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How can I help my friend change his saving habits? | Get him the book "Total Money Makeover" (http://www.amazon.com/Total-Money-Makeover-Classic-Financial/dp/1595555277/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1448904191&sr=8-1&keywords=total+money+makeover) and tell him to follow the baby steps. If he comes to you again or doesn't follow your advice, remind him to follow the baby steps. ... |
How can I find out who the major short sellers are in a stock? | There is no way to know anything about who has shorted stuff or how concentrated the positions are in a few investors. Short positions are not even reported in 13(F) institutional filings. I'll take the bonus points, though, and point you to the US Equity Short Interest data source at quandl. |
Why can't you just have someone invest for you and split the profits (and losses) with him? | This means that if your capital under my management ends up turning a profit, I will keep half of those profits, but if I lose you money, I will cover half those losses. The bold part is where you lose me. This absolutely exists with the exception of the loss insurance. It just requires a lot more than the general ret... |
Owner-Financed home sale or Land Contract — how to handle the transaction and the ongoing entity? | You need to talk to a local attorney specializing in real estate matters. The contract needs to ensure that your interests are protected. How you do that is too complex for an answer here and varies from state to state, or even jurisdictions within a state. There are all sorts of options. Sometimes deals like this are ... |
What is the purpose of endorsing a check? | In my experience, you don't need to endorse a check with a signature to deposit it into your account. You do if you are exchanging the check for cash. Businesses usually have a stamp with their account number on them. Once stamped, those checks are only able to be deposited into that account. Individuals can do the... |
What's an economic explanation for why greeting cards are so expensive? | As one answer points out, people buying greeting cards care little about whether they cost 25 cents or $5. Those are both small amounts of money and it's not something you buy often---also people feel the need to spend money because it's a gift. On the supplier side, it should be noted that the cost of cards has littl... |
Why do credit cards have minimum limits? | They have a minimum to discourage applications for that particular card. Every application costs them money because they have to pay the credit agencies to pull the applicant's credit history. So one way they save money and reduce their cost of business is to discourage people from applying if they're not creditworthy ... |
Are Index Funds really as good as “experts” claim? | Why would it not make more sense to invest in a handful of these heavyweights instead of also having to carry the weight of the other 450 (some of which are mostly just baggage)? First, a cap-weighted index fund will invest more heavily in larger cap companies, so the 'baggage' you speak of does take up a smaller p... |
How can I invest in an index fund but screen out (remove) certain categories of socially irresponsible investments? | It sounds like you need an index fund that follows so called Sustainability index. A sustainability index does not simply select "socially responsible" industries. It attempts to replicate the target market, in terms of countries, industries, and company sizes, but it also aims to select most "sustainable" companies fr... |
Why can't I short a stock that sells for less than $5? Is there another way to “go short” on them? | Timothy Sykes specializes in this type of trade, according to his website. He has some recommendations for brokers that allow shorting low-priced stocks: |
Why is the fractional-reserve banking not a Ponzi scheme? | The fundamental underlying difference between a bank and a Ponzi scheme: When a bank lends money and charges interest, people can do things with that borrowed money which are worth it. (Building factories, starting businesses, or just enjoying the comfort and warmth of a single-family home instead of paying rent). This... |
Do governments support their own bonds when their value goes down? | Without getting to hung-up on terminology here, the management of a company will often attempt to keep stock prices high because of a number of reasons: Ideally companies keep prices up through performance. In some cases, you'll see companies do other things spending cash and/or issuing bonds to continue to pay divide... |
How to trade “exotic” currencies? | Use a currency ETF. there are many. Specific to your question there is WisdomTree Dreyfus Brazilian Real Fund (BZF) I don't happen to find a currency ETF for Thailand, so the closest you could come to a Thai currency fund would be something that's an Index fund ETF that is based on an index in the Thai Market such as... |
Is there a good options strategy that has a fairly low risk? | There isn't really a generic options strategy that gives you higher returns with lower risk than an equivalent non-options strategy. There are lots of options strategies that give you about the same returns with the same risk, but most of the time they are a lot more work and less tax-efficient than the non-options str... |
