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ObsidianBeast posted:I've recently been using a single monitor exclusively instead of dual monitors, and I find it means that I'm less distracted. There was an article about this recently: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/20/technology/personaltech/surviving-and-thriving-in-a-one-monitor-world.html?_r=0 When I'm developing web apps, I need at least a text editor, a browser, and the developer tools for that. So even with two monitors there's too much switching going on for my taste unless I embed the dev tools window in the browser. With one monitor it's almost intolerable.
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Nov 28, 2014 13:53
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District Selectman posted:I guess that's the other part of the question: how do you calculate savings rate? I use (cash savings + 401k contribution + employer match)/(net pay + 401k contribution). That's just my intuitive sense of what seems right. I guess I could put employer match in the denominator, that lowers me to 50.5% I essentially use (increase in net worth due to my saving) / (How much I earned less taxes, including employer match) To break it down more, this works out to: (cash savings + 401k contribution + employer match + increase in principal in house) / ((gross pay - taxes paid) + employer match) Ignore the person who doesn't count 401k savings in their savings rate. That's absurd, and "can't touch it for 20 years" is completely ignorant of the many various ways you can tap that well before retirement age without penalty. A good topic to google if you are concerned about accessing that money is "roth converison ladder".
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Nov 28, 2014 18:10
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Vilgan posted:I essentially use (increase in net worth due to my saving) / (How much I earned less taxes, including employer match) It's definitely inaccurate to count it pre-tax, estimating taxes on it is what I recommended.
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Nov 28, 2014 18:23
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AbsenceVsThinAir posted:When I'm developing web apps, I need at least a text editor, a browser, and the developer tools for that. So even with two monitors there's too much switching going on for my taste unless I embed the dev tools window in the browser. With one monitor it's almost intolerable. Yeah I feel like it really depends on what you're doing. Editing code is a minimum of two monitors given that I'm using sublime text plus an IDE.
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Nov 28, 2014 19:14
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Vilgan posted:I essentially use (increase in net worth due to my saving) / (How much I earned less taxes, including employer match) LOL I tried doing (change in net worth)/income and got a savings rate of 125%. Real estate appreciation for the win! Okay, this is pretty silly, forget trying to figure out my savings number. I'll just keep on keeping on trying not to spend more than I make.
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Nov 28, 2014 20:07
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moana posted:LOL I tried doing (change in net worth)/income and got a savings rate of 125%.
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Nov 28, 2014 22:44
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moana posted:man, this is hard to do using Mint. I just did it as (income-spending)/income and got 51%, which lumps mortgage and some of my taxes into spending since I have withholding and estimated tax payments and also a huge chunk of taxes I pay every year to catch up and it's too confusing to separate it out. For the tax stuff just label it as tax related and then exclude tax related stuff from spending which should help clean up the numbers a bit. As for 125% - I said change in net worth due to saving not change in net worth period. Did you buy stocks? That's savings. Did you make a payment towards the principal towards your house? That's savings. Did you pay interest on your house? That's spending. Etc. A car is spending not savings because on a long time horizon it isn't worth anything.
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Nov 29, 2014 15:48
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moana posted:man, this is hard to do using Mint. I just did it as (income-spending)/income and got 51%, which lumps mortgage and some of my taxes into spending since I have withholding and estimated tax payments and also a huge chunk of taxes I pay every year to catch up and it's too confusing to separate it out. I had a hard time using Mint to calculate this too, seems like a feature they could add. And yeah it's stupid, but I like numbers and I want to compare my money numbers to the money numbers of internet people! Vilgan posted:A car is spending not savings because on a long time horizon it isn't worth anything. Excuse me, let me remind you of truck equity!!
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Nov 29, 2014 18:22
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District Selectman posted:Excuse me, let me remind you of truck equity!! Boy do I have a deal for you just pay $70k over 5 years and you'll gain up to $500 in truck equity!
