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How can I generate $250/month every month from $4000 that I have? | If you are looking to begin living off the money now, then Dheer's answer is correct - it is not possible. However, if you are looking to grow that money (and potentially additional money added at later dates), then you could make this work. 250 a month corresponds to 3000 per year. A first approximation is that you wi... |
What do people mean when they talk about the central bank providing “cheap money”? What are the implications for the stock market? | Newspapers write a lot about the central bank stopping "cheap money" in the US. What is that exactly and what are the implications for the stock market? An interest rate is simply defined as the price of money. So if money is cheap, it must mean there is a low interest rate compared to normal. If milk is cheap, we're... |
Multiple mortgage pre-approvals and effects on credit score | Johnny. I recently bought my first home as well, and I have worked in the credit business (not mortgage), so I think I can answer some of your questions. Disclaimer first that I'm in NY, and home buying does vary from state to state. In my experience, pre-qual is not too different from pre-approval. Neither represen... |
What are “equity assets”? | If I hold a bond then I have a debt asset. If I hold physical silver then I have a commodity asset. If I hold the stock of an individual company then I have an equity asset. Equities, commodities and debts are the three kinds of assets that a person can hold. Edit: I forgot one other kind of asset; monetary asset. If ... |
Do I need to report to FInCEN if I had greater than $10,000 worth of bitcoin in a foreign bitcoin exchange? | Lets look at possible use cases: If you ever converted your cryptocurrency to cash on a foreign exchange, then **YES** you had to report. That means if you ever daytraded and the US dollar (or other fiat) amount was $10,000 or greater when you went out of crypto, then you need to report. Because the regulations stipula... |
If stock price drops by the amount of dividend paid, what is the use of a dividend | Best as i can tell, the simple answer is: the smartest approach to investing for dividends is to pick a company that is, has, and will continue to make a solid profits. there are lots of them out there. specifically, companies with no debt, a history of long-term and steady growth and a stable market share will, almost... |
How to amend an amended return? | File a 2nd amended return that corrects the mistake I made on the 1st amended return This. Pay the $500 before April 27th and try to get it back later This. |
What is street-side booking? | The way I would use it is, every trade done by a broker has a client side and a street side. The client side is for their brokerage account, and the street side is whoever they traded with Say, John Doe calls me at Charles Schwab and wants to buy 100 IBM. I look at the market and decide that the best execution is on ... |
Should I sell a 2nd home, or rent it out? | I don't see anything in this forum on the leverage aspect, so I'll toss that out for discussion. Using generic numbers, say you make a $10k down payment on a $100,000 house. The house appreciates 3% per year. First year, it's $103,000. Second year, $106090, third it's 109,272.70. (Assuming straight line appreciation.)... |
Is Real Estate ever a BAD investment? If so, when? | All other factors being equal, owning your primary residence is almost always a good investment over the long haul. Why? Because you have to live somewhere, and rentals, especially long-term leases that are important when you have kids in school, etc., are generally in the same ballpark as a mortgage in most markets. ... |
What investments work for these goals? | Assuming this will be a taxable account (since you want to pull income off of it, although this will lower wealth growth), you could open a brokerage account at some place like Vanguard (free on their ETFs) and look at tax efficient index fund ETFs (such as total stock market or their 500 fund), including some interna... |
Is there a government-mandated resource that lists the shareholders of a public company? | No, there is no such list, as the other answers mention it is practically impossible to compile one. However you can see the institutional investors of a public company. MSN Money has this information available in a fair amount of details. For example see the Institutional Investors of GOOG |
Can you use external money to pay trading commissions in tax-free and tax-deferred accounts? | Nice idea. When I started my IRAs, I considered this as well, and the answer from the broker was that this was not permitted. And, aside from transfers from other IRAs or retirement accounts, you can't 'deposit' shares to the IRA, only cash. |
Tax treatment of a boxed trade? | Here's how capital gains are totaled: Long and Short Term. Capital gains and losses are either long-term or short-term. It depends on how long the taxpayer holds the property. If the taxpayer holds it for one year or less, the gain or loss is short-term. Net Capital Gain. If a taxpayer’s long-term gains are more... |