Should I buy a house because Mortgage rates are low | Reasons for no: In your first sentence you say something interesting: rates low - prices high. Actually those 2 are reversely correlated, imagine if rates would be 5% higher-very few people could buy at current prices so prices would drop. Also you need to keep in mind the rate of inflation that was much higher durin... |
How can OTC scams affect you? | Am I being absurd? No. Should I be worrying? Yes. If I sell in the morning, I've only lost a couple hundred dollars, and learned a valuable lesson. Is there any reason to believe it won't be that simple? If you're lucky, you'll be able to dump your stocks to someone like you who'll be punching himself in the face t... |
Why would refinancing my mortgage increase my PMI, even though rates are lower? | There are deals out there which allow refinancing up to 125% of appraised value so long as you have a solid payment history. You need to research banks in your area working with HARP funded mortgages. An alternate method is to find a bank that will finance 80% of the current value at 4% and the rest as a HELOC. The ra... |
Income At the Sell or Reception? | It looks like fair-market value when you receive your virtual currency is counted as income. And you're also subject to self-employment tax on that income. Here's an FAQ from the IRS: Q-8: Does a taxpayer who “mines” virtual currency (for example, uses computer resources to validate Bitcoin transactions and maintain ... |
Can I do periodic rollovers from my low-perfoming 401k to an IRA? | My two-cents, read your plan document or Summary Plan Description. The availability of in-service withdrawals will vary by document. Moreover, many plans, especially those compliant with 404(c) of ERISA will allow for individual brokerage accounts. This is common for smaller plans. If so, you can request to direct your... |
How can I diversify $7k across ETFs and stocks? | When you are starting out using a balanced fund can be quite advantageous. A balanced fund is represents a diversified portfolio in single fund. The primary advantage of using a balanced fund is that with it being a single fund it is easier to meet the initial investment minimum. Later once you have enough to transiti... |
Why do Americans have to file taxes, even if their only source of income is from a regular job? | One of the reasons, apart from historical, is that different people have different tax liabilities which the employer may not be aware of. For example, in the US we don't pay taxes in source on investment income, and there are many credits and deductions that we can't take. So if I have a child and some interest income... |
What assets would be valuable in a post-apocalyptic scenario? | This is going to be a list of some things that will likely be of value immediately after some apocalyptic event. However, note that I am not answering your question of what you should invest in now to take advantage of such an event. That is a pretty ridiculous notion. Preparing oneself for such a possibility is cer... |
How can I stop wasting food? | You want to combine a set of techniques to avoid throwing food away. Consider setting aside a weekend day or other non-busy time to do some food prep. Check to see if there is anything in the fridge that needs to be used quickly and prioritize meals that use that item. Make a weekly menu and get your groceries. Chop... |
How do I determine how much rent I could charge for a property or location? | Check out the property websites to get an idea of how much, the property in question, could yield as rent. Most give a range and you can get a good idea of it. Just one example from zoopla. Likewise you can refer mouseprice or rightmove and get yourself an idea. Property websites do a lot of data crunching to do an upd... |
Why invest for the long-term rather than buy and sell for quick, big gains? | There are many technical answers above , but the short story to me is that very few active fund managers consistently beat the market. Look at the results of actively managed funds. Depending on whose analysis you read, you will find out that somewhere between 80-90% of fund managers in a given year do not beat passive... |
Tenant wants to pay rent with EFT | It isn't EFT, but you might mention to your tenant, that many banks offer a Bill Pay service (example) where the bank will automatically mail a check to the right person for you. I have my rent setup this way. My bank will send a rent check directly to my landlord 5 days before it is due. |
If the co-signer on my car loan dies, can the family take the car from me like they're threatening to? | I was in a similar situation about a year ago, and the expedient thing to do would be to remove your grandfather from the Title. He would probably have to agree with this, but I think he will if you approach it correctly. In my case, I was the cosigner for my son's car loan and was told by the dealer that I "had to be... |