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Nov 30, 2014 23:29
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As I've been thinking more recently about financial independence, it occurred to me how much work related expenses add to my cost of living, and therefore my "retired" or semi-retired cost of living would be that much lower. I spend $280 a month on gas, insurance and tolls, and I spend $120 a month on food at work. That's $400 a month, or almost $5k a year. It wouldn't be totally wiped out without work, but it would be drastically lower. That's not even accounting for random maintenance, or time wasted doing maintenance. Honestly without work to commute to, I would sell my car. Outside of my commute, I rarely use it, so I could get a zip car pass for those rare times a car is necessary. In my city, I bike, walk or take public transit to get anywhere I need to go as it is. I would order takeout less, because the #1 reason I order takeout is total exhaustion from work. I'd imagine my regular food bill would be lower too, because I end up buying certain things out of convenience that I wouldn't buy if I had more time. Today being Sunday, I made some food for the week, but it's not enough for the whole week. If I had two more days a week off, I would bulk cook even more (I like it, just not after a 10 hour work day plus 1.5 hours of commuting), and probably cut my food bill by at least $100 a month. I don't even know how to quantify stupid financial decisions caused by stress. Probably another $1k spent out drinking on Fridays ($20 a week) that I might not have felt to urge to do without 5 days of stress.
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Dec 1, 2014 00:51
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District Selectman posted:As I've been thinking more recently about financial independence, it occurred to me how much work related expenses add to my cost of living, and therefore my "retired" or semi-retired cost of living would be that much lower. I've thought the same thing about lower expenses, but then I've also thought that we'd probably travel more. Due to this, and wanting to have a little bit more of slop room in the calculations, I use our current expenses as a rough number. Might be worth having 2 numbers, one of what you think the minimal expenses would be, then another with extras for traveling/eating out/etc.
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Dec 1, 2014 01:14
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District Selectman posted:As I've been thinking more recently about financial independence, it occurred to me how much work related expenses add to my cost of living, and therefore my "retired" or semi-retired cost of living would be that much lower. There's at least a whole chapter in Your Money or Your Life: 9 Steps to Transforming Your Relationship with Money and Achieving Financial Independence talking about this. For me, I always tried to minimise my work-related costs. I didn't want my job to cost me money. Even as young as 19 working in IT office jobs, I rarely ate out at work. Today I'm even better; I haven't eaten out at work since May. I also hated commuting by car. It made no sense to me. Public or active transportation whenever possible, leaving my car in the driveway. My method for dealing with stress-related purchases is just to be aware of it and avoid the temptation. "Why am I buying this good/service? Is it work-stress? Yes? Well, soon you won't have to work if you avoid buying bullshit things for no reason". Delayed gratification, ladies and gents.
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Dec 1, 2014 03:03
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Suspicious Lump posted:This is from pages ago, what's your stall about? Sorry lump, haven't been checking my own thread lately. I talked about it in the first couple of pages, but it's a market stall doing mainly coffee, with some pancakes, chai and other random things that work well. My latest addition is little baby banana breads, people freak about how cute they are and for an hours work on a friday night I'm earning an extra 100-150 bucks a week. EDIT: Be happy to change the thread title, have no idea how to. Editing the OP doesn't let me change thread title. Chadzok fucked around with this message at 11:55 on Dec 5, 2014 |
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Dec 5, 2014 11:51
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Hey folks. I'm working my way through the first pages in this thread and I see a lot of Vanguard talk, but mainly US-centric. Does anyone have experience of Vanguard UK and how they stack up to the competition? Edit: Scratch that, they apparently require a minimum investment of £100k per fund invested in, if you want to open a direct account with them. Going through a marketplace obviously gets rid of the low fee advantage.  That's disappointing.
Prince John fucked around with this message at 21:49 on Dec 5, 2014 |
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Dec 5, 2014 12:59
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Lowest fee uk indexs are hsbc and blackrock iirc you just have to manage things a tiny bit more hands on.
