I don't see a problem, we are just doing the same thing our government does and teaches us.

http://cdn.theatlantic.com/static/mt...x314-49343.png

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ibu2Q2sZy8...40-to-2010.gif

Is that why I went into debt, and emptied out my six figure bank account when I sold mine?

:jerkit:

Oh yeah, you love bubbles...

As Brain alluded to, that is a gross oversimplification at best. You could theoretically have $100k equity in a house with no mortgage that you ended up paying over $250k for. On one hand, you've got $100k equity. On the other hand, you lost $150k.

I recommend people only buy a house if they believe they will live there for a long time - which would entail a strong sense of job security and roots in that community. The biggest problem with houses today (and I expect in the near to intermediate future) is lack of liquidity. It takes away a lot of mobility for young people (i.e. changing jobs, moving to new locations, etc).

If you are disciplined, rewards based credit cards are great. Like you said, you've got additional protections built in plus "free money" via the rewards (our main one is a cash-back Visa). We recently picked up a new car for the Mrs. and called to up the credit limit so we could put a big chunk through the card.

:facepalm:

yeah but we cant print fake money :)

When I get into the Marines I'm thinking of doing something equivalent to putting a dollar a day into a roth IRA. Probably a percentage of my paycheck, my bro said they talked to the recruits about it at boot camp.

lol, no wonder your a librarian.

I take money out of my paycheck every two weeks for my Roth (and my wife's as well). It is automatically withdrawn and transferred to Etrade. Every three months I purchase stock with it (manually). We currently max out both Roths and my 401K. I don't really worry too much about the market dropping because that means I am buying new shares at a cheaper price.

you should worry more about historically high days.

smileyface.

what about my librarian?

that's retarded when you have a yearly limit of $2,000. you should be putting $5 a day into it; like the Brain.

Assuming he is putting in a fixed dollar amount per purchase period, he is buying fewer shares at the higher prices while buying more shares at the lower prices (in addition to actually adding money).

Why does he have a $2k yearly limit for Roth contributions?

Did not know about the yearly limit, what if I had multiple IRAs? Then again I think they can be taxed so maybe I'll just be like the Brain.

cause thats the way Roth IRAs work. it's either 2K or 5K a year limit, and if you make over a certain amount a year you cannot do them.

I dont think you can, or when you report it, the gov't wont like what you did when they audit you.

roths aren't taxed, you load them up with pretaxed dollars, then when you withdraw after 40 years of exponential growth, you do not have to pay taxes on them. thats the reason they are so bomb and why you should contribute as much as possible to them.

Another upside is compounding interest right? Or am I thinking of something else?

no, that's the main benefit. taxewd now, grow, then you dont pay taxes on it later when its worth millions.

Can you have more then one?

I am not sure where you are coming up with the $2k per year limit. The maximum contribution is $5k per year for those under age 50, up to earned income, subject to phase-outs (beginning at $169k for a married couple and $107k for single, AGI).

$2k is an old contribution limit, which you may be thinking of.

You may have multiple traditional IRAs and Roths at any given time, however, your annual contributions are capped in aggregate. Said another way, if you were eligible to contribute $5k for the year, it would be a total of $5k among all of them. Deductible traditional IRAs have lower income eligibility phase-outs.

i let my broker handle my money. i cant keep track of the limits, like I said, I've breached the earned income, so only give to my various roll-over and trad. iras.

I don't mess with brokers any more. Years ago I had one and stopped in to buy a stock with my wife. He talked me out of buying $4K of Compaq stock (worth about $400,000 just a few years later). I figure if they actually knew anything (other than some legal and accounting stuff) they would be living on a beach somewhere.

A decent money manager will help you with tax sheltering, diversifying/allocation, risk assessment, investment prioritizing, etc. They aren't just there to give specific stock advice. People who are exclusively brokers are extremely rare these days.

I was talking about 1989. It was an Edward Jones office.