Burren
Bronze Baronet of the Realm
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Home | Voxel Systems
Not yet public, but has massive resources behind it. This will pre-diagnose CTE and cognitive diseases. Keep an eye on it.
Retirement... (i.e. what are you going to be after you've grown up)
- Thread starter Haus
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Not yet public, but has massive resources behind it. This will pre-diagnose CTE and cognitive diseases. Keep an eye on it.
Gravel
Mr. Poopybutthole
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Yeah, Ramsey is good for people who are stuck in debt still. Once it comes to investing though, ignore him because he's a fucking moron there (or snake oil salesman, your pick).
If you've already ingrained some responsibility in your financials though, yeah, absolutely use credit cards for emergencies and then immediately pay them off (because you never carry a balance anymore).
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Kirun
Buzzfeed Editor
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I use credit cards for literally every purchase outside of guns/ammo. It's free money just for doing what you'd otherwise be doing anyway - buying shit.
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BrutulTM
Good, bad, I'm the guy with the gun.
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He's built his system for a mass audience and he's considering psychology as well as math. Sure if you are able to handle money in a rational way you could min-max and theoretically beat his methods, but it's very good advice for anyone who's not super on top of their finances and that's the people who need his advice.
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Furry
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I dunno what his advice is. Is it something like 20% to 401k, invest in S&P500? That's what I recommend to financially illiterate relatives. It's simple and always works (so far).
A lot of people think they can do better than that...most of those people are ultimately wrong.
Haus
I am Big Balls!
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This, I believe, breaches into one of the areas of "things have changed and older people just don't grasp how". One example?
I remember when I was a kid, one of the reasons my grandfather bought me the first "pc" we had at the house (an Apple ][e) was to be able to help him track his assets and prep for his impending retirement. At that point I remember he had stock, but to turn stock into cash was a serious hassle. You had a broker you had to work through, they had to execute an order on your behalf, that order had to completely settle, then they had to wire transfer the funds to your bank account. That process could easily take a week or longer. It would involve going to the bank, or the broker's office, or multiple phone calls.
Now? You can have a checkbook/debit card attached to your brokerage account. Deal with the entire sale transaction over your phone with no broker involved. The worst is usually just waiting for the transaction to settle to have funds availability. Total soup to nuts? A couple/few days, and you can do it while sitting on the crapper dropping a deuce.
This opens the door a ton to not needing to keep cash on hand. And I'll admit the cash I keep on hand I keep giving myself a side eye over as I know it would be "working for me", instead of being a pile of pieces of paper... devaluating pieces of paper.
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Haus
I am Big Balls!
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This is great so long as you pay the whole balance in full before interest charges hit, and don't have some stupid annual fee on the card. It's a game system you can beat with diligence. I thoroughly enjoy the fact that with the amount of crap I buy off Amazon I get 5% back using an Amazon VISA. Which can be put direct into cash back. But if I ran a balance paying interest for even a few months it would erase a years worth of the benefits.
The problem is many people lack diligence. And ergo the amount of CC debt the average person carries.
Cad
scientia potentia est
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I do the same as Kirun, I pay for literally everything possible on my one credit card and have it on auto-pay every month. The way the current system is setup there's no reason not to, it's free money for 6-8 weeks. Which is annoying because it funnels so much power into the credit card processors, but it is what it is for now.
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BrutulTM
Good, bad, I'm the guy with the gun.
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I think he says 15% to the 401k but he's scorched earth about getting people out of debt and paying off credit cards. I think what people are calling "insane" here is the idea that you pay off your mortgage before you start investing even if it's a low interest rate and never use credit cards or borrow money for anything except your house if you really have to.
BrutulTM
Good, bad, I'm the guy with the gun.
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I do the paying bills for everything on a credit card and then the full balance autopays from my checking account every month. I have to say though, the "free money" is pretty underwhelming. I do it now for convenience but the "rewards" are pretty much insignificant. A few times a year I get a gift card and buy myself some beef jerky or something but if you were the type to be tempted by credit cards it would not be worth it for the rewards IMO.
Mahes
Silver Baronet of the Realm
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That is changing. Not sure if you have noticed, but a lot of places are beginning to add 3% upcharges to a service or item if a credit card is used. I started using cash again in a lot of places now.
This is where we differ a bit. My wife and I lived in a house that was just over 1000sq ft. It just got to a point where I felt cramped in the house. It had a descent sized living room and a descent sized Master bedroom. Everywhere else felt so small. We looked for a larger house. I wanted 2500+ and we found a 3075 sqft. house. I love this house. I think of this house as the perfect size for me. It has an area where I can see from one side to the other side of the house, and it feels like the right distance. My cat can run near full speed and slow down as needed.
Now I would never want one of those houses that has like 8 bedrooms+ with multiple entertainment areas and such. That kind of house would just feel empty and feel like a waste of space.
Kirun
Buzzfeed Editor
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I haven't noticed this at all.