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Dec 5, 2014 22:35
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Chadzok posted:My latest addition is little baby banana breads, people freak about how cute they are and for an hours work on a friday night I'm earning an extra 100-150 bucks a week.  I want to hear more about this...
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Dec 9, 2014 06:52
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pig slut lisa posted:
As would I, since I'm considering perfecting a few recipes and maybe getting a start selling at a local farmers' market. That sounds like a great way to make some cash on the side, but I sure would like to hear about some pitfalls and considerations.
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Dec 11, 2014 02:35
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Chadzok posted:Sorry lump, haven't been checking my own thread lately. Whats it like, living my dream?
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Dec 11, 2014 03:59
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xpander posted:I sure would like to hear about some pitfalls and considerations. This is very state based, but licensing for food making can be onerous. Some states require a commercial kitchen which can cost over $100 an hour to rent out. We looked into this when my wife wanted to make and sell caramels and it just didn't make sense. Some states have exemptions for production below a certain amount. Ours, alas, does not.
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Dec 11, 2014 04:04
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Bloody Queef posted:This is very state based, but licensing for food making can be onerous. Some states require a commercial kitchen which can cost over $100 an hour to rent out. If this is something you want to do, check and see if your neighborhood has a community association that has a commercial kitchen available, or if anyone you know has one in theirs. You might be able to find one that's available very cheaply or even free to people living in the neighborhood.
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Dec 11, 2014 20:50
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I'm not going to lie, it's pretty loving sweet. It's a lot of hard work, especially on top of a full time job, but the monetary rewards are more than motivating enough. The hardest part was the first 6-8 months, we were probably making money still but it felt like everything we had was going into building the business. If I had to start something from scratch now with the knowledge I've gained the last couple years, I would go to all my local successful farmers markets, write a list of all the stalls that are at each of them, and look for gaps. If there's a cane juice stall at three of them but not at the fourth, I'd apply as a cane juice stall/talk to the market managers and buy the equipment if accepted. Market stalls that do well: (you'd be shocked at how much money some of these people are making) Coffee, obviously Lemonade/ Cane juice/ Smoothies or any combination of the three (if your local area has never heard of cane juice I would get into this right now. Wish I'd jumped on it years ago.) Women's fashion (buy dresses wholesale, preferably from a non-local source so it's something a bit different to what's around) Most food stalls with attractive signage or unique products from a random ethnicity (more stringent OH&S requirements but honestly it's not hard to meet them) Turkish gozleme (must have awful signage and access to community of elderly Turkish women) Running the actual markets themselves (someone I know is trying this, I will keep you updated) Handmade jewellery Funny t-shirts Crystals and oogie boogie bullshit stuff Handmade crafts (soaps, candles, chopping boards, bags, whatever) do okay, better if you have the skills to build a compelling web/social media presence Wouldn't bother with homemade cakes unless it's an addition to an existing stall or can be done in combination with a food/drinks stall. These guys never last more than a couple months. Ice cream/ ice blocks is hard. Too weather dependent, seen many of them fail. If you have any ideas, bring them up, I'll help you develop them. Ask away, any other questions.
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Dec 15, 2014 03:49
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crimedog posted:You guys listen to podcasts? I've been listening to Radical Personal Finance since his interview with Jacob Lund Fisker of Early Retirement Extreme. He talks about permaculture, entrepreneurship, economic green living, child and adult education, and of course financial independence. I'm finally listening to these, good stuff. I was bummed his tax avoidance podcasts are kind of top level (would prefer some real life examples as a business owned AND as an employee) but overall I enjoy it. Are there other podcasts I should follow if I like this one?
