I’ve got around $29-30k sitting in a high-yield savings account and roughly $25k in stocks. I make about $5,500/month after tax if I don’t pick up extra shifts.

Buying a house here isn’t really on my radar anytime soon, mortgage rates are around 9%, and even a small, unremarkable house runs about $700k. I already have a reliable car worth about $15k, so that’s not something I need to save toward either.

I just don’t have anyone in my life who can actually advise me on how much I should be investing.

I know this i pretty good for my age but i have a lot of coworkers that have been on these wages for 15 years and dont have anything in the bank. I have been investing around 2k a month in the last year

My mother was legally married to a woman who passed away in 2018. Over time, it came to light that there's a stock certificate for shares of AMD purchased in the 80's... wife liked to squirrel things away and not everything was automatically transferred over to mom. Mom's done lots of digging for bank accounts, retirement accounts, etc. through whatever hoops a same-sex marriage may have brought up.

The AMD stock has done pretty well since purchased, needless to say. Mom has gotten letters about unclaimed property and it does show up in California's unclaimed property database. Actually claiming it has been so far impossible.

Mom has the original Merrill Lynch receipt complete with certificate numbers. So far as we can tell, the shares are held by ComputerShare. In her digging, there's mention of a Medallion Signature required to transfer anything. Mom has accounts at Chase; Chase is worthless for help. Mom has accounts at Fidelity; Fidelity has apparently said "get to a physical office and MAYBE we can help out". If that's what she needs to do, that's a valid answer... she doesn't have one very close to her, which may be why she's not tried that option.

Is this even the right place to ask? Any help greatly appreciated, multiple attempts over several years have left her very weary of even trying. My brother and I can only do so much, we aren't financial experts, and none of us are within 1000 miles of each other to physically help her go places and get it figured out.

I graduated college about 10 years ago. I had a job by the time I graduated, but I never prioritized starting my 401k. I always thought let me pay off debt first. Or I don’t make enough just yet. Always had a reason not to, fast forward 10 years I thought well hell let me just open it with 50 bucks per check and I’ll slowly start increasing it. I guess my plan worked because within 2 months I’m close to maxing out the 5% match. I know early 30s is later than usual but shit better late than never.

Ive been contributing 8% to a 401k through my job…no employer match, with a retirement target year 2050, currently has around 65k with a estimate of 533k in 2050

I know very little about the subject but from ive read i should keep my current 401k, lower the contributions maybe half to 4% and put the difference in a roth ira?

Just looking for any advice

Edit…additional info, i make about 60k a year, i am married, and i live in New Jersey

Hi all- my wife has about $50k in student loans and recently her parents have offered to give her about $30k as a gift to pay off some of her student loans. They were hoping to give us a cash gift to deposit and pay off the loans. As far as I can tell the cash gift limit is $19k per individual, and depositing greater than $10k will trigger CTR form. We certainly are not doing anything insidious and none of us know the best way to go about doing this. Does anyone have any advice on how to accomplish this?

Of note, I believe that the money has to be in the form of cash since it’s what they have and they may have issues with depositing it themselves.

Appreciate any help!

Title says it all basically, I have a house that’s worth $1.2m I owe $500k on it. I’be been debating selling and buying a house around $500k to be able to jump start my investment accounts. I previously had holdings in VOO and some other stuff.

TLdr: have nice house or have avg house and $700k in stock, I’m 29 yo

Thanks In advance

Edit:
QOL wouldn’t really change, I’d be moving from a brand new build on estate lot, to an upper class neighborhood. Same school district. My interest rate would be the same. I would be borrowing the 500k for new house not owning it outright. Bills would stay the same(prop tax would be less)

The title sums it up. I'm a 24F and I am constantly freaking out about my personal finances and losing sleep over working a 8-4 and side hustles and being utterly exhausted and it feels like I'm still not making enough.

