Bogleheads.org

Very sad statement, it seems that any AI should be “intelligent enough” to read, understand and follow the copyright rules posted on each web site. https://www.bogleheads.org/forum/rules# For me, the goal here is to educate, and aren't you ultimately glad that AI tools are learning from the best? I can't imagine why anyone would want to prevent it. Can you imagine the potential that the makers of AI tools have to produce a tool that doesn't follow copyright laws? Do you believe copyrights should protected? There's nothing about the current copyright policy that says that you can't train a model off the content. Yes, if someone were to copy/paste a post word-for-word, that would run afoul of copyright. But if someone trains a model and spit...

Only 78% of small businesses survive their first year. The most common reason small businesses fail is that the market simply doesn't need their products or services. 29% of businesses fail because they run out of cash.

My suggestions would be to start small and try to understand the need for your business.
- Talk to a yoga studio owner or employee in your area.
- Sit outside a yoga studio for a day and count the number of people that walk inside.
- Talk to customers at that yoga studio and ask why they go there and if they would switch.
- Try to teach classes outside at a park where you don’t have to pay rent.
- Try to start at home in the backyard.
- Start a Facebook Page to collect contacts for people that are interested.

Note for others that are looking into this. Unfortunately, it seems that page 6 of the law prohibits NING/DING trusts from being used in this manner. https://lawfilesext.leg.wa.gov/biennium/2021-22/Pdf/Bills/Session%20Laws/Senate/5096-S.SL.pdf?q=20230329181649 (i) An individual is considered to be a beneficial owner of long-term capital assets held by an entity that is a pass-through or disregarded entity for federal tax purposes, such as a partnership, limited liability company, S corporation, or grantor trust, to the extent of the individual's ownership interest in the entity as reported for federal income tax purposes. (ii) A nongrantor trust is deemed to be a grantor trust if the trust does not qualify as a grantor trust for federal tax...

Washington State passed a 7% tax on long term capital gains for any individual with more than $250k of LTCG in a year. This tax does not apply to trusts, companies, etc.

Any thoughts on how to legally avoid this tax? People helpfully suggest things like moving out or state, offsetting gains with losses, and just not selling.

I’m thinking of doing a DING/NING trust to address the tax. With the trust located in Nevada, it shouldn’t need to pay taxes to Washington state. Yes, there’s additional costs to setup but figure that it should pay for itself pretty quickly. I’ve never done a NING trust - any downside? Any other suggestions to avoid this tax?

My neighbor has multiple fountains - some fountains are those huge 3-tier varieties that you might have seen with an auto-fill hose so that the fountain level is always right :). Neighbor went on vacation and water from their fountains flooded our garage and basement. We contacted our insurance company and they suggested that we file a claim with the neighbor's insurance company because if we go through our insurance, we would likely have to pay up to our deductible (something like $5k). Damage is likely in the area of $7k - $10k. We talked to our neighbor and he wasn't keen on sharing his insurance information. He compared this to a tree limb in a storm and said that insurance wouldn't cover downed tree limbs. A couple of questions: - In y...

We bought an air conditioning setup that seemed to struggle on particularly hot days. One thing we noticed was that we didn’t have any window coverings and we had a few uncovered skylights — all of which allowed the sun to come in and absolutely bake the house. We invested in some blackout curtains and a shade for the skylight. Ever since then we have had no problems.

Your issue may be with the air conditioning itself. But could be exacerbated by the house setup.

I have found that “Enough” is a mirage and the closer you get, the further away it looks.
- When I was much younger, I dreamed of $1M. Then I got married and bought a house and was amazed at how much debt I was in.
- I got older and wiser and dreamed of $5M. Surely that was enough money to retire and sail away. Then we had a baby, got a bigger house and I was amazed at how expensive children were.
- I got even older and thought that when we hit $10M, surely then there would be enough money. That day has come and gone.