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Jan 10, 2015 01:50
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Minty Swagger posted:I'm finally listening to these, good stuff. I was bummed his tax avoidance podcasts are kind of top level (would prefer some real life examples as a business owned AND as an employee) but overall I enjoy it. Are there other podcasts I should follow if I like this one? I've been listening to it for the last few weeks as well and I am really enjoying it, too, except for when he or his guests crank the religion mentions up. I haven't really been into podcasts since 7-8 years ago, so it's weird for this to be a fixation again. I'm even thinking about signing up for his membership program just for the entertainment value even if it is bad with money, and especially because of his final answer to the final question of the Episode 118 Q&A regarding gifting money to a nephew. It's really amazing.
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Jan 10, 2015 07:40
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SpelledBackwards posted:I've been listening to it for the last few weeks as well and I am really enjoying it, too, except for when he or his guests crank the religion mentions up. I haven't really been into podcasts since 7-8 years ago, so it's weird for this to be a fixation again. I'm even thinking about signing up for his membership program just for the entertainment value even if it is bad with money, and especially because of his final answer to the final question of the Episode 118 Q&A regarding gifting money to a nephew. It's really amazing. I enjoyed this podcast, but actually strongly disagreed with his assessment about the last question. Personally, I'd want to do it with an UTMA. While the man with the question said 2-3k a year now, he might increase this over the next 18 years of the nephews life. We also do not have a crystal ball that the gift tax exemption limit will go up over time. Personally, I believe it will go down, especially if congress eliminates a "you + your spouse" action. Gift taxes effect a very small part of the population, so sacrificing them would generate potential revenue while angered very few constituents. (But we didn't raise taxes!!!) So if the nephew is in possession of the money as each year goes along, we don't have to worry about what the IRS will do. It also sounds like the brother-in-law is not really wealthy, so kiddie tax probably won't come into play. Though what the podcast didn't mention about UTMAs which is a major negative is that they are counted as the applicants' assets during the financial aid process.
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Jan 10, 2015 17:42
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Bloody Queef posted:I enjoyed this podcast, but actually strongly disagreed with his assessment about the last question. Personally, I'd want to do it with an UTMA. While the man with the question said 2-3k a year now, he might increase this over the next 18 years of the nephews life. We also do not have a crystal ball that the gift tax exemption limit will go up over time. Personally, I believe it will go down, especially if congress eliminates a "you + your spouse" action. Gift taxes effect a very small part of the population, so sacrificing them would generate potential revenue while angered very few constituents. (But we didn't raise taxes!!!) So if the nephew is in possession of the money as each year goes along, we don't have to worry about what the IRS will do. It also sounds like the brother-in-law is not really wealthy, so kiddie tax probably won't come into play. Though what the podcast didn't mention about UTMAs which is a major negative is that they are counted as the applicants' assets during the financial aid process. No, the podcast guy definitely has the right idea. It's much more likely that the kid would blow the money from the UTMA than that Congress will appreciably reduce the annual gift tax exclusion. The annual exclusion gift limit is indexed for inflation and will continue to increase barring an act of congress. $14,000 per person per year really isn't a big deal in the big picture of tax revenue. Now, if you were talking about the $5m+ lifetime exclusion, I might agree that that could come down. But the annual amount? Not going to happen. Further - it doesn't make sense that congress would stop allowing couples to split gifts. Why should a married couple not be able to gift as much annually as two single people? It's just not going to happen. edit: Just for fun, here's a history of annual exclusion limits: http://www.thewealthdesigncenter.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/History-of-Estate-and-Gift-Taxes-1916-2013.pdf It did go down in the 1930s and 40s, but if my inflation adjustment is accurate, the $3000 limit in 1942 is equivalent to $42k today. So the current annual exclusion is already pretty low in comparison Crabby Abby fucked around with this message at 23:59 on Jan 10, 2015 |
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Jan 10, 2015 23:46
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I just read this yesterday and thought this thread might enjoy: “Frugality, my dear, must be our refuge,” wrote John Adams to his wife, Abigail, during the revolution. “I hope the ladies are everyday diminishing their ornaments, and the gentlemen, too. Let us drink water and eat potatoes rather than submit to unrighteous domination.” Financial Independence: Let us drink water and eat potatoes
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Jan 12, 2015 13:51
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Crabby Abby posted:No, the podcast guy definitely has the right idea. It's much more likely that the kid would blow the money from the UTMA than that Congress will appreciably reduce the annual gift tax exclusion. The annual exclusion gift limit is indexed for inflation and will continue to increase barring an act of congress. $14,000 per person per year really isn't a big deal in the big picture of tax revenue. Now, if you were talking about the $5m+ lifetime exclusion, I might agree that that could come down. But the annual amount? Not going to happen. Further - it doesn't make sense that congress would stop allowing couples to split gifts. Why should a married couple not be able to gift as much annually as two single people? It's just not going to happen. So what you're really saying is that the dollar amount hasn't gone down, but the inflation-adjusted amount has? So, effectively, the effective annual amount is less than in 1942. No special work required - just increase the amount slower than inflation.