Why do banks finance shared construction as mortgages instead of financing it directly and selling the apartments in a building? | Why should a bank get into construction specifically? Lots of business opportunities require capital. Conceivably banks could build factories, develop consumer electronics, complete with SpaceX, etc. It's all capital in, profits out, with varying levels of risk and returns. There's nothing special about constructing ap... |
Uncashed paycheck 13 years old | Under US law, a bank is not obligated to honor a check that is more than six months old. § 4-404. BANK NOT OBLIGED TO PAY CHECK MORE THAN SIX MONTHS OLD. A bank is under no obligation to a customer having a checking account to pay a check, other than a certified check, which is presented more than six months after its ... |
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... |
Buy index mutual fund or build my own? | Go with a Vanguard ETF. I had a lengthy discussion with a successful broker who runs a firm in Chicago. He boiled all of finance down to Vanguard ETF and start saving with a roth IRA. 20 years of psychology research shows that there's a .01 correlation (that's 1/100 of 1%) of stock/mutual fund performance to predictio... |
Options vs Stocks which is more profitable | As already noted, options contain inherent leverage (a multiplier on the profit or loss). The amount of "leverage" is dictated primarily by both the options strike relative to the current share price and the time remaining to expiration. Options are a far more difficult investment than stocks because they require that ... |
What is the best way to get a “rough” home appraisal prior to starting the refinance process? | It's extremely easy to get a rough valuation of your home. Just phone a real estate agent. Virtually any real estate agent will come and value your home free. Even if you say outright "I'm not considering selling, I just want a valuation" they will probably do it, because for them getting contacts of people who might o... |
When should I open a “Line of credit” at my bank? | With the information you have given, I would say never. Remember the banker is a salesman, and the line of credit is the product. If you don't need to borrow the money for something specific, then you don't need the line of credit in the first place. Even if you did need something I would tell you to save up and pay ca... |
Start a Holding Company? | If you are trying to invest in closely held / private companies (things that don't trade on the stock market), you will run into a variety of regulatory problems. For various reasons, most private companies only raise funds with accredited investors. To be an accredited investor you basically have to have $1,000,000 in... |
Is an Income Mutual Fund a good alternative to a savings account? | The value will certainly fluctuate up and down (but on average gain more than a savings account), but so long as you have enough liquid assets for emergencies, then yes, it's a perfectly good alternative to savings accounts. how risky, in general, are Index Income Funds. How are you defining "risk"? If you mean "probab... |
I'm halfway through a 5-year purchase financing deal on my car. It's expensive. Can I sell it and get a cheaper car? | You say "it's expensive". I'm going to interpret this as "the monthly payments are too high". Basically, you need to get your old loan paid off, presumably by selling the car you have now. This is the tough part. If you sold the car now, how much would you get for it? You can use Kelley Blue Book to figure out what... |
Is there a good rule of thumb for how much I should have set aside as emergency cash? | I think that Dave Ramsey has a good approach to emergency funds. Save $1,000 that is immediately accessible in an emergency, pay off your debts, then build a 3-6 month fund. Two years is great, but takes a really long time to build up. |
Pay via Debit Card or Bank's portal | There are reward points that you have already mentioned. Some banks also give reward points for netbanking transfer, although very few and less than debit card. On a fraudulent site, debit card adds a layer, if compromised, easy to change. i.e just hot list the card, get a new card issued. Netbanking quite a few banks ... |
How to buy stock on the Toronto Stock Exchange? | You probably bought the cross listed WestJet stock. If you wanted to buy shares on the TSE, I'd suspect you'd have to find a way to open a brokerage account within Canada and then you'd be able to buy the shares. However, this could get complicated to some extent as there could be requirements of Canadian tax stuff l... |
Should I pay off my student loans or keep it in the bank? [duplicate] | Basically you have 4 options: Use your cash to pay off the student loans. Put your cash in an interest-bearing savings account. Invest your cash, for example in the stock market. Spend your cash on fun stuff you want right now. The more you can avoid #4 the better it will be for you in the long term. But you're apparen... |
Is giving my girlfriend money for her mortgage closing costs and down payment considered fraud? | When you purchase a mortgage, you have to prove the source of your down payment. Primarily this is so that the mortgage lender knows that there are no other outstanding liens against the property. If you show that some or part of your down payment was a gift, there is no fraud, but it may affect your qualification fo... |
