getting a joint-mortgage? | The first and most important thing to consider is that this is a BUSINESS TRANSACTION, and needs to be treated as such. Nail down Absolutely All The Details, specifically including what happens if either of you decides it's time to move and wants to sell off your share of the property. Get at least one lawyer involved ... |
Understanding how this interpretation of kelly criterion helps the trader | I don't know too much about the kelly criterion, but going by the other answers it sounds like it could be quite risky depending how you use it. I have been taught the first thing you do in trading is protect your existing capital and any profits you have made, and for this reason I prefer and use Position Sizing (PS).... |
Do technical indicators actually work while analyzing stocks? [duplicate] | Sure they work - right until they don't. Explanation: A stock picking strategy based on technical indicators is at worst a mix of random guessing and confirmation bias, which will "work" only due to luck. At best, it exploits a systematic inefficiency of the market. And any such inefficiency will automatically disappe... |
How to start personal finances? | A few practical thoughts: A practical thing that helps me immensely not to loose important paperwork (such as bank statements, bills, payroll statement, all those statements you need for filing tax return, ...) is: In addition to the folder (Aktenordner) where the statements ultimately need to go I use a Hängeregistrat... |
Who can truly afford luxury cars? | I don't think you're missing anything on the math side as far as the payments. Likewise, it may seem everyone's driving a nicer car, but I'm going to predict that's based on area and a few other factors (for instance, my used car feels like riches in a college town). The behavior of why people would pay money, especi... |
Dollar Cost Averaging (Or value averaging) vs Lot sizes, what am I missing? | Don't take it so literally. 100 is close to 98, so if your formula calls for 98, buy 100. |
How secure is my 403(b)? Can its assets be “raided”? | I assume you get your information from somewhere where they don't report the truth. I'm sorry if mentioning Fox News offended you, it was not my intention. But the way the question is phrased suggests that you know nothing about what "pension" means. So let me explain. 403(b) is not a pension account. Pension account i... |
UK: Personal finance book for a twenty-something | As you are in UK, you should think in terms of Tax Free (interest and accumulated capital gains) ISA type investments for the long term AND/OR open a SIPP (Self Invested Pension Plan) account where you get back the tax you have paid on the money you deposit for your old age. Pensions are the best bet for money you do ... |
How do I get into investing? | Don't do it until you have educated yourself enough to know what you are doing. I hope you won't take this personally, but given that you are wandering around asking random strangers on the Internet how to "get into investing," I feel safe in concluding that you are by no means a sophisticated enough investor to be cho... |
Best way to invest money as a 22 year old? | What is the goal of the money? If it is to use in the short term, like savings for a car or college, then stick it in the bank and use it for that purpose. If you really want this money to mean something, then in my opinion you have only one choice: Open a ROTH IRA with something like Vanguard or Fidelity and invest ... |
How can I work out how much a side-job contracting will be taxed for? | Being self-employed, your "profit" is calculated as all the bills you send out, minus all business-related cost that you have (you will need a receipt for everything, and there are different rules for things that last for long time, long tools, machinery). You can file your taxes yourself - the HRS website will tell y... |
Can I cover a short sale with the stock I already own? | Yes you can. This is known as a short selling against the box. In the old days, this was used to delay a taxable event. You could lock in a gain without triggering a taxable event. Any loss on one side of the box would be offset by a loss on the other side, and vice versa. However, the IRS clamped down on this, an... |
Why are auto leases stubbornly strict about visa status and how to work around that? | In the U.S., most car dealers provide lease financing through one company (usually a subsidiary of the auto manufacturer). Whereas they provide loan financing through a variety of companies, some of whom offer very high interest rate loans and sell the loans as collateralized debt obligations (CDOs). Have you checked w... |
Is gold really an investment or just a hedge against inflation? | The problem I have with gold is that it's only worth what someone will pay you for it. To a degree that's true with any equity, but with a company there are other capital resources etc that provide a base value for the company, and generally a business model that generates income. Gold just sits there. it doesn't make... |