For context, I am a singer and I got my undergraduate degree in Vocal Performance and Theatre Arts before moving to a larger city to pursue my artistic career (I really dont want to argue with people about "choosing a bad major" so keep those thoughts to yourself please). I had help with paying for my degree so I have no student loans luckily, and I have always considered myself financially savvy but a couple recent emergencies have really put a bad taste in my mouth. My cat had to be hospitalized and unfortunately the entire expenses added up to $15K (again, I dont want to hear that I shouldve put her down or something) and I have a couple doctors expenses that are going to total around $3k out of pocket by the end of the year. Luckily, Ive been working since highschool and I saved everything I made in an emergency fund that was $9k and I have family who loaned me the extra money for my cat so I wouldn't have credit card debt, but the expectation is to pay them back about $5k whenever I can. So I'm feeling stressed about needing $8k more and rebuilding my emergency fund, which I now want to be between 15-20k because yeeeesh what a vet bill.

I am currently working 32-40 hours a week at an 8-4 making $17 an hour, I teach private lessons and workshops at a music school for about 2-8 hours a week making $30 an hour (and will hopefully be working more as I get more students), and I work a social media side hustle that gives me $50 a month (this one is just fun and less than an hour of work a week). I am actively performing so I have about 10 hours of rehearsal each week as well, not paid other than a very small stipend, but as you can see my schedule has gotten overwhelming very quickly and I am constantly exhausted.

Financially, I expect to make around $2,200 a month. I have no car payment, no student loans, and not any outstanding expenses that are immediate other than paying back my family so all my monthly money is divided up like this.

Rent- $650

Transportation/Gas - $150

Groceries - $200

Eating out - $100

My cat - $100

Laundry - $20

Subscriptions - $12

Performance things (like voice lessons) - $200

House maintenance - $50

Personal expenses - $100

Fun money - $75

So totaling about $1657 for regular expenses, that leaves me with around $543 a month of extra money. I am currently putting $100 a month into my emergency fund and just started my Roth at $75 a month so we are down to $367. I also have a dear friend's birthday this week so I'm planning on spending about $200 total for their birthday expenses (plus I feel like we can assume around this much comes up in random unexpected expenses), so that leaves me with $167 a month extra.

This feels like next to nothing when looking at such big goals like paying back my family and rebuilding my fund. I was going to begin auditions for graduate school this year but will have to pay for all the planes and auditions myself so I dont even know if i can afford to go to school and not be working while I'm paying this off. I think I just am hoping someone will tell me I'm on the right track (or wrong track!) with my thinking and budgeting, but I would love any and all advice on what to move around in my budget. Thank you guys so much!!

Hello, I'm 23 in Europe and just graduated. I live with my parents and have around 7000eu in savings.

I will soon start a job where I will be paid about 2650eu net/month but as I will still live with my parents, I will be able to save this money aggressively (I'm thinking about 2000eu a month, probably more as I won't pay for rent nor food most of the time, but I prefer to keep a margin).

I will probably live with my parents for another 2 years and then rent a room in a cheap apartment with roommates. My goal is to buy my own apartment (aiming for a 200-250k property) in a European capital city in 4-5 years (for personal reasons, I won't be able to buy before that with the job I will have) so I'm wondering if it's really interesting to invest now even if I will need a substantial amount of this money in 4-5 years? Or will I likely have the possibility to invest on one side and save enough for a mortgage on the other side?

My question is when should I start investing and how much should I keep in savings knowing my goals?

I don't really have any financial education (other than some Youtube channels I follow), so I'm a bit lost.

I was also thinking of discussing this with a financial advisor at my bank but I feel like their job is just trying to sell me products and I don't like that but I don't really know who to contact otherwise.

I just saw the devastating disaster that recently happened in Nepal on the news again and how devastating it is to the community. There's a CTA to donate at the end and I thought maybe I can try donating the remaining balances of my prepaid cards?

Turns out it worked! ($1 donation minimum)

If you have small leftover balances on prepaid credit cards that would otherwise go unused, you can put them toward a disaster relief instead of letting them disappear into the ether.

I just donated to the Nepal relief fund, but you can donate to any causes you choose.