Homeowners: How can you protect yourself from a financial worst-case scenario? | Honestly, the best way to manage this risk is to manage your savings appropriately. Many experts recommend that maintain a reasonably liquid account with 6-9x your minimum monthly expenses for just this occurrence. I know, easier said than done. Right? As for insurance, I can only speak for what is the case in the US. ... |
Is there a bank account that allows ACH deposits but not ACH withdrawals? | Yes, kinda. Talk to local banks about a business account, and tell them you want to enable certain employees to make deposits but not withdrawals. They don't need to know you're all the same person. For instance I have a PayPal account for business. These allow you to create "sub accounts" for your employees with... |
If I sell a stock that I don't have, am I required to buy it before a certain amount of time? | I'm just began playing in the stock market. I assume you mean that you're not using real money, but rather you have an account with a stock simulator like the one Investopedia offers. I am hopeful that's the case due to the high level of risk involved in short selling like you're describing. Here is another post abou... |
Beginner questions about stock market | In the US, and I suspect in most of the developed world, one major point of a corporation is limited liability. The stockholders are not on the hook for liabilities beyond their investment. If the company does something terrible, or fails economically, it goes bankrupt. Usually the stockholders have their investment... |
What is a better way for an American resident in a foreign country to file tax? | If you live outside the US, then you probably need to deal with foreign tax credits, foreign income exclusions, FBAR forms (you probably have bank account balances enough for the 10K threshold) , various monsters the Congress enacted against you like form 8939 (if you have enough banking and investment accounts), form ... |
Is real (physical) money traded during online trading? | I asked a followup question on the Islam site. The issue with Islam seems to be that exchanging money for other money is 'riba' (roughly speaking usury). There are different opinions, but it seems that in general exchanging money for 'something else' is fine, but exchanging money for other money is forbidden. The physi... |
How long can a company keep the money raised from IPO of its stocks? | Is it correct that there is no limit on the length of the time that the company can keep the money raised from IPO of its stocks, unlike for the debt of the company where there is a limit? Yes that is correct, there is no limit. But a company can buy back its shares any time it wants. Anyone else can also buy shares on... |
How can this stock have an intra-day range of more than 90% on 24Aug2015? | As you know, the market is in turmoil today. At this moment, 11:45 am, the S&P is down 2.3%, 45 points. But, premarket, it was down 100 points. Now, premarket, I heard Jim Cramer say, "today is not the day to use market orders." Yes, on Mad Money, he seems a bit eccentric, but he does offer some wise advice at times. ... |
Do property taxes get deducted 100% from the Annual Tax Return or only a fraction of them? | Any deductable expense will reduce your taxable income not your tax payable. Your Example 1 above is correct and gives you 100% deduction. It is like having a business where your sales are $100,000 and your expenses in making the sales is $40,000. The expenses are your tax deductions and reduce your profits on which yo... |
Why do banks encourage me to use online bill payment? | One other aspect of this is that the bank will plan to eventually approach the merchant that they are sending paper checks to and say "why don't you sign up with us and give us your ACH info, and we won't send you checks?" And a lot of merchants will say "sure", because someone has to open those checks and take them d... |
UK: Personal finance book for a twenty-something | Public sector and private industry retirement plans, taxation and estate planning would be the most substantial differences between the two countries. The concepts for accumulating wealth are the same, and if you are doing anything particularly lucrative with an above average amount of risk, the aforementioned differen... |
How to calculate interest payments without EBIT | The actual financial statements should always be referenced first before opening or closing a position. For US companies, they are freely available on EDGAR. Annual reports are called 10-Ks, and quarterly reports are called 10-Qs. YHOO and GOOG do a great job of posting financials that are quickly available, but money... |
Recent college grad. Down payment on a house or car? | I'd suggest buying a used car for cash, car loans are a bad idea. I bought my last car a few years ago for $8k off of craigslist, and it is still running great. Make sure you get a car checked out by a mechanic before buying (usually they'll drop it off at a mechanic you want to have take a look, or perhaps just go wit... |
First job: Renting vs get my parents to buy me a house | Say the price is $200K. Would I, as a real estate investor, want to buy such a house? If the rent is $600, that's $7200/yr. "the local property tax rate is levied on the tax base, and the applicable tax rate ranges from 0.40% to 0.76%" so, I'll assume .5%, just $1,000. There are rules of thumb that say half the rent wi... |