Is interest on a personal loan tax deductible? | When you pay interest on a loan used to fund a legitimate investment or business activity, that interest becomes an expense that you can deduct against related income. For example, if you borrowed $10k to buy stocks, you could deduct the interest on that $10k loan from investment gains. In your case, you are borrowing... |
How to compute for losses in an upside down trade-in of a financed car? | I think you are making this more complicated that it has to be. In the end you will end up with a car that you paid X, and is worth Y. Your numbers are a bit hard to follow. Hopefully I got this right. I am no accountant, this is how I would figure the deal: The payments made are irrelevant. The downpayment is irrel... |
What is a good rental yield? | I've never heard of rent quoted per week. Are you in the US? In general, after the down payment, one would hope to take the rent, and be able to pay the mortgage, tax, insurance, and then have enough left each year to at least have a bit of emergency money for repairs. If one can start by actually pocketing more than ... |
Fund equalisation / dividend | What you are describing is a very specific case of the more general principle of how dividend payments work. Broadly speaking, if you own common shares in a corporation, you are a part owner of that corporation; you have the right to a % of all of that corporation's assets. The value in having that right is ultimately ... |
What is the opposite of a sunk cost? A “sunk gain”? | In the second example you are giving up future free cash flows in exchange for a capital gain on the original investment. With that respect the money you will not gain will be the difference of the future cash flows ( net of related costs) minus the net gain on the panel you have sold. The financial result can be con... |
Do large market players using HFT make it unsafe for individual investors to be in the stock market? | There's a lot of hype about HFT. It involves computers doing things that people don't really understand and making a bunch of rich guys a bunch of money, and there was a crisis and so we hate rich wall street guys this year, and so it's a hot-button issue. Meh. There's some reason for concern about the safety of the ma... |
Confused about employee stock options: How do I afford these? | I've been offered a package that includes 100k stock options at 5 dollars a share. They vest over 4 years at 25% a year. Does this mean that at the end of the first year, I'm supposed to pay for 25,000 shares? Wouldn't this cost me 125,000 dollars? I don't have this kind of money. At the end of the first year, you will... |
Should I take out a bigger mortgage, or pay a greater cash deposit? | The answer to your question depends on your answer to this question: Would you be willing to take out a loan at that interest rate and invest that money straight into stocks? That's basically what you're planning to do. You leverage your stock investment, which is a valid and often used way to improve returns. Better ... |
Making higher payments on primary residence mortgage or rental? | I'll assume you live in the US for the start of my answer - Do you maximize your retirement savings at work, at least getting your employer's match in full, if they do this. Do you have any other debt that's at a higher rate? Is your emergency account funded to your satisfaction? If you lost your job and tenant on the... |
Should I buy a home or rent in my situation? | MY recommendation is simple. RENT The fact that you have to ask the question is a clear sign that you have no business buying a home. That's not to say that it's a bad question to ask though. Far more important then rather it's finically wise for you to buy a home, is the more important question of "are you emotionall... |
Value of tokens bought at an older price | You will make a profit in nominal dollars (or nominal units of whatever currency you used to buy the token). Whether you'll make a profit in real dollars depends on inflation, and in practice whether it would be possible to sell your existing tokens to someone else for the new price. Suppose when the price was 50 U (5... |
Credit Card Purchase - 'it is the bank's money no[t] yours' ? | Yes, they're referring to the credit card dispute (chargeback) process. In the case of dispute, credit card company will refund/freeze your charge so you don't have to pay until the dispute is resolved (or at all, if resolved in your favor). If the dispute is resolved in your favor, your credit card company will charge... |
Buying a home without a Real Estate Agent - Who should I get to do the paperwork? | For a real estate transaction there are multiple stages: From the sellers viewpoint: From the buyers viewpoint: If both parties are comfortable skipping some of the steps the role of the agent can be minimized. How will a fair price be determined? Some realism might be needed, to make sure that the loan appraisal will ... |