Best Time to buy a stock in a day | The best time to buy a stock is the time of day when the stock price is lowest! Obviously you learned nothing from that sentence, but unfortunately you won't get a much better answer than that. Here's a question that is very similar to yours: "Is it better to have a picnic for lunch or for dinner to minimize the chance... |
How can I invest in gold without taking physical possession? | You could buy shares of an Exchange-Traded Fund (ETF) based on the price of gold, like GLD, IAU, or SGOL. You can invest in this fund through almost any brokerage firm, e.g. Fidelity, Etrade, Scotttrade, TD Ameritrade, Charles Schwab, ShareBuilder, etc. Keep in mind that you'll still have to pay a commission and fees w... |
How does owning a home and paying on a mortgage fit into family savings and investment? | Your home (the one you live in) is not an investment. Its an expense/liability/asset, but its something you pay for to use, not invest to grow. |
Advantage of credit union or local community bank over larger nationwide banks such as BOA, Chase, etc.? | Banks, the big ones, have shareholders and the board to answer to. Credit Unions have members and the board to answer to. You become a member by joining a CU. Banks' prime objective is profit maximization, a credit union's prime objective is members' welfare. Personal experience: I didn't mind that the banks charge... |
How should I begin investing real money as a student? | I like your enthusiasm and initiative. However, there are a few things you need to consider that you haven't yet thought about. First, it is important to remember that trading with fake money is not the same as trading with real money. In the fake world, you have $100k. With this fake money, you can do reckless thing... |
Free service for automatic email stock alert when target price is met? | You can do it graphically at zignals.com and freestockcharts.com. |
Is there a general guideline for what percentage of a portfolio should be in gold? | It depends on what your goals are, your age, how much debt you have, etc. Assuming -- and we all know what happens when you assume -- that your financial life is otherwise in order, the 5% to 10% range you're talking about isn't overinvesting. You won't have a lot of company; most people don't own any. One comment on ... |
Principal 401(k) managed fund fees, wow. What can I do? | I would even say 1% is not even reasonable in this age. The short answer is there probably isn't much you can do directly. However, there are a few things to consider: |
what is a mortgage gift exchange? | The issue is that the lender used two peoples income, debts, and credit history to loan both of you money to purchase a house. The only way to get a person off the loan, is to get a new loan via refinancing. The new loan will then be based on the income, debt, and credit history of one person. There is no paperwork you... |
Is there any emprical research done on 'adding to a loser' | It works if after the price has halved and you buy more the price then rises, however if you are attempting to do this you are basing you "doubling down" on hope, and if you are basing a purchase on hope you are gambling. In many cases if the price has halved it could be because there is something very wrong with the c... |
Where can I find a definition of psychological barriers with respect to marketable securities? | I think "Psychological Pricing" is a similar phenomenon to what you are looking for. This is where retailers use certain numbers in prices because those prices are more appealing to consumers. Since stocks - and in your case bitcoin - have prices, they too will be more or less appealing at different prices based on p... |
Can I register for VAT to claim back VAT without selling VAT applicable goods? (UK) | You cannot "claim back" VAT. What happens is that if you sell goods with VAT and charge customers VAT, you would have to send that VAT straight to HMRC, but if your business itself paid VAT, then you already paid VAT, so you have to send less. As an example, if you send an invoice for £10,000 plus £2,000 VAT, and you ... |
Why do people use mortgages, when they could just pay for the house in full? | Besides all of the other answers, I will point out that many people simply don't have enough cash sitting around to buy a home outright. It would take many years (or even decades) for the average family to accumulate the necessary cash. Also, while you are pinching your pennies for years in an attempt to save up for y... |
Tax on Stocks or ETF's | No, not really. This depends on the situation and the taxing jurisdiction. Different countries have different laws, and some countries have different laws for different situations. For example, in the US, some investments will be taxed as you described, others will be taxed as "mark to market", i.e.: based on the FMV d... |
Whether to prepay mortgage or invest in stocks | I strongly doubt your numbers, but lets switch the question around anyway. Would you borrow 10k on your house to buy stocks on leverage? That's putting your house at risk to have the chance of a gain in the stock market (and nothing in the market is sure, especially in the short term), and I would really advise agai... |