Why do some expiration dates have more open interest for options? | The third Friday of each month is an expiration for the monthly options on each stock. Stock with standardized options are in one of three "cycles" and have four open months at any give time. See http://www.investopedia.com/terms/o/optioncycle.asp In addition some stocks have weekly options now. Those generally have... |
How to calculate ownership for property with a partner | To add to ChrisInEdmonton's answer: Your conveyancing solicitor should be able to advise on the details, but a typical arrangement involves: As an alternative to the numbers in Chris' answer, it could be argued that you should first be reimbursed for the fees you paid (accounting for inflation), but that any remaining ... |
Accepting high volatility for high long-term returns | Modern portfolio theory dramatically underestimates the risk of the recommended assets. This is because so few underlying assets are in the recommended part of the curve. As investors identify such assets, large amounts of money are invested in them. This temporarily reduces measured risk, and temporarily increases ... |
What does it mean for a normal citizen like me when my country's dollar value goes down? | There are several possible effects: There isn't much you could do about it. If you had enough money to try to hedge by buying foreign securities, in theory you could be happy no matter what your dollar did: if it goes up, you have pain or gain from local effects (depending on whether imports or exports have a bigger ef... |
If stock price drops by the amount of dividend paid, what is the use of a dividend | There are many reasons for buying stock for dividends. You are right in the sense that in theory a stock's price will go down in value by the amount of the dividend. As the amount of dividend was adding to the value of the company, but now has been paid out to shareholder, so now the company is worth less by the value... |
Do I have to pay the internet installation charges for my home's company internet? | It appears so. I suppose you could try saying that you don't want to pay for it and won't have Internet installed, but that could be detrimental to your career. There is no law that says your company has to pay for your Internet unless you have some kind of contract with them that says you will. If anything, your best ... |
What happens when a stock gets delisted? | When a delisting happens, the primary process involves, the firm or the entity, trying to buy everyone out so that they can take the firm private by delisting from the stock exchanges. As the firm wants to buy everyone out, the current owners of the equity have the upper hand. They wouldn't want to sell if they believe... |
Typical return for an IRA? How can I assess if my returns were decent? | To me it looks pretty good (10% per year is a pretty good return). Lagging behind the indexes is normal, it is hard to beat the indexes over a long period of time, the longer the period - the lesser the chances to succeed. However, half a year is a relatively short period of time, and you should check your investments ... |
I cosigned on a house for my brother | This is why we tell people not to co-sign unless they are able and willing to risk that money becoming a gift... or are able and willing to treat it as business rather than family. Unfortunately that advice is a bit late now to help you. When you cosigned, you promised the bank that you would make any payments he didn'... |
Can signing up at optoutprescreen.com improve my credit score? | If I had a business and was able to claim a feature, I would. It's simple marketing. If in fact, opting out helped your score, the site would promote that feature. Soft pulls for prescreened offers are not counted. No more than my constant peek at my score through Credit Karma. Opt out, if you wish. The benefit of co... |
Is it unreasonable to double your investment year over year? | One thing I like to do every once in a while is look at the day's market movers. It's a list of symbols that had huge movement. There tend to be a couple of 50+% movers every time I look. In fact today I see ATV moved up 414.48%: So there it is—doubling your investment in one day and then some is technically possible.... |
Why do people buy insurance even if they have the means to overcome the loss? | In addition to stoj's two good points I'll add a couple more reasons: 3) In some situations there are secondary factors involved that can make it a good deal. These normally amount to cases where you can buy the insurance with pre-tax dollars but would have to pay the bills with post-tax dollars. 4) Insurance compan... |
What is the interest rate online brokerages paying out tied to? | The prime rate is the interest rate banks use amongst themselves to lend money to each other only. It is used as the basis (sometimes) for what interest rate banks charge you. The prime rate is based loosely on the Fed rate. There is a committee that meets regularly to set this and other industry interest rates. http... |
How does delta of an option change with time if underlying price is constant? | As the option approaches expiry, the delta will approach zero or one, depending on whether you're in or out of the money. This might be easiest to conceptualise if you look at the option value as a function of the stock price, and then realise that the delta is the slope of that curve. Now, as we get closer to expiry, ... |