Rent is due tomorrow so I said that I could pay it when I get my paycheck. They kept pressing for payment, even offering to put my card on file to auto pay on Friday, I hung up because I don’t like when people get pushy for my money.

That being said, do I even need to pay this? It’s so old and so little (in terms of debts). I have more medical expenses coming up so would rather not be paying for ones that are almost 6 years old.

Did what I said about being able to pay Friday reset my debt? Now I am worried

I just learned today that you can roll 35k from a 529 into an IRA after 15 years. Currently I have maxed out my IRA and maxed my employer match on my 401k (but I don’t want to do more since the options for what I can buy aren’t great). I am still on my parents insurance so I cannot open an HSA yet. Would opening a 529 with the goal of using it as a tax advantage account that I can just add to my IRA later on be a bad idea?

Looking for advice on savings vs spending. Wife and I are both 42. In general we are somewhat frugal spenders and have aggressively saved over the past 20 years relative to our income. The market has also obviously cooperated. Current net worth is sitting at ~$2.6MM broken down as follows.

$1.6MM 401k

$100K 403b

$300K Roth IRA

$100K HSA

$200K Cash Balance Pension

$300K Home Equity

We don't have a specific dollar target, but I want to be retired by 55. $5MM has always seemed like an aggressive, but also achievable number, but I have no ties to that. I'd like to spend our retirement on a nice home and traveling. If we can leave a chunk for our kids that's a bonus.

Lately I've been thinking a lot about reprioritizing travel vs savings. We're not getting any younger and I don't want to sacrifice more than we need to to reach our goals. Am I being unreasonable to think we've done the work to set ourselves up and we can start spending more on experiences now? Posting this anonymously because money is never an easy topic to bring up with friends and family. Would appreciate any advice from those in similar situations.

Hi! I'm a 23 F living with my partner of 4+ years (23M). I'm a pharmacy student who brings in $1200/month during the school year and he brings in a little over $3600/ month. Over breaks I average $2500/month. Rent/ Utilities/Wifi come out to $1100 split between the two of us. We budget $400 for groceries and $400 for eating out shared between the two of us. Other misc. expenses come out to $300/month. We drive used cars so no car payments.

I'm fortunate to have parents who cover my portion of living expenses while I'm in school so I'm able to save most of what I make monthly. We want to purchase a modest house (<400k) with a hefty down payment by the time we're 30. I would also like to be financially independent by 45. Here's what we're working with:

Roth IRA: 11k (me) , 8k (him)

Traditional IRA - rolled over from 401K: 1.8k (me)

HYSA : 18k (me) , 22k (him)

401k: 2k (me), 4k (him)

Debt: 0, we pay off our CCs every month. Neither of us have student loans and I will be able to graduate debt free.

Since I'm in school, I feel a little behind than my peers who are already working. What can I do to optimize my finances to achieve our goals?

Thanks in advance!

due to obviously sad circumstances, i inherited a traditional IRA account worth ~110K.

im curious about the following:

1. is my taxable brokerage account the only thing i can move the money into?
2. should i take the full ten years to deplete the ira or do it all at once now?
3. it’s currently invested in some silly things (e.g., individual companies like google and coca cola)- should i put all in VT and BNDW? in a target date fund? That’s my usual MO.

relevant details: non-spouse so i must deplete by 10 years end, i make too much (~200k) to contribute to a roth ira front door style, i already max out all the things one can max out (minus mega roth- i can’t do that), i live in CA, this is the lowest salary year i expect to have in the next 10 years EDITS: I’m 36, i want to save this for retirement

I would love input from you all on my current investing situation. All comments welcome.

Context: 24F, want to prioritize investing for retirement but want to be sure I have my order of operations right/not over investing in one area. I make $80k, living in Chicago.

