Money Matters
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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
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Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
2017 in a few months OMG!
I'M BACK! Finally getting back to normal in SC after being hit by Matthew! Hope all of you were OK! I can't believe the year is almost over so for fun i thought i would post this
1. has anyone started there 2017 budgets yet
2. what is different on your 2017 budget from 2016
3. does anyone have an account just for HURRICANE EVACUATONS?
4. Do you keep your savings account and efund in one account or seperate?
5. when you retire, how many sources of monthly income will you have and where would it come from!
1. has anyone started there 2017 budgets yet
2. what is different on your 2017 budget from 2016
3. does anyone have an account just for HURRICANE EVACUATONS?
4. Do you keep your savings account