Long-term capital gain taxes on ETFs? | Generally speaking, each year, mutual funds distribute to their shareholders the dividends that are earned by the stocks that they hold and also the net capital gains that they make when they sell stocks that they hold. If they did not do so, the money would be income to the fund and the fund would have to pay taxes on... |
Should I use an NRE or NRO account to transfer money from India to the US? Any reports needed? | NRE is better. It's a tax free account, exempt from income tax. NRE account is freely repatriable (Principal and interest earned) while the NRO account has restricted repatriability |
Can a buy market order be matched with a sell market order in Forex trading? | If there are no limit orders on the opposite side of the book when your market order gets its turn for execution, it should be rejected by the market. A market order should generally not "sit on the book" like your question suggests waiting for another order to arrive. Thus, the situation that you describe should not... |
Do I not have a credit score? | I'm the contrarian in the crowd. I think credit scores and debt are the closest thing to evil incarnate. You're in good company. The absence of a credit score simply means the agencies have insufficient data in their behavioral model to determine how profitable your business would be to the bank. The higher your score,... |
For young (lower-mid class) investors what percentage should be in individual stocks? | I don't believe the decision is decided by age or wealth. You only stock pick when a) you enjoy the process because it takes time and if you consider it 'work' then the cost will probably not be offset by higher returns. b) you must have the time to spend trading, monitoring, choosing, etc. c) you must have the skill... |
Should I Pay Off my Student Loan Debts First or Invest in an Index Fund? | Pay off the debt first. Life circumstances change without notice, and starting any stage of life with a debt puts you at a disadvantage. Luckily, your debt is small. Please also consider accumulating a 6 month emergency fund before making investments. This will further protect you when life hands you a curveball. |
property owned 50/50 between my brother and me | ASSUMING you're talking about a property in the United States, the answer generally would be "no". You aren't actually paying any of the expenses for the property and yet you want to take the deductions for doing so? That's a rather cheeky move, I'd say! (grin) It probably would lead to some real strife with your b... |
How can I lookup the business associated with a FEIN? | In most cases you cannot do "reverse lookup" on tax id in the US. You can verify, but for that you need to have more than just the FEIN/SSN. You should also have a name, and some times address. Non-profits, specifically, have to publish their EIN to donors, so it may be easier than others to identify those. Other busin... |
What percent of a company are you buying when you purchase stock? | As you can see at https://www.google.com/finance?q=NASDAQ%3AAAPL the number of apple shares at this very moment is 5.25B, so if you have 1 share you own 1 / 5.25B of the company. |
Any problem if I continuously spend my credit card more than normal people? | How will going from 75% Credit Utilization to 0% Credit Utilization affect my credit score? might answer your question if US based. In the US, what counts is what shows on the bill. I've run $20K through a card with a $10K limit, but still ended the month under $2K by making extra payments. As long as you stay ahead o... |
Short Selling Specific to India | In India, as suggested above, short/long position can be taken either in F&O or Spot market. The F&O segment short/long can be kept open for appx. 3 months by taking position on the far contract. In intra-day/Spot market, usually the position has to be squared at the end of day or the broker will square it during expir... |
A-B-C Class Shares: What's the difference? | In most cases, the other classes of shares are preferred stock (example, JPM-F). Preferred stock usually pays higher dividends and shareholders get preferential treatment in the event that the company goes under. (Preferred shareholders are behind bondholders in line, but ahead of common stock holders) In other cases, ... |
what is this type of stock trade? | I think that pattern is impossible, since the attempt to apply the second half would seem to prevent executing the first. Could you rewrite that as "After the stock rises to $X, start watching for a drop of $Y from peak price; if/when that happens, sell." Or does that not do what you want? (I'm not going to comment on ... |
Pay off car loan entirely or leave $1 until the end of the loan period? | In some states there are significantly higher automobile insurance costs and higher coverage requirements for vehicles that have a lien on them. I suspect this is not your scenario, or you probably would not be considering holding the loan open. But it is something to consider. If you live in a state where insurance ... |
What's the catch with biweekly mortgage payments? | So the principle is true. Assuming that you get paid bi-weekly, you end up getting three paychecks two months during the year. Typically that is in January and July/August. So if things were different, and your mortgage was setup so you paid half a monthly payment each paycheck, then you would wind up making one ful... |