Double-entry bookkeeping: When selling an asset, does the money come from, Equity or Income? | There are basically two approaches, based on how detailed you want to be in your own personal accounting: Obviously the more like a business or like "real" accounting you want to be, the more complex you can make it, but in general I find that the purpose of personal accounting is (1) to track what I own, and (2) to en... |
Why can it be a bad idea to buy stocks after hours? | The sentiment is because between closing and opening a lot can happen, and between opening and the time your order actually goes through, even more can happen. An after-hours trade has an extra amount of short-term risk attached; the price of a stock at the opening bell is technically the same as its price as of the c... |
help with how a loan repayment is calculated | It appears the interest is not compounded daily. Each period of interest has the loan amount calculated on the "capital" remaining on the start of period, for each day in the period. The Excel finance functions don't handle irregular periods that well, but I can reconstruct the interest calculations: |
Why can't online transactions be completed outside of business hours? | Generally, unless you're doing a wire transfer, bank transactions are processed in batches overnight. So the credit card company won't be able to confirm your transfer until the next business day (it may take even longer for them to actually receive the money). |
Friend was brainwashed by MLM-/ponzi investment scam. What can I do? | I don't want to repeat things that have already been said as I agree with most of them. There's just one little thing I'd like to add: If things go the way we're all expecting, this guy will eventually be in desperate need of a friend as he is extremely likely to lose most of his friends sooner or later. Perhaps all yo... |
Cash out 401k for house downpayment | As @AlexKuhl says, ever? yes, but generally? no. If your 401k is invested in stocks and bonds, the long term return is very likely higher than the interest on a mortgage. Long term return on the stock market is around 7%. Mortgage rates these days are around 4%. Add the tax penalty on top of that and you're almost sure... |
If NYSE has market makers, what is the role of NYSE ARCA which is an ECN | I would say it's a bit more complicated than that. Do you understand what a market maker does? An ECN (electronic communication network) is a virtual exchange that works with market makers. Using a rebate structure that works by paying for orders adding liquidity and charges a fee for removing liquidity. So liquidity ... |
What can I replace Microsoft Money with, now that MS has abandoned it? | Current Money users may want to take a look at this: http://sites.google.com/site/pocketsense/home/msmoneyfixp1 Pretty easy (and secure) way to continue getting online data into Money. |
Book or web site resources for an absolute beginner to learn about stocks and investing? | Los Angeles Times Investing 101 http://www.latimes.com/business/la-moneylib,0,3098409.htmlstory Clark Howard's Investing Guide http://www.clarkhoward.com/news/clark-howard/personal-finance-credit/clarks-investment-guide/nFZK/ |
Using a self-directed IRA to buy vacation condo, rent it out to an LLC for $1 | Self directed IRAs have rules to prevent self-dealing of this sort called "prohibited transactions". You can't buy or sell or lease assets or obtain services from anyone closely linked to you or any beneficiaries of the IRA. You can't loan yourself money from the IRA, and you can't deliberately take the proceeds that s... |
Borrowing money and then investing it — smart or nart? | There are two fundamental flaws to your plan: Supposing that you can get a loan with an interest rate that is less than the profit you are likely to get from an investment. Historically, the U.S. stock market goes up by 6 to 7% per year. I just did a quick check and found rates for unsecured loans of 10 to 15%. Of cour... |
How do I enter Canadian tax info from US form 1042-S and record captial gains from cashing in stock options? | There are two parts in this 1042-S form. The income/dividends go into the Canada T5 form. There will be credit if 1042-S has held money already, so use T2209 to report too. |
Do Options take Dividend into account? | The CBOE had a great article on this. I will search for it and edit. The normal dividends are not adjusted. Which is why you see early exercise of just out of the money options sometimes. To get that dividend. A special dividend, say a $50 stock with $1/yr dividend but now has a $3 one time dividend would likely result... |
On what quantity the Dividend is given in India? | So My question is if I purchased the shares on 03-08-15 then will I get the dividend? Yes if you purchase on 3-Aug, the shares will actually get credited to your account on 5-Aug and hence you will hold the shares on 6-Aug, the record date. |
Does financing a portfolio on margin affect the variance of a portfolio? | Financing a portfolio with debt (on margin) leads to higher variance. That's the WHOLE POINT. Let's say it's 50-50. On the downside, with 100% equity, you can never lose more than your whole equity. But if you have assets of 100, of which 50% is equity and 50% is debt, your losses can be greater than 50%, which is to ... |