If anything, I’ve gotten even more aggressive in allocation as time has gone on.

We plan to do a combination of gifting early and late. :) Every year, we give the maximum annual gift allowed for a couple (something like $30k/year) which our son will get when he turns 18. We won’t tell him about the money until he turns that age. We also have a trust that he won’t know about but will get when he turns 30. Finally, he’ll get some form of inheritance when we both pass that he again won’t know about and won’t be able to predict. The goal is to gradually give him money. An 18 year old doesn’t need millions of dollars and there’s always a concern that he doesn’t know how to spend and invest it responsibly. At the same time, giving everything at a very late age doesn’t allow him to take advantage of what the money is intended ...

The first time I met with a financial advisor (Merrill Lynch), I kept asking in slightly different language what performance I could expect and whether previous performance was higher than overall market performance. He never answered that question. Instead, he used a variety of sell techniques - e.g. we have very high net worth clients, what happens when you pass away - who will look after your family, we have a box at the baseball stadium that we bring all our clients to. I appreciate the effort but ignoring my investment return question seems to indicate nothing good about returns. Also, I learned that I would be grouped into some type of profile group - retiree, growth mindset, etc. - and that a portfolio allocation would be assigned to...

I’m 100% in this boat. I’m low 8 figures, work is stressful, and I wonder why I spend 80% of my waking day thinking about something that brings in <10% of my daily net worth increase. Had a chat with my wife recently and she pointed out that the expectations of myself at work are potentially too high. She suggested cutting back on hours and making work something that gives order to life rather than a driving motivation. Thinking that she might have a point.

Thanks for the replies. It's clear that this setup needs the right amount of paper to be legit.

From here: https://www.barrons.com/articles/how-fa ... 1443243701

So when you’re planning your wealth transfer, think about pairing a loan and a trust

It's amusing to me that I can't loan a family member money. But I can create a trust with the family member designated as a beneficiary and then loan the money to the trust. I can't do A=>C but A=>B=>C is totally legit...

Mid-forties with a 21 month old child. Assets approaching $10M. With interest rates where they are, I’m wondering if it’s possible to do a family loan with our son (21 months old) for $1M for investing purposes. We would do things above board, pay taxes on the interest, have a contract (that yes, he can’t read or sign at the moment), etc. The goal is that over 20 years, this $1M could turn into $5M. Doing a loan also means that we wouldn’t eat into our lifetime gift exclusion. Finally, the paperwork and hassle seem minimal. Some people might say, “why not a trust?” And I don’t think that’s ruled out. This is more of a “this seems easy right now” kind of thing and can be done in addition to a trust. Does this seem legit to people? I hear peo...

Recently, I’ve discovered that I could contribute after tax dollars to my 401k and started contributing the max ~$57k/year to my 401k. Welcome to the forum. People are going to want to know before they can give an informed answer/advice: Does your 401(k) plan allow you to convert the after-tax contributions to Roth relatively promptly? (This is colloquially known as the "mega-backdoor Roth" ) Mega-backdoor Roth ability is very attractive for high net worth individuals/couples. Or, alternatively, does your 401(k) plan force you to have the after-tax contributions just sit there generating pre-tax earnings until you leave the company? (Not so attractive....) Yeah, I rollover after-tax into a 401k Roth on a maybe quarterly basis. At...

I’m 45, wife is 35. Total assets are around $8M. IRAs / 401ks combined are about $1.5M. Recently, I’ve discovered that I could contribute after tax dollars to my 401k and started contributing the max ~$57k/year to my 401k.

My question is if there is a point where you shouldn’t be putting this much into a retirement account. I can’t touch this money for many, many years and once I hit a certain age, I’m forced to take RMDs and get taxed on those distributions. Does it make any sense to have a $15M IRA when I’m 72? Or should I stop funding the IRA/401k and put it in taxable where the money can actually be used for other things - e.g. real estate / alternative investments, trusts, family expenses, etc.