What happens if futures contract seller defaults? | MD-Tech answered: The answer is in your question: derivatives are contracts so are enforced in the same way as any other contract. If the counterparty refuses to pay immediately they will, in the first instance be billed by any intermediary (Prime Broker etc.) that facilitated the contract. If they still refuse to pay... |
irr calculation on stock with dividends | Re. question 2 If I buy 20 shares every year, how do I get proper IRR? ... (I would have multiple purchase dates) Use the money-weighted return calculation: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rate_of_return#Internal_rate_of_return where t is the fraction of the time period and Ct is the cash flow at that time period. For ... |
How does a big lottery winner cash his huge check risk-free? | If the funds are deposited into a noninterest-bearing account, they will be covered by FDIC insurance regardless of the amount (However, this extended coverage may not be valid after Dec. 31, 2012): On November 9, 2010, the FDIC issued a Final Rule implementing section 343 of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consu... |
Has anyone compared an in-person Tax Advisor to software like Turbo Tax? | I've done my taxes using turbotax for years and they were not simple, Schedule C (self-employed), rental properties, ESPP, stock options, you name it. It's a lot of work and occasionally i did find bugs in TurboTax. ESPP were the biggest pain surprisingly. The hardest part is to get all the paperwork together and you'd... |
Do bond interest rate risk premiums only compensate for the amount investors might lose? | [...] are all bonds priced in such a way so that they all return the same amount (on average), after accounting for risk? In other words, do risk premiums ONLY compensate for the amount investors might lose? No. GE might be able to issue a bond with lower yield than, say, a company from China with no previous records o... |
Why are stocks having less institutional investors a “good thing”? | It's not necessarily bad but it can cause the stock price to become a lot more volatile. Depends on which side of the bet you're on ;) Suppose a hedge fund manager thinks a company is poorly run. He may buy a ton of shares so that he can get rid of the current CEO and replace it with his/her own. For the hedge fund and... |
Price movement behaviour before earnings announcements | This depends entirely on what the market guesses the news will be and how much of that guess has already been factored into the price. There is no general answer beyond that. Note that this explains the apparently paradoxical responses where a stock good down on good news (the market expected better) or up on bad news... |
Short-term robots and long-term investors in the stock market | ....causes loses [sic] to others. Someone sells you a stock. The seller receives cash. You receive a stock certificate. This doesn't imply a loss by either party especially if the seller sold the stock for more than his purchase price. A day trading robot can make money off of the price changes of a stock only if th... |
Making your first million… is easy! (??) | Easy. Start with 2 millions and lose only one. Jokes aside, if you want a million USD, you should be asking yourself how you can produce products or services worth $5 millions. (expect the extra to be eaten up by taxes, marketing, sales, workforce...) If by investment you mean making risky bets on the stock market, you... |
As a small business owner, should I pay my taxes from my personal or business checking account? | Payment of taxes for your personal return filed with the IRS always come from your personal account, regardless of how the money was earned. Sales tax would be paid from your business account, so would corporate taxes, if those apply; but if you're talking about your tax payments to the IRS for your personal income tha... |
Can I buy only 4 shares of a company? | Simple answer: Yes A better question to ask might be "Should I invest all my savings to buy 4 shares of a single stock." My answer to that would be "probably not". If this is your first venture into the world of owning publicly traded companies, then you're better off starting with some sort of mutual fund or ETF. Thi... |
Why do credit cards have minimum limits? | It discourages people from obtaining a high-limit card simply to show off, because the bank's forcing them to use it or lose it. |
Annuities question - Equations of value | The solution is x = 8.92. This assumes that Chuck's six years of deposits start from today, so that the first deposit accumulates 10 years of gain, i.e. 20*(1 + 0.1)^10. The second deposit gains nine years' interest: 20*(1 + 0.1)^9 and so on ... If you want to do this calculation using the formula for an annuity du... |
To rebalance or not to rebalance | An asset allocation formula is useful because it provides a way to manage risk. Rebalancing preserves your asset allocation. The investment risk of a well-diversified portfolio (with a few ETFs or mutual funds in there to get a wide range of stocks, bonds, and international exposure) is mostly proportional to the asset... |