Personal Brokerage: $1.5k (88% VTI, 12% SOFI), contributing $50-100/mo or whatever I can. Kinda more of a sandbox

ROTH IRA: $19k (100% FXAIX), maxing out each year

Company 401k: $12.1k (100% FXAIX), contributing $600/mo, company match is 5% but have yet to receive it since I’ve only been employed here for a little bit

HYSA/Cash: $4k, been paying for my part-time master’s program while working full time so just took a large hit as fall tuition rolled around lol

Debt: None

What would you change? Am I investing the right things at my age? I would like to be aggressive since I like to think I have some time. What advice do you have for me? Financial literacy is important to me, especially being a first gen and a woman of color!

I am receiving around 200k from a civil settlement. What would be the best method to grow this, my initial reaction was to pay off all personal debts and use whatever is remaining to start saving and grow it from there but I'm questioning this. I would appreciate any perspectives on this.

55m here, released from prison three years ago with $500.00 to my name. My parents gave me $30k and a place to live to get started again, so I only spend about $600 per month, sometimes from side hustles. I invested all this seed money into AI stocks in a regular brokerage account, and have managed to max out my 401k, Roth and HSA accounts for 3 years in a row now, resulting in a net worth of $340k. For most of the year, my paychecks are $0.00 because of pretax deductions out of my $50k/yr income. I liquidate a little of my taxable brokerage accounts if I need money rather than pay taxes on my income.

When my very elderly father passes (likely within 5 years), I will inherit $1MM and put it into a new brokerage that will provide me a secured loan to purchase a condo for $150K and also pay for my HOA and monthly expenses so long as my rate of return on my investments is higher than the interest rate on my loan. If I have to make interest payments, I will liquidate some assets from my original brokerage account, or use social security checks down the road, but I will never pay off the principal. They can take it when I die!

I don't want to pay mortgage insurance, I want to make an all-cash offer on a condo. I don't want to pay capital gains on a withdrawl to buy the condo. I am going to try to never take a paycheck again - all pretax deductions and Roth (I know this isn't 100% possible). I'd like to do the FIRE at 60, but I think I'll have to liquidate $25k a year until social security kicks in. I have two heirs that I'd love to make millionaires and retire when I am 80 myself.

What do y'all think?

I’m currently unemployed and haven’t been able to land a job. My mother (co signer), kicked me out and refuses to help me with the loan and is not an option. My school slashed my major and my minors and the loan was for my study abroad expenses. I’m at a loss of what to do and I didn’t even finish my degree and cannot get in school until I at least save some money; I can’t get another loan or go to school without money, right? I believe the loans total around 14.5k. I’m not sure what I’m looking for here but any help would be greatly appreciated and I can answer any questions necessary. Thank you. (Located in USA, NC)

She works some weekends and said she wants to put all her money into an investment account so she can reflect back and say she is glad she did. Whats an account you suggest we do to kick start her wealth?

I am 19 years old and looking to move $4000 from my BOFA savings account into a higher yielding account, as well as hoping to be able to deposit $100-200 into it each month. Any recommendations?

White collar married professional in my late 40s. Most of my retirement savings are in index funds and target date funds that are highly exposed to any potential AI bubble. Also have some old company stock from my 1 year spent working at a FAANG company.

I'm looking to move a portion of my portfolio into a fund or ETF that's broadly diversified but not exposed to the tech sector. I was thinking of medium cap or small cap index funds, but open to other options. Any recommendations?

My (46M) wife (42F) have app. $1.1mm combined in tax advantages returement (403b, 401k, trad IRAs). Combined income of app $180K. We would like to retire by the time I am 60 and she is 56. We have no debt outside of mortgage and that will be paid before retirement (app $300K equity). We have another app $50K in HSAs, another $75K in roths, and app $110K in brokerage accts.

We will continue to MAX both roths and HSAs every year. I figure we can live on app $100K per year in retirement. Is it time to COAST on trad 401k/403b and start pumping up our after tax accounts? Who knows, we may be able to retire earlier than planned.

I know this isn't a complete picture but hoping for some words of wisdom. We are good "accumulators" but are lacking as "planners"

How can I save and make more money as an EMT and in EMS in general I still live at home with my parents rent free and want to have money in order to move out and live comfortably