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The Simple Path to Wealth

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Season’s Greetings!!

by 20 Comments - Updated:

Before the week slips away I just wanted to take a moment to wish you and yours….

 

A very 

Merry Christmas 

and a 

Wonderful Holiday Season

 

Here’s to a 

Happy, Healthy and Prosperous New Year!

 

 

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Important Resources

  • Talent Stacker is a resource that I learned about through my work with Jonathan and Brad at ChooseFI, and first heard about Salesforce as a career option in an episode where they featured Bradley Rice on the Podcast. In that episode, Bradley shared how he reached FI quickly thanks to his huge paychecks and discipline in keeping his expenses low. Jonathan teamed up with Bradley to build Talent Stacker, and they have helped more than 1,000 students from all walks of life complete the program and land jobs like clockwork, earning double or even triple their old salaries using a Salesforce certification to break into a no-code tech career.
  • Credit Cards are like chain saws. Incredibly useful. Incredibly dangerous. Resolve to pay in full each month and never carry a balance. Do that and they can be great tools. Here are some of the very best for travel hacking, cash back and small business rewards.
  • Empower is a free tool to manage and evaluate your investments. With great visuals you can track your net worth, asset allocation, and portfolio performance, including costs. At a glance you'll see what's working and what you might want to change. Here's my full review.
  • Betterment is my recommendation for hands-off investors who prefer a DIFM (Do It For Me) approach. It is also a great tool for reaching short-term savings goals. Here is my Betterment Review
  • NewRetirement offers cool tools to help guide you in answering the question: Do I have enough money to retire? And getting started is free. Sign up and you will be offered two paths into their retirement planner. I was also on their podcast and you can check that out here:Video version, Podcast version.
  • Tuft & Needle (T&N) helps me sleep at night. They are a very cool company with a great product. Here’s my review of what we are currently sleeping on: Our Walnut Frame and Mint Mattress.
  • Vanguard.com

Filed Under: Life

Comments

  5. Happy all the holidays!

    FYI…the republic wireless link isn’t working. I’d love to give Tmobile the boot and some change in your pocket.

    Thank you!

    Reply

  9. So grateful for you! You’ve made such an incredible difference in our lives. Happy Holidays and a healthy, delightful New Year!!

    Reply

  12. Happy Holidays J.L! Would love to walk by that winter wonderland.

    I can second the Tuft and Needle pillow, very supportive and comfortable, also makes a great cushion for worn-out 19 year old office chairs!

    Reply

  13. I’m a new fan (coming over from your Google Talk) and will attempt some holiday flattery in hopes of being your next Case Study. First, thank you for taking a subject that scare the bejeesus out of most of us and explaining it in basic language. I’m already changing my investment and portfolio strategy.

    My (fingers crossed) Case Study… my younger brother (turning 59 soon) is high functioning developmentally disabled. He is competent to drive a car, live on his own, and held down a stable job for 38 years. Dad took care of managing his affairs up until he passed 4 years ago, when that responsibility passed to me. Brother Joe didn’t make much but he also didn’t spend much. He has savings, a 401k, and a paid off condo. He also lived in Alaska, which is far away from me and trying to manage things like appliances breaking, car issues, Covid exposure, ect. grew to be too difficult for me. He was eligible for early retirement and I ran all the calculations on his pension based on what he needs to live and found that he could retire and make it all work.

    We pulled the trigger and he retired last spring (now in the Wealth Preservation Stage) moved him down to Washington to be near Mom for her final years and sold his condo. His 401k ($40k) is with Vanguard and I have his IRA parked with a high return rate and savings broken out into CD’s that mature in stages based on his financial needs (roughly 8k per year).

    My heartburn is how to invest the $180k profit from his condo sale. I calculate out that he won’t need to tap into that money for about 10 years. Yes, I know that ideally we’d have kept him working until he was 65 but without any support system up in Alaska it wasn’t feasible. He’s delighted to near Mom, in an affordable senior apartment, it barely snows where he’s at, and if anything breaks he calls the apartment managers. And he has a support system, it’s all good.

    All in all, I want him not to outlive his money so he can continue to live independently. My guess is that he’s covered for 20 years based on current cash on hand. If he goes past that point, I can and will move him in with my husband and myself. None of us knows how long we shall grace this earth, so I’m hoping to stretch his finances to cover as long as possible.

    So, I’d like an idea of mix stocks and bonds for someone who’s retired. I think I can move his $180k into his existing Vanguard account and put it into VTSAX and VBTLX. Running the Vanguard Nest Egg Calculator suggests that a 50/50 mix will stretch his $180k out 20 years (94% certainty) giving him a total of 30 years of financial security. I gather that you are much more aggressive.

    Any thoughts from what I imagine to be an extremely smart readership would much appreciated by a big sister trying to take care of her developmentally disabled brother.

    Big love and my whatever you celebrate be blessed.

    Reply

    • Once you get to $50k at Vanguard outside of the 401(k) you can access their advisor services for .3% (about $150 for 50,000 invested). Normally you know calculators and such would be good but with special needs and multiple people involved I don’t think it’s a bad idea to have a professional look over everything and give you the best plan but also make sure you don’t have any blindspots in this specific circumstance. Then, after you get the plan, you can turn off the advisor services if you don’t see any additional value.

      Reply

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