How do I get rid of worthless penny stocks if there is no volume (so market/limit orders don't work) and my broker won't buy them from me? | Your broker should be able to answer this. Many brokers will buy it from you for the cost of a commission, if there's no legit buyer. |
Consolidate my debt? Higher APR, but what does that actually mean? | No, it means that each year (Annual Payment Rate) you are accruing interest at 29.8%. If your principal is $10,000, that means you are gaining $3,000 of debt per year in addition to this, excluding payments you make/interest on interest. |
What are good games to play to teach young children about saving money? | I also saw a lot of reference to Mutual Mania Board Game, which is geared towards kids 11yrs+ and helps them learn about spending, saving, profit and loss. |
Investing in real estate when the stock market is high, investing in stocks when it's low? | The right time to buy real estate is easy to spot. It's when it is difficult to get loans or when real estate agents selling homes are tripping over each other. It's the wrong time to buy when houses are sold within hours of the sign going up. The way to profit from equities over time is to dollar-cost average a divers... |
How do I add my income to my personal finance balance? | Congratulations on keeping better track of your finances! Typically there will be a class of accounts labelled "Income", under which you will have a separate account for each type of income (stock dividends, paychecks, home appreciation, etc). In that case, showing your income would be a transfer from the Paycheck acco... |
How to estimate federal and state taxes likely to be due on my side income? | Most states that have income tax base their taxes on the income reported on your federal return, with some state-specific adjustments. So answering your last question first: Yes, if it matters for federal, it will matter for state (in most cases). For estimating the tax liability, I would not use the effective rate b... |
What does the settlement date of short interest mean? | At the bottom of the page you linked to, NASDAQ provides a link to this page on nasdaqtrader.com, which states Each FINRA member firm is required to report its “total” short interest positions in all customer and proprietary accounts in NASDAQ-listed securities twice a month. These reports are used to calculate short i... |
Is it legal if I'm managing my family's entire wealth? | I agree that this is a "bad idea" but I want to add in one more reason. Let's pretend your family and you are ok with all the tax ramifications and legal issues. This is still a horrid idea. You have to deal with the What Ifs. What if you get in an accident with your car, and then a law suit comes around and they deci... |
Are there any banks with a command-line style user interface? | At one point you could log into your HSBC account from the command line, but gosh, I've never heard of a bank that has a command line interface! |
Why do VAT-registered businesses in the EU charge VAT to each other? | Not doing this would defeat the entire purpose of a VAT. The reason for a VAT rather than a simple sales tax is that it's harder to evade. Having a simple sales tax with the type of rates that VAT taxes typically are is unworkable because evasion is too easy. Imagine I'm a retailer. I buy products from a wholesaler and... |
give free budgeting advice | They've asked you, so your advice is welcome. That's your main concern, really. I'd also ask them how much, and what kind of advice. Do they want you to point them to good websites? On what subjects? Or do they want more personal advice and have you to look over their bank accounts and credit card statements, provi... |
Friend was brainwashed by MLM-/ponzi investment scam. What can I do? | The title of your question basically asks: What can I do? And you state this regarding the meeting and “advice” they gave towards criticism of their method: While this they also indoctrinated that you should avoid talking to people talking bad about it (or say it is scam) because you gain no money from them and the... |
Does an individual share of a stock have some kind of unique identifier? | There is no unique identifier that exists to identify specific shares of a stock. Just like money in the bank, there is no real reason to identify which exact dollar bills belong to me or you, so long as there is a record that I own X bills and I can access them when I want. (Of course, unlike banks, there is still a 1... |
Is refinancing my auto loan just to avoid dealing with the lender that issued it a crazy idea? | I’d say No, it’s not crazy. I did that even for a mortgage, because the bank tended to lose my checks or let them sit for some days, and then claim I paid late. They were known on the internet for their poor processing department, so I decided to avoid that monthly hassle with calling and arguing, and refinanced. Compa... |
Why do stock prices of retailers not surge during the holidays? | Systemic and well know patterns in sales are priced in to the security. Typically companies with very cyclical earnings like this will issue guidance of earnings per share within a range. These expected earnings are priced in before the earnings are actually booked. If a company meets these expectations the stock wi... |
