Search results

Wow, you’re truely one in a million! Actually 1 in 913,130 - according to the Powerball website. The big one is 1 in 292,201,338 - so you can feel better knowing you were really not as close as it seems. Congrats!

Hi - same happened to me. Hit the 30 year mark and was done. My ah ha moment was when I looked at my family month budget and realized I had enough saved to implement the 4% withdrawal rule. My wife is still working so I have a lot of wiggle room on the budget numbers for now. Good luck and...

Hi, welcome to the forum. I'm pretty new around her myself. My guess is that you are in better financial shape than 99% of other 24 year olds. I just ran some quick numbers assuming the 4% withdrawal rule on your monthly budget of $1,606. So for basic FI, you need $1,606 x 12 months x 25...

No closing costs and no fees at all. Just the promo rate, and if I keep the money out past January, the rate goes back to 4.7% (or higher if rates rise in the meantime). I should add this is an existing Home Equity Line of Credit.

My bank mailed me a promo rate deal on my home equity loan today. The normal variable rate is 4.7%, and the promo rate is 0.490% through my January statement cycle. Would you ignore, or take the money and invest for the difference? I have been investing in floating rate bonds (FLRN and FLOT)...

I had my 2nd shot yesterday - about 2 months after the first. Sore arm again, but does not seem as bad as the first shot. BUT, did have a 101 fever and chills last night and generally feeling unwell. Did not have that with the 1st shot. Feeling totally fine today.

Lets see, we have 4 iPhones and 4 iPads in my family of 5. Personally, I love having a smartphone and carry it when I'm out at all times. We recently moved to the Comcast Xfinity Mobile plan (basically resold Verizon service) and its saving us some money. It's $12 per GB that we can all...

My heart says pay it off, but that might not be the best option. A few months ago, I sent 40k to my mortgage because my 5 year adjustable is going to reset to a higher rate next year - and I wanted to lower my balance. But, this book I just read (by a financial planner), says "Do not pay off...

My ah-ha moment was when I read about multiplying my yearly expenses by 25 to roughly get the amount needed to retire. I did that and holy cow, I was there. Did some soul searching, and then gave 3 weeks notice to my best friend (and boss at the time!). Now I'm 5 weeks in and loving it. I...

I'll just add about backing up your iPhone/iPads. Apple gives you 5GB free storage. Go to Settings, touch the top item (with your name, and Apple ID, iCloud). Then touch, iCloud, and go down to "iCloud Backup". I stay within the 5GB limit because I don't want to pay Apple more for increased...

And just to add, another nice benefit of the ML/BOA highest level preferred program is getting 100 free trades a month. (Not that we need that many!!). But its nice when I buy one share of a fund for my kids UTMA account and don't have to pay a fee.

Now that I'm in FIRE, I am working to get out of individual stocks. Been reading up on investment books (from the library - great source!!), and low cost ETF's or funds diversified between stocks and bonds are the way to go. One thing I read that stuck with me is something like this saying-...

I started mowing my one acre again now that I'm retired. I dug my 14 year old John Deere out of the shed, changed the oil, sharpened the blades and it needed a new fuel pump from Amazon (took me a while and some Youtube videos to figure out the problem). But, its running fine now. I would...

Yes, good idea - I just hate the annual fee. Do you cancel before the fee is charged (I assume at the 1 year anniversary)?

Thanks for the info. I've been using the Bank of America Travel Reward with the preferred bonus for years and getting 2.625% - for everything except gas and supermarkets. For Gas and Supermarkets, I've been using my PenFed Platinum Rewards Visa Signature. I had to recalculate the percentage...

Thanks again for the comments. I know I should sell, and I've been reading up on risk and proper allocation. But, I have to admit, I've fallen in love (wink wink). Apple and many techs have been great lately, so its easy to think they will keep going up, or at least stay up. So its is...

I had a case of Shingles about 2 years ago. It was on my face (and the roof of my mouth) and let me tell you, most unpleasant. One of the worst 2 weeks of my life. Anyway, when I found out about this new vaccine, I was very happy to get a shot. I do not want a repeat of Shingles. It's that...

Thanks all for the comments. Much to think about.

Hi All,:greetings10: I just retired and made it through my first non-working week. I worked a few corporate IT jobs over 30 years and finally decided that 30 years was enough. I have 3 kids and my wife is still working so that makes this a bit easier! So I'm watching the kids this summer while...