Is there a law or regulation that governs the maximum allowable interest amount that can be charged on credit cards or in agreements where credit is extended? | In the U.S., each state has its own local usury law. This website has a separate page for each state summarizing the local usury law and provides a reference to the local statute. The rules aren't simple: some set absolute limits, some appear to be pegged to something like the Prime Rate, some states don't have a gener... |
How can I tell what is “real” Motley Fool advice? | The Fools have a range of advice from common-sense to speculative, aimed at different audiences (one hopes). As always, don't take anyone's word for it; think it through and decide whether the risk/reward ratio is really in your favor and how much you can afford to risk. They're good on the basics, but the more advance... |
Should I pay off my 50K of student loans as quickly as possible, or steadily? Why? | Two things you should consider about paying off student loans ahead of the 10 year amortization schedule: What interest rate are you paying on your loans? What are you earning on your investments in a balanced mutual fund? When you pay off your student loans you are essentially guaranteed a return of the interest rate ... |
Do you pay taxes on stock gains that are just returning to their original purchase price? | You don't generally pay capital gains taxes until you sell the stock. If you bought it in 2013 and the price goes up in 2014 but you just hold on to the stock, you won't have to pay any taxes on it. If you then sold it in 2015 for a profit, you'd have to pay capital gains taxes on the profit. Note that this excludes di... |
How much money should I lock up in my savings account? | Lets imagine two scenarios: 1) You make 10.4k (40% of total income) yearly contributions to a savings account that earns 1% interest for 10 years. In this scenario, you put in 104k and earned 5.89k in interest, for a total of 109.9k. 2) You make the same 10.4k yearly contribution to an index fund that earns 7% on avera... |
In a house with shared ownership, if one person moves out and the other assumes mortgage, how do we determine who owns what share in the end? | Let's look at the logical extreme. Two people get a house, no money down, 10 year mortgage. One moves out the day after the closing, and the gal left pays the full mortgage. Why in the world would the one who left be entitled to a dime? You offer no information about the downpayment or amount paid during the time both... |
How to evaluate an annuity | You need to see that prospectus. I just met with some potential new clients today that wanted me to take a look at their investments. Turns out they had two separate annuities. One was a variable annuity with Allianz. The other was with some company named Midland Insurance (can't remember the whole name). Turns out... |
Buying my first car out of college | DO NOT buy this car. First, I want to say I love BMW's. There's a reason why they call them "ultimate driving machine" and why other car manufacturers compare their new models to BMWs. I own 330i and I absolutely love it. Every time you get into the car, it just begs you to push and abuse it. Everything from steeri... |
Are 'per trade' fees charged on every order or just once per stock? | You will be hit every time, once every buy order and once every sell order. Commissions to the broker are paid every time they do something for you. This is true regardless if it is a security in which you are already invested. It is true regardless if you make or lose money. It is just as sure as death and taxes. |
Why can't the government simply payoff everyone's mortgage to resolve the housing crisis? | Interestingly, ancient Judaism and Christianity held a Jubilee year every 50 years in which all debts were forgive, slaves were freed, etc. "The land must not be sold permanently, for the land belongs to me. You are only foreigners, my tenant farmers." -Leviticus 25:23 Jubilee would more resemble "the government declar... |
Dry cleaners lost $160 pants, what should I do? | Dude, it's your lucky day! You just won the lottery!! Do like this guy and sue them for $67 million :-) Pearson v. Chung, better known as the "pants lawsuit",1 is a civil case filed in 2005 by Roy L. Pearson, Jr., an administrative law judge in the District of Columbia in the United States, following a dispute w... |
Issuing bonds at discount - computing effective interest rate | In this case the market interest rate is the discount rate that sets equal the market price (current value) of the bond to its present value. To find the market interest rate which is also referred to as promised yield YTM you would have solve for the interest rate in the bond price formula A market price of bond is th... |
How Often Should I Chase a Credit Card Signup Bonus? | An inquiry to your credit report is a slight ding and lasts 2 years. I'd suggest that if you are playing the bonus game you watch your score closely, and if it drops below the level you'd like to maintain, hold off a while. Credit Karma offers a good simulation to show the impact of inquiries, utilization, new accounts... |