Why should we expect stocks to go up in the long term? | I feel something needs to be addressed The last 100 years have been a period of economic prosperity for the US, so it's no surprise that stocks have done so well, but is economic prosperity required for such stock growth? Two world wars. The Great Depression. The dotcom bust. The telecom bust. The cold war. Vietnam, Ko... |
How to deal with the credit card debt from family member that has passed away? | First, when a debt collector says, "It's to your advantage to give me money now", I'd take that with a grain of salt. My ex-wife declared bankruptcy and when debt collectors couldn't find her, they somehow tracked me down and told me that I should tell her that it would be to her advantage to pay off this debt before t... |
Single investment across multiple accounts… good, bad, indifferent? | One implication is the added fees if you are investing in something with a trading cost or commission, such as your stock purchase. If you pay low costs to trade (e.g. with a discount broker) and don't switch your investments often, then costs overall should remain reasonable .. but always be aware of your costs and se... |
What does PMI mean? | Yes, PMI is what the lender requires to loan you more than 8O% of the home's value. I could easily present scenarios where it's exactly the right decision to use PMI and get the purchase done. A 100K mortgage at 90% LTV will cost you $521/year in PMI. If you are renting and struggling to get a higher downpayment, it c... |
How to value employee benefits? | Employee Stock Purchase Plans (ESPPs) were heavily neutered by U.S. tax laws a few years ago, and many companies have cut them way back. While discounts of 15% were common a decade ago, now a company can only offer negligible discounts of 5% or less (tax free), and you can just as easily get that from fluctuations in t... |
If I were to get into a life situation where I would not be able to make regular payments, do lenders typically provide options other than default? | I would say generally, the answer is No. There might be some short term relief to people in certain situations, but generally speaking you sign a contract to borrow money and you are responsible to pay. This is why home loans offer better terms then auto loans, and auto loans better than credit cards or things like ... |
The Benefits/Disadvantages of using a credit card | I just want to stress one point, which has been mentioned, but only in passing. The disadvantage of a credit card is that it makes it very easy to take on a credit. paying it off over time, which I know is the point of the card. Then you fell into the trap of the issuer of the card. They benefit if you pay off stuff ov... |
What's “wrong” with taking money from your own business? | If you are the only owner: then morally there is nothing wrong with this, as long as you make sure that everything is tracked so that you pay the proper taxes from the correct entity. The danger for you and your business is if the transfers aren't planned. Because you may not be re-investing enough of the profits back ... |
Where to find CSV or JSON data for publicly traded companies listed with their IPO date? | Here is a list to Yahoo! Finance API. Not sure how much longer this will be support though: https://code.google.com/p/yahoo-finance-managed/wiki/YahooFinanceAPIs |
When is Cash Value Life Insurance a good or bad idea? | Buy term and invest the difference is certainly the standard recommendation, and for good reason. When you start looking at some sample numbers the "buy term and invest the difference" strategy starts to look very good. Here are the rates I found (27 yr old in Texas with good health, non-smoker, etc): $200k term life: ... |
Deductible expenses paid with credit card: In which tax year would they fall? | I'm a CPA and former IRS agent and manager. Whether you are a cash or accrual basis taxpayer, you get to deduct the expense when your card is charged. Think of it this way: You are borrowing from the credit card company or bank that issued the credit card. You take that money to make a purchase of a product or service.... |
To whom should I report fraud on both of my credit cards? | You need to run a virus scan on your computers to make sure you do not have a key-logger program running on either. I would also think about designating one old computer to only access your bank accounts and not do anything but that. If your computer is infected then every time you login your credit cards can be com... |
My landlord is being foreclosed on. Should I confront him? | I wouldn't confront him. It's really none of your business what he has done or not done with your money as long as you've been a faithful tenant. Whoever gets the house after the foreclosure wants you to stay. I mean, a faithful tenant paying rent is a whole lot better than no one in the house at all. The new landlord ... |
I have $12k in a Chase checking account, but want to start earning interest/saving/investing/etc to make more money. What should I do? | First thing's first: migrate your savings to an interest-bearing savings account (such as from Ally Bank). While it still lags behind inflation, 0.84% is still better than 0.00%. Short-term CDs are also an option. I've personally thought about experimenting with peer-to-peer lending, but a few thousand in savings isn't... |
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