Can I use an HSA to pay financed payments for LASIK? | From HSA Resources - I understand that I can reimburse myself from my HSA for qualified medical expenses that I pay out-of-pocket but is there a time limit? Do I need to reimburse myself in the same year? You have your entire lifetime to reimburse yourself. As long as you had your HSA established at the time the expen... |
What low-fee & liquid exchange-traded index funds / ETFs should I consider holding in a retirement portfolio? | If liquidity and cost are your primary objectives, Vanguard is indeed a good bet. They are the walmart of finance and the absolute best at minimizing fees and other expenses. Your main portfolio holding should be VTI, the total stock market fund. Highly liquid and has the lowest fees out there at 0.05%. You can augm... |
Does bull/bear market actually make a difference? | The main difference between a bull market and a bear market is due the "the leverage effect". http://www.princeton.edu/~yacine/leverage.pdf The leverage effect refers to the observed tendency of an asset’s volatility to be negatively correlated with the asset’s returns. Typically, rising asset prices are accompanie... |
Why are Bank of America and Citi trading so far below book value? | Its not just Citi and BoFA, even Barclays, HSBC and other large Banks are trading below book value in markets they are listed. Are there particular assets that are causing these two banks to be valued lower relative to their book values than the other banks? There no particular assets. Given the current economic situat... |
Is it better to buy put options or buy an inverse leveraged ETF? | Depends on how far down the market is heading, how certain you are that it is going that way, when you think it will fall, and how risk-averse you are. By "better" I will assume you are trying to make the most money with this information that you can given your available capital. If you are very certain, the way that ... |
Why are stocks having less institutional investors a “good thing”? | Its pretty much always a positive to have large institutional investors. Here's a few cases where I can see an argument against large institutional investors: In recent years, we've seen corporate raiders and institutional investors that tend to influence management in ways that are focused on short term gain. They'll ... |
How do owners in a partnership earn income? | The partnership agrees to pay each of you salaries and/or bonuses, typically based on the net profit brought in. You do have a legal document setting out the rules for this partnership, right? If so, the exact answer should be in there. If you don't or it isn't, you need a lawyer yesterday. |
Pros and Cons of Interest Only Loans | Given the current low interest rates - let's assume 4% - this might be a viable option for a lot of people. Let's also assume that your actual interest rate after figuring in tax considerations ends up at around 3%. I think I am being pretty fair with the numbers. Now every dollar that you save each month based on th... |
Renting from self during out of area remodel project - deductible? | There are certain situations where you could legally pay yourself rent, but it'd be in the context of multiple business entities interacting, never in the context of an individual renting their own property. Even if you could, any rent paid to yourself would count as rental income, so there'd be no benefit. Edit: I wa... |
How does a online only bank protect itself against fraud? | @ Daniel Anderson shared interesting insights. In my research I learned a few things Some interesting data on fraud trends AFP Payments Fraud and Control Survey 2016 As a consumer, at the very least I'd improve awareness of I'd also learn about basic types of fraud And for the techies out there, I'd recommend learning... |
ETFs are a type of mutual fund, correct? | Your question is one of semantics. ETFs and mutual funds have many things in common and provide essentially the same service to investors with minimal differences. It's reasonably correct to say "An ETF is a mutual fund that..." and then follow up with some stuff that is not true of a typical mutual fund. You could ... |
How can I stop a merchant from charging a credit card processing fee? | This might not be the answer you are looking for, but the alternative to "don't patronize these merchants" is this: DO patronize these merchants, and pay cash. Credit cards are convenient. (I use a credit card often.) However, there is no denying that they cost the merchants an incredible amount in fees, and that o... |
How do I research, analyze, and choose the right mutual fund for a roth ira? | There is a lot of interesting information that can be found in a fund's prospectus. I have found it very helpful to read books on the issue, one I just finished was "The Boglehead's Guide to Investing" which speaks mostly on mutual and index funds. Actively managed funds mean that someone is choosing which stocks to bu... |
Landlord living in rental unit - tax implications? | Does allowing family to stay at the rental jeopardize my depreciation? No, accumulated depreciation that hasn't been deducted reduces your basis in the event of sale. That doesn't go anywhere. Accumulating more may not be allowed though. If the property is no longer rental (i.e.: personal use, your family member lives... |