Can my accounting for Tax Basis differ from my broker's | No. If you didn't specify LIFO on account or sell by specifying the shares you wish sold, then the brokers method applies. From Publication 551 Identifying stock or bonds sold. If you can adequately identify the shares of stock or the bonds you sold, their basis is the cost or other basis of the particular share... |
“Convertible -debt/note/bond/debentures” which of these are the same or different? | They all basically mean the same thing - a type of debt than can be exchanged for (converted into) equity at some point. It's only the mechanics that can be different. A convertible bond is structured just like a regular bond - it (usually) pays periodic interest and has a face value that's due at maturity. The differe... |
Are my parents ripping me off with this deal that doesn't allow me to build my equity in my home? | If I understand you situation correctly, then the accepted answer is extremely misleading and incorrect. Your arrangement with your parents is definitely unreasonable. It is definitely not "similar to an interest-only loan". In an interest-only loan, like you can get from a bank, you will loan a sum of money, which you... |
The doctor didn't charge the health insurance in time, am I liable? | I had a similar issue take place at a hospital when the repeatedly billed the "wrong me" -- a stale insurance record left behind from when I was a dependent on my parent's insurance a decade earlier. They ended up billing me for anesthesia when I had a major surgery (everything else was billed to the correct insurance.... |
Are stories of turning a few thousands into millions by trading stocks real? | you'll need 25k to start or 2k in multiple accounts, that way you have access to margin, and don't have to worry about Pattern day trading limits. Be right more than you are wrong. Go up look for 3x potential up vs down risk. Compound daily. you can't double a penny every day every day for a month it becomes to diffic... |
Tax consequences of changing state residency? | I did the reverse several years ago, moving from NH to MA. You will need to file Form 1-NR/PY for 2017, reporting MA income as a part-year residence. I assume you will need to report the April capital gain on your MA tax return, as you incurred the gain while a MA resident. (I am not a lawyer or tax professional, so I ... |
What should I do with $4,000 cash and High Interest Debt? | Every $1,000 you use to pay off a 26% interest rate card saves you $260 / year. Every $1,000 you use to pay off a 23% interest rate card saves you $230 / year. Every $1,000 you put in a savings account earning ~0.5% interest earns you $5 / year. Having cash on hand is good in case of emergencies, but typically if your... |
Is it true that the price of diamonds is based on a monopoly? | De Beers is the company most cited as the near monopoly. They used to own a massive chunk of the diamond supply and intentionally restricted that supply to increase the price. In recent decades, new sources of diamonds have reduced the De Beers' singular grip. They still have a large share though. Video about this from... |
Will capital gains affect my tax bracket? | I think you're misunderstanding how tax brackets work. If you make $1 more and that bumps you into a higher bracket, only THAT particular dollar will be taxed at the higher tax bracket rate... Not your entire income. Short term capital gains are treated as income. Long term capital gains have a special tax rate curre... |
Why do 10 year-old luxury cars lose so much value? | Personally, I buy newer luxury cars for two reasons. 1) Status symbol Newer cars have the latest looks, performance, and features like heated side mirrors and sensors that adjust cruse control speed when in heavy traffic etc. 2) Older cars have more wear and tear. No one has spent any significant amount of time in ... |
Are there index tracking funds that avoid the “buy high - sell low” problem? | In a cap-weighted fund, the fund itself isn't buying or selling at all (except to support redemptions or purchases of the fund). As the value of a stock in the index goes up, then its value in the fund goes up naturally. This is the advantage of a cap-weighted fund, that it doesn't have to trade (buy and sell), it just... |
Gauge the strength of the resistance level of a stock just using EMA | Firstly, you mean resistance not support, as a support is below the current price and resistance is above the price. Secondly using a MA as support or resistance would mean that that support or resistance level would move up or down as the price moved up or down and would not be static at $25. Generally stocks will ran... |
How do you determine the dividend payout date for Mutual Funds? | Mutual funds generally make distributions once a year in December with the exact date (and the estimated amount) usually being made public in late October or November. Generally, the estimated amounts can get updated as time goes on, but the date does not change. Some funds (money market, bond funds, GNMA funds etc) di... |