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Jan 12, 2015 13:58
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District Selectman posted:I just read this yesterday and thought this thread might enjoy: I was curious so I looked it up, this quote is pretty close to what he actually wrote in the letter! September 20, 1774: My Dear I am very well yet - write to me as often as you can, and send your Letters to the Office in Boston or to Mr. Cranches, whence they will be sent by the first Conveyance. I am anxious to know how you can live without Government. But the Experiment must be tryed. The Evils will not be found so dreadfull as you [apprehend] them. Frugality, my Dear, Frugality, OEconomy, Parcimony must be our Refuge. I hope the Ladies are every day diminishing their ornaments, and the Gentlemen too. Let us Eat Potatoes and drink Water. Let us wear Canvass, and undressed Sheepskins, rather than submit to the unrighteous, and ignominious Domination that is prepared for Us. -Tel Brackett, I shall make him leave off drinking Rum. We cant let him fight yet. -My Love to my dear ones. Adieu. John Adams
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Jan 12, 2015 14:09
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C... posted:So what you're really saying is that the dollar amount hasn't gone down, but the inflation-adjusted amount has? So, effectively, the effective annual amount is less than in 1942. No special work required - just increase the amount slower than inflation. In 1997 the annual exclusion amount was tied to the inflation rate so that it will automatically increase at the same rate as inflation. I'm not sure why anyone would see the need to undo that. The reason the annual exclusion limit exists is that it would be an administrative nightmare to try and identify and tax all gifts (especially non-cash gifts and gifts of services) under a certain threshold. Literally nobody would benefit from reducing the limit below some reasonable amount, and $14,000 seems pretty reasonable compared to where the limit has been in the past.
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Jan 12, 2015 14:57
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Dessert Rose posted:The thing that really blew my mind when I started looking into this was how eating well, being healthy/fit and being frugal actually all support each other. I was eating like poo poo, driving tons of places and spending way too much money to do it. Now I'm eating actual food made from base ingredients, I'm enjoying doing so, it's better for me, and I'm getting free exercise when going places ... and it costs me significantly less money. Hey, I really like this post, and the idea that they all support each other. I notice that when I drive to work for a week, my mood's lower, which saps my willpower to cook, which robs me of a "yeah I MADE this" high, which discourages me from working on my personal projects that provide me with "gently caress YEAH I MADE THIS" highs, which makes my mood lower... Also, I like how people think that ALL life has to offer is toys, meanwhile the best hours of their days in the healthiest years of their lives are spent taking orders from management.
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Jan 13, 2015 02:57
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Mofabio posted:Also, I like how people think that ALL life has to offer is toys, meanwhile the best hours of their days in the healthiest years of their lives are spent taking orders from management. At the same time, I think a lot of FI people oversell travel as the way to live and spend your time. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy going new places and I have been fortunate enough to backpack in Europe and visit family in India many times, among other wonderful trips with my family and friends seeing other places and cultures. But the thing I love even more than going somewhere new is finally coming home to a familiar dog, shower, bed, and kitchen. Maybe it's just me, but there's a lot to be said for local leisure with your family and close friends too, and of course it's often much cheaper to have a backyard cookout or movie night at a friend's house very frequently than take lots of short trips (for example). In many cases at least these will still be pleasurable moments you look back on later in life and they didn't require you to go somewhere far.
