Here's a statement of the obvious: The opinions expressed here are those of the participants, not those of the Mutual Fund Observer. We cannot vouch for the accuracy or appropriateness of any of it, though we do encourage civility and good humor.
”hank, are you willing to provide more personal details about your situation, so your opinions have some context?”
Which opinion? I’ll try to compare my situation to yours but not sure if that affects most of my opinions about investing or finance…
hank, are you willing to provide more personal details about your situation, so your opinions have some context? bee did provide personal details of retirement and consideration of an "annuity-like" income stream:
"When I retired 13 years ago, I a…
@dtconroe, do you have Medicare or Medicare Advantage? Once you start Medicare, you cannot contribute to hsa, But you can continue to draw from hsa.
I have a Medicare Advantage plan and an HSA. Fortunately, I have been very healthy throughout my re…
bee: "Question: How many have turned to annuities or "annuity - like" strategies to increase your income spending?
When I retired 13 years ago, I attempted to project my future spending needs. Over these years I have meet my spending needs with a …
According to the Morningstar definition of "other":
"Other"
"The proportion of the fund invested in other securities such as property or other financial instruments"
When I use to do a lot of bond oef investing, and you broke down the funds holdi…
I don't have any "urge to manage friends and families investments"! I have a hard enough time just managing the investments for me and my wife. I will encourage families and friends to do as much self-education as possible, and then decide for the…
Just bought a one year share certificate/CD from a local credit union, paying 4.5%. That is higher than my MMs at Schwab, which are on a trend downward. If you want to phrase it as "betting", I guess I am betting that MMs stay below 4.5% for the n…
I tend to get as much mileage as I can out of my cars before I replace them. I now own a 15 year old car, and a 7 year old car--only Liability on the oldest but still have comprehensive on the "newest". I attempt to use Kelly Blue Book to monitor …
FDIC is important in my world of investing, with my use of CDs and banks in general. I am now starting to venture into Credit Unions, where the SIF insurance is the FDIC counterpart for government protection. For older Fixed Income investors, ther…
I see mostly men posting about the lack of financial interest from their wives. Individually find out the root cause for yourself and your role in it. As Yogi said, others can guess but can be wrong. If you need help, ask another woman for the ca…
At the risk of boring posters about CD information on this thread, I did a review of CD offerings at Schwab this morning. For non-callable CDs, with a maturity of one year or longer, the non-callable CDs have stayed pretty similar now for the past …
@dtconroe
(1) I have enjoyed the thread and have learned from it.
(2) You seem to have an extremely narrow (“needle’s eye”) area of focus. You choose to mention your wife’s role in your planning (obviously a very important consideration) but ob…
msf, you are absolutely correct! My Schwab assigned Personal Account Representative has previously informed me that there is a list of local FAs, that they can provide to me, if I want to work with someone locally. We have not gone down that path …
DT, you know I like and respect you, but often it boils down to your wife and extremly limited options in a 10-mile radius.
What would happen if there was only one lousy bank and nothing else?
I think the best choices long term are mutual funds. If …
@dtconroe, I remember discussing this some years ago. At the time, you had indicated that Fido office was 2 hours away in Dallas, but there was a 2-3 person local Schwab broker/office - did that close?
Yes, it closed, and all the Schwab Account info…
In reading the various recent posts regarding banks and brokerages, I assume everyone's spouses have the skill sets, to do all the financial transactions online, without your direct assistance? With regard to Schwab, there is no local Schwab office…
One should avoid bank or CU financial advisors. They typically have high commissions & push a narrow group of products or firms' own products.
A general salaried advisor at Fido or Schwab may offer better free, no obligation opinions.
Use bank…
It looks to me that a big CU is a better choice for safety. I use Penfed for their credit cards. It is federally insured by the National Credit Union Administration.
I would not select a small CU for large amounts of Certificate of Deposit to get a …
A couple of brief notes regarding credit unions:
- There is a shared network of brick and mortar CUs so that you can conduct some transactions in many locations (if your CU participates) even though individual CUs tend to have small footprints.
ht…
@dtconroe : With your last comment it leads me to ask, what % are you receiving for your $15K deposit & I'm taking it to mean saving, MMF, or checking account ?
My bank offered to move MMF at a higher rate if I opened checking account paying…
I can endorse CU as financial institutions, especially for their excellent customer service. I have dealt with them over the years. I never had large enough invested with them to worry about their balance sheet or how NCUA works. It seems they ge…
Just a little additional information on Credit Unions. Credit Unions are very "similar" but not identical to banks. Credit Unions offer the same wide array of products that Banks do--checking accounts, savings accounts, credit cards, debit cards, …
For those few posters still reading this, who have interest in CDs, I just checked Schwab CD offerings. Lots of callables paying 4.4% and more, but interestingly there are non-callables being offered at 4% for 2 and 3 years by major well-known bank…
racqueteer: "Risk is an odd and variable concept. People tend to view things which haven't exhibited poor outcomes as being "riskless", but just because something hasn't manifested, does not mean that its potential isn't present. Unless you believe…
This turned out to be an interesting thread, that became somewhat broader than I expected. It is true that I am one of the more risk averse, conservative fixed income investors/posters, which is why I directed my original post to posters, who also …
BaluBalu: "What is going on? Over the years, I have seen some meaningful posts from you and I am surprised you are seriously considering a CU term deposit of any meaningful duration with the level of superficial information you shared as a reply to …
Our CD/Treasury ladder is only out to three years, but I'm 85 and don't want to go too far out. Our Schwab SUTXX MMKT is currently at 4.35% and falling, the CD/Treasury ladder is at 4.81%. I'm replacing CDs and Treasurys as they mature, which will g…
@dtconroe,
What is going on? Over the years, I have seen some meaningful posts from you and I am surprised you are seriously considering a CU term deposit of any meaningful duration with the level of superficial information you shared as a reply …
Most of us know how FDIC insurance works and troubled banks are resolved but most of us have no understanding of how deposit insurance works at credit union level. Please educate us with examples of how depositors of CUs were protected (or not pro…
Thanks msf! I have a CD in my IRA account maturing in a few days. I am tempted to reinvest it in 2 year callable CD, treating it like a 6 month noncallable CD. If it is called, I think I will still be able to get a 4% replacement callable CD, and…
Regarding annuities, I had a bad experience in the 1980s, when my company retirement program was negatively impacted by bankruptcy of a major annuity provider--the Baldwin Company. The company retirement was frozen for a few months until the Baldwi…
I failed to mention the option of using Credit Union Share Certificates for you CD money/investments that are maturing. They are "almost" identical to CDs regarding deposit protection coverage, varying terms, and interest rate offers. I have a loc…
I appreciate all the many, and varied, responses to my queries. I started the thread, to see how current CD investors were choosing to invest CDs that have been reaching maturity recently. I received many great and varied responses to that query, …
@dtconroe,
In your first post today, you used the words "callable" and "non-callable" to mean the opposite of what they are commonly used for in the CD / bond land. Seems like everyone understood what you are trying to convey but it made your post…
Thanks msf! I have a CD in my IRA account maturing in a few days. I am tempted to reinvest it in 2 year callable CD, treating it like a 6 month noncallable CD. If it is called, I think I will still be able to get a 4% replacement callable CD, and…
The biggest problem with CDs and annuities is that most hold them while giving up good opportunities in bondland. I can trade my funds any day.
Vanguard 10 years estimates (https://advisors.vanguard.com/insights/article/series/market-perspectives)
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