I'm super meticulous about paying my credit cards immediately. I basically monitor my accounts daily and have cards that offer larger cash back bonuses on different things - restaurants, Amazon, etc. I got super anal about my finances back during 2010 when I was out on my own, poor as shit, making $10.15/hr and had to be more frugal than your typical Palestinian Genocider.
Gravel
Mr. Poopybutthole
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If I recall, Ramsey has some shitty, high expense ratio mutual funds he recommends. Which I believe he has a stake in.
For houses, there's definitely a sweet spot. In California we had a 2100 sqft house which we loved, but two of the bedrooms ended up just being closed off 99% of the time. We felt like we had wasted house.
We downsized to 1500 sqft here in Florida. It feels okay most of the time, but we're definitely cramped for space as well. We're back to wanting about 2k sqft again (although we may end up with a much larger 3000+ someday when we build, as we want an inlaw suite, as well as an entirely separate area for a gym and my music studio).
For houses, there's definitely a sweet spot. In California we had a 2100 sqft house which we loved, but two of the bedrooms ended up just being closed off 99% of the time. We felt like we had wasted house.
We downsized to 1500 sqft here in Florida. It feels okay most of the time, but we're definitely cramped for space as well. We're back to wanting about 2k sqft again (although we may end up with a much larger 3000+ someday when we build, as we want an inlaw suite, as well as an entirely separate area for a gym and my music studio).
Haus
I am Big Balls!
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I've noticed this, but so far just on larger ticket situations and services. For instance, I am looking at a project I need to get done at my house (replacing the breaker panel) and all the electricians I have gotten quotes from so far have a 3% upcharge if you're using a CC. This was also the case with the company I had come to paint the house last year. It's the reason I go to the bank once a year and pay $3 for a printed sheet of checks I can use.
Another place? Governmental payments. In Dallas county, if you pay your property taxes with a CC it's a 3.5% upcharge, if you do it via wire transfer or "electronic check" there isn't. Debit card is a flat $4.95 charge IIRC instead of the 3.5%.
I have also heard of, but not seen, some diners and such starting to do this.
Koushirou
Log Wizard
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Only time I don’t immediately pay off my CCs is if I have some promo financing. Usually if I need to have some larger than normal purchase I’d just throw it on PayPal credit and just pay it off before 6 months just to smooth it out. Thankfully I generally just don’t have much spending on the CCs in general.
Cad
scientia potentia est
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How do you feel about adding stuff in your house in retirement? I'm kinda waffling on this because I think giving myself reasons to get out of the house are good. I've purposefully avoided getting gym equipment at home for example because I want to get up, get dressed, and go to the gym. Or yoga, or whatever - reasons to get out of the house are good.
I kinda go back and forth between "it'd be nice to have all this stuff at home" and the other way. In actual retirement, how have you fared with that? Do you need to engineer reasons to get out of the house or do you find you're out and about plenty anyway?
Mahes
Silver Baronet of the Realm
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I think about going to the gym. The problem is I live in a college town. Students do not care about being a little sick and still going out. I am not overly concerned about Covid but I do not like getting the flu. Gyms can be a very easy place to get sick from during the colder months. I just go outside for walks or work in my yard if I want some good fresh air.
OU Ariakas
Diet Dr. Pepper Enjoyer
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I don't understand how people with no knowledge of his total outlook tell people not to listen to him. My whole family has been financially illiterate going back generations and taught me NOTHING about personal finances or how to build wealth (since none of them had any).
To me, he was a dedicated rationalist when it came to getting to the root cause of poor fucking people issues - not understanding how money worked and why debt of any kind is fucking slavery. 99% of his message can be boiled down to one phrase - don't spend what you don't have. That may sound like a boring ass dumb person shit thing to you, but that is like mana from fucking heaven to about 75% of the people in the United States. He is, quite literally, a painful cure for an insidious disease. If you don't have the disease then his cure is nearly useless for you.
Oh, and you are 100% wrong about him advocating paying off your house before you start investing and it is right on his giant ass website for anyone to see.
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Haus
I am Big Balls!
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I have to agree with this in that he's a guy who's focused, as you mentioned, on getting the financially illiterate out of the debt slave hole. To which his plans and advice work towards that goal.
Yeah, if you've reached a good level of financial literacy then you probably moved into/past step 7 on his plan and it's time for a more nuanced view and approach. This is when you start looking at things like "can I make more on my investments than I'm paying in interest on that mortgage". Maybe I should learn about advanced stock option and paper plays to make more? How do I best protect my investments in terms of taxes? Or (one of the drivers of me starting this thread) how much of an egg do I need to look at comfortable retirement?
But the reality is between the cost of living for younger people and the way we've regressed AWAY from teaching kids financial literacy in schools (I remember getting a course in high school which involved learning how to build your own budget and plan to spend accordingly, which I aced because my grandfather had taught me that crap when I was 10-12) we have entire generations coming up now who will start off in that debt hole and never know a way out.
Everybody here either is, or is portraying themselves, as an astute and learned person in regards to finance, and many probably are (since people who are financially illiterate probably aren't reading a thread about retirement...). But even around here we have people who could benefit from that base level blocking and tackling financially.
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