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Jan 13, 2015 03:48
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Mofabio posted:Also, I like how people think that ALL life has to offer is toys, meanwhile the best hours of their days in the healthiest years of their lives are spent taking orders from management. There is some fun in buying toys but financing them while doing nothing else in your life is pretty lovely. For me setting goals on things I'd like to be doing has been the best cure for wasteful spending, and for years having some more specific goals has been lacking. Not that I've had much spare time to ponder anything other than my work until the past year.
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Jan 13, 2015 04:07
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SpelledBackwards posted:At the same time, I think a lot of FI people oversell travel as the way to live and spend your time. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy going new places and I have been fortunate enough to backpack in Europe and visit family in India many times, among other wonderful trips with my family and friends seeing other places and cultures. But the thing I love even more than going somewhere new is finally coming home to a familiar dog, shower, bed, and kitchen. I remember just being totally repulsed when MMM put up this chart:  Specifically, the part about one kid being the "full Human Experience". It's like one kid is the minimum viable product. What FI's revealed to me is that there actually was some sanity in the normal way that successful people do things. The most important thing in life is to be around people whom you want to be around and who want to be around you - and this most consistently comes from deep friendships, family, and by excelling at a job where people you respect work. (Young and attractive people also find it quite easy to find people who want to be around them, of course, which is why it's much easier to drift at 20 than to drift at 50.) FI's still absolutely essential to make sure that you can actually make the best decisions for yourself, as it makes work optional and actually fun again. But remember that whatever your lifestyle, you're going to need to give people a reason to want to be around you - otherwise you'll start feeling like a stain.
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Jan 17, 2015 16:29
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This is the most pathetic thing I've seen in a long time. SpelledBackwards posted:At the same time, I think a lot of FI people oversell travel as the way to live and spend your time. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy going new places and I have been fortunate enough to backpack in Europe and visit family in India many times, among other wonderful trips with my family and friends seeing other places and cultures. But the thing I love even more than going somewhere new is finally coming home to a familiar dog, shower, bed, and kitchen. Travel is great, but if you don't have a rich inner life then things aren't going to change just because you're taking high-speed rail around Europe. When I was in Italy last year I saw a lot of middle-aged Rick Steves automatons who really seemed to be just going with the flow.
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Jan 17, 2015 16:53
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I loving hate Rick Steves. Is there a younger, in-touch version of Rick Steves who knows where to find the bacchanalia in whatever foreign place you happen to travel?
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Jan 18, 2015 22:45
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LLCoolJD posted:This is the most pathetic thing I've seen in a long time.
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Jan 19, 2015 03:02
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Cicero posted:I don't see what's so bad about it. I imagine most people think in similar terms to this at some point, weighing the pros of having kids against the cons. It's the way he presents it, it can be pretty grating. I used to feel that way too, but I don't think he's really taking himself that seriously, I think he's just trying to be funny.
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Jan 19, 2015 16:28
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Cicero posted:I don't see what's so bad about it. I imagine most people think in similar terms to this at some point, weighing the pros of having kids against the cons. I think you're right. I'd find it much more off-putting if he couched the discussion in a more prescriptive tone, i.e. "it's bad to have 0 or 2 kids, 1 is obviously the best!" But he's really just talking about tradeoffs. It's what I like about Afford Anything: quote:This website is based on one radical idea: You can afford anything.
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Jan 19, 2015 18:28
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Is MMM slowly going off the deep end?
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Jan 20, 2015 05:20
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Nah he's just mostly run out of obvious topics to talk about.
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Jan 20, 2015 06:56
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