Will my father still be eligible for SNAP if I claim him as my dependent? | This may be best handled by an expert. Look for somebody recommended by a church, homeless shelter, food pantry, office of unemployment, office of disability, or Veterans services to advise you on maximizing support for your father. You want to know what type of help you can give without causing the overall level of ... |
For very high-net worth individuals, does it make sense to not have insurance? | There are 2 maxims that help make sense of insurance: Following those 2 rules, "normal" insurance makes sense. Can't afford to replace your car? insure it. Can afford to lose your TV? Don't insure it. People with a net worth in the low millions have very similar insurance needs to the middle class. For example, they mi... |
How much of a down payment for a car should I save before purchasing it? | If you're getting 0% on the financing, it's not costing you anything to borrow that money. So its basically free money. If you are comfortable with the monthly payments, consider going with no downpayment at all. Keep that money aside for a rainy day, or invest it somewhere so that you get some return on it. If you nee... |
Multi-Account Budgeting Tools/Accounts/Services | Have you looked at mint? Their budgeting feature can track spending against your budget categories across your checking and credit card accounts. Not the same as the envelope system -- so if you need the built-in limitation that this provides, it may not work for you. But it is a low-effort, automatic system that does ... |
Will paying off my car early hinder my ability to build credit? | No. Credit scores are primarily built by doing the following: To build credit, get a few major credit cards and a couple of store cards. Use one of them to make routine purchases like gas and groceries. Pay them on time every month. You're good to go. I would hate to sell stocks to pay off a loan -- try finding a bette... |
Why would you ever turn down a raise in salary? | Sometimes it's not entirely about take-home pay. A pay raise can affect other things like: These things need to be considered since they also affect quality of life. |
Any tips for asset allocation across multiple retirement accounts? | I have a similar plan and a similar number of accounts. I think seeking a target asset allocation mix across all investment accounts is an excellent idea. I use excel to track where I am and then use it to adjust to get closer (but not exactly) to my target percentages. Until you have some larger balances, it may be ... |
Trade? Buy and hold? Or both? | You don't seem to be a big fan of trading as you may think it may be too risky or too time consuming being in front of your computer all day long. You also don't seem to be a fan of buy and hold as you don't know what your investments will be worth when you need the funds. How about a combination of the two, sometimes ... |
How do I get bill collectors who call about people I know to stop calling me? | I had a similar situation, except the debtor had no connection to us whatsoever, other than holding our phone number previously. We tried going through channels to deal with it, and had no success. At the end of the day, I was very abusive to the people calling, and forwarded the number to a very irritating destination... |
Choose online stock trading companies | Every brokerage is different, on all of their websites they have an actual list of fees. There are tons of different charges you may encounter. |
How to understand expenses matter relative to investment type for mutual funds? | The net return reported to you (as a percentage) by a mutual fund is the gross return minus the expense ratio. So, if the gross return is X% and the expense ratio is Y%, your account will show a return of (X-Y)%. Be aware that X could be negative too. So, with Y = 1, If X = 10 (as you might get from a stock fund if y... |
What gives non-dividend stocks value to purchasers? [duplicate] | A share of stock is a share of the underlying business. If one believes the underlying business will grow in value, then one would expect the stock price to increase commensurately. Participants in the stock market, in theory, assign value based on some combination of factors like capital assets, cash on hand, revenue,... |
Why should the P/E ratio of a growth stock match its percentage earnings growth rate? | Your observation is mostly right, that 1 is a the number around which this varies. You are actually referencing PEG, P/E to Growth ratio, which is a common benchmark to use to evaluate a stock. The article I link to provides more discussion. |
15 year mortgage vs 30 year paid off in 15 | Why would anyone ever get a 15 year instead of just paying off a 30 year in 15 years? Because the rate is not the same. Never that I've seen in my 30 years of following rates. I've seen the rate difference range from .25% to .75%. (In March '15, the average rate in my area is 30yr 3.75% / 15yr 3.00%) For a $150K loan, ... |
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