I recently spoke with the Director of the Pro Bono Committee for the Financial Planning Association of New York, and we shared some stories on volunteering. The Pro Bono committee is a fantastic group of people who go out into the community to help support the vulnerable by providing financial education to them. It has […]
Taking an Early 401(K) distribution can be a savvy move with the Net Unrealized Appreciation Tax Rule
Common thinking with regard to 401(k) plans is to roll them over into low cost IRA’s as soon as employment has ended, thus allowing assets to grow with the least bite taken out of them both in terms of fees, because most 401(k) plans offer higher fee mutual fund options rather than lower cost index […]
Flat Fees and Percentages
Maybe this is obvious to you, but a core part of pricing strategies and profitability is how a fee is built into a sales price. Even though it may be no surprise, understanding this concept better, and internalizing these pricing strategies can save you considerable amounts of money, and allow you to negotiate like a […]
Financial Boat Drill – what to do in the event of a real emergency
I hate boat drill. It’s that time when on a cruise, just after you have got to your cabin and are ready to plop yourself down on a deck chair with a whopping portion of ice-cream and a bucket of beer that an alarm sounds, and you must go to your muster station.Life Boat Drill […]
Things You Didn’t think you could buy from Staples
I love Staples. There, I said it. The reason I do is that if I need anything ‘officey’ they have a solid selection, I can earn my 5x from the Chase Ink Bold, and I can Plink them too. If was actually seeking to buy something with real money the rebates are pretty insane there: […]
Contrarianism
I’m a strange one, I hope that you are too. We all have our quirks and my own sometimes surprise even me. A concept that I broached recently in my post ‘Knowledge Must Be Stolen‘ was that there is good in many different philosophies, and you can take the best of an idea and leave […]
Early Retirement and Social Welfare- from the Systems perspective
Some readers and I have been discussing some aspects that surround retirement planning from people who seek to voluntarily exit the workforce at a premature age in order to enjoy the finer things life. I’ll start out by stating that I may actually do some of these harmful things myself, but I think it is […]
Last Day of 2013 to Convert to a ROTH IRA
I just quickly converted $15,000 into a ROTH IRA for the year, using Partial Transfers you will bring your income up by the amount of the Transfer, but in doing so move the Traditional IRA money that was growing Tax Deferred into a ROTH IRA that grows tax free, and is more favorable in estate […]
My Response to the ‘Moustachians’ who call my spending shameful
One of my posts was recently pulled into a forum from a member of Mr Money Mustache. The site is quite well known in the ‘early retirement’ crowd as he has some legendary status as being a guy who ‘retired at 30’. I have to say, I like a lot about this guy and the […]
Credits and Deductions – Getting more from your pay check
The IRS has two general areas which we can use to reduce our tax bill each year, knowing about these, how to trigger them, and which to use can make a big difference to our take home pay and is something worth keeping a close eye on. This post will look briefly at the differences […]