What is the meaning of Equal Housing Lender? Do non-banks need to display it? | At the top result of the Google search, on the Google results page it's sumarized as applicable to every lender participating in FDIC: The terms equal housing lender and equal opportunity lender are synonymous and refer to all banks insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation in the United States. Such banks a... |
How is the opening-day price of a stock decided? | When a stock is going to become public there's a level of analysis required to figure out the range of IPO price that makes sense. For a company that's somewhat mature, and has a sector to compare it to, you can come up with a range that would be pretty close. For the recent linkedin, it's tougher to price a somewhat u... |
What happens to people without any retirement savings? | There are a host of programs in the US to help low/no-income seniors: Many states discount property taxes for the elderly as well. Not a dream retirement, but plenty of people are provided for without having prepared for retirement whether due to poor decisions or unfortunate circumstances. |
Would I qualify for a USDA loan? | If you even qualify for a no-down payment USDA loan, which I'm not sure you would. It would be extremely risky to take on a $250K house loan and have near-zero equity in the house for a good while. If property values drop at all you are going to be stuck in that house which likely has a pretty high monthly payment, ins... |
Someone asks you to co-sign a loan. How to reject & say “no” nicely or politely? | This is a real difficult situation and I think the correct way to proceed here is to be honest and straightforward. |
Shared groceries expenses between roommates to be divided as per specific consumption ratio and attendance | The solution to this problem is somewhat like grading on a curve. Use the consumption ratio multiplied by the attendance (which is also a ratio, out of 100 days) to calculate how much each person owes. This will leave you short. Then add together all of the shares in a category, determine the % increase required to get... |
Should a retail trader bother about reading SEC filings | I use 10-K and 10-Qs to understand to read the disclosed risk factors related to a business. Sometimes they are very comical. But when you see that risk factor materializing you can understand how it will effect the company. For example, one microlending company's risk factor stated that if Elizabeth Warren becomes hea... |
Is there any sort of tax write off for unfulfilled pay checks? | If you don't receive a W2, there are 2 scenarios you should consider: If you have reason to believe that scenario 1 is accurate, then you could file your taxes based on the last valid paycheck you received. If you have reason to believe that scenario 2 is accurate, then you need to do some extra math, but fortunately i... |
Does the “Free Ride” rule always apply to your entire collection of shares in a particular stock? | You should check with your broker for details, but you can generally specify which "lot" you are selling. where I've seen it, that's done by concurrently sending a "letter of instruction" documenting your choice of lot concurrent with the sale, but different brokers may handle this differently. I would think this sho... |
How Technical Analysts react to non-market hours effects | You can't. Even as a technical trader you should know what events are coming up and be prepared. You can't prepare for everything but you should know when the earnings dates are. You should also pay attention to the market in general. Stocks also have personalities and you should get to know that personality. Most imp... |
I spend too much money. How can I get on the path to a frugal lifestyle? | I agree with the first poster- the first step is to measure your spending and put it down into raw numbers. Once you have the raw numbers, you will feel a natural inclination to improve on those numbers. Set yourself a daily target for cash / incidental expenses. It doesnt have to be a crazy target - just something you... |
Finance the land on a non-financeable house? | Some lenders will make loans for vacant land, others will not. You have to discuss with local bank what are your plan for the land: live in the old mobile home; install a new mobile home; build a new house; Sell it to a developer; use it for camping... Is the property part of a development with other mobile homes? If s... |
What tax advantage should I keep an eye for if I am going to relocate? | Look for states that have no income tax. A lot of these states supplement their revenue with higher property taxes, but if you rent and do not own property in the state, then you will have no state tax liability. Similarly, many states treat capital gains no differently than income tax, so if you make your earnings due... |
Should I file a change of address with the IRS? | The most important thing to do when moving is to change your address with the post office. This will forward most mail for a year, and even automatically send change of address notices to many businesses that send mail to you. If you do this, and the IRS needs to send you something over the next year, you'll get it. T... |
Is it wise for an independent contractor to avoid corporation tax by planning to only break even each year? | First, point: The CRA wants you to start a business with a "Reasonable expectation of profit". They typically expect to see a profit within 5 years, so you may be inviting unwanted questions from future auditors by using a breakeven strategy. Second point: If the goal is to pay as little tax as possible, you may want t... |
If you want to trade an equity that reflects changes in VIX, what is a good proxy for it? | VXX VZX XVIZ and there are plenty others correlated to market volatility if you want the wildest hedge, use VXX, it is also the most liquid |
The doctor didn't charge the health insurance in time, am I liable? | I was in a similar situation years back and I refused to pay the bill. My point of view was that I provided the hospital with all information needed to submit the claim in a timely matter and that I should not be held responsible for their failure to do so. In the end they waived the charges. So while technically I mig... |
Can I make my savings keep in check with or beat inflation over a long time period via index funds? | For your base question, yes. (Barring some major collapse-of-civilization event, but in that case you're screwed anyway :-)) On the individual points: 1) Depends on whether you choose to invest in index-type funds (where profit is mainly expected from price appreciation), or more value-based investing. But either or... |
How is Los Angeles property tax calculated if a 50% owner later buys out the other 50%? | Can't vouch for LA, but property typically is taxed at either the appraised value, the most recent purchase price ("if it wasn't worth that much, you wouldn't have paid that much"), or some combination of the two (usually highest of the two, to prevent "$1 and other goods and services" from lowering the tax to zero). Y... |
How can home buying be considered a sound investment with all of that interest that needs to be paid? | I'm going to start with your title question: How can home buying be considered a sound investment with all of that interest that needs to be paid? If taken literally, this is a loaded question because if you pay cash for a home, you don't pay any interest. Furthermore, if your interest rate is 3% for 10 years you won't... |
I have savings and excess income. Is it time for me to find a financial advisor? | Is my financial status OK? You have money for emergencies in the bank, you spend less than you earn. Yes, your status is okay. You will have a good standard of living if nothing changes from your status quo. How can I improve it? You are probably paying more in taxes than you would if you made a few changes. If you ma... |
Why is it possible to just take out a ton of credit cards, max them out and default in 7 years? | I should apply for everything I can on the same day, get approved for as many as I can First it may not sound as easy. You may hardly get 2-3 cards and not dozens. Even if you submit the applications the same day; If you still plan this and somehow get too many cards, and draw huge debt, then the Banks can take this se... |
Why do some people say a house “not an investment”? | The below assessment is for primary residences as opposed to income properties. The truth is that with the exception of a housing bubble, the value of a house might outpace inflation by one or two percent. According to the US Census, the price of a new home per square foot only went up 4.42% between 1963 and 2008, whe... |
Help! I've cancelled their service, but this company continues to bill my credit card an annual fee. What can I do? | Short of canceling the card, you could just report the card as lost and ask for a new card number on the same account. Another option is to just make a note to look for the charge and keep disputing it. It has been a while since I did credit card processing at my business, but I think the company gets dinged if too man... |
How do day-traders or frequent traders handle their taxes? | You need to track every buy and sell to track your gains, or more likely, losses. Yes, you report each and every transactions. Pages of schedule D. |
(United Kingdom) Multiple Stock ISAs? | It is a very good idea to spread your ISAs over more than one stock broker. However now that a lot of stock brokers charge an admin fee it can get expensive if you use too many. There is no need to tell your last year’s ISA provider that you are using a different one, however you MUST ONLY pay into one ISA provider ... |
Why is property investment good if properties de-valuate over time? | It's all about the land value. The structure is only ever worth as much as it would cost to build a new one (minus demolition costs) |
In a competitive market, why is movie theater popcorn expensive? | It's because true competition does not exist in the movie theater business. If you wanted to open up a competing theater whose competitive advantage was cheaper popcorn, you couldn't do it - the studios would never give you rights to screen popular new release movies. I know this because there are indie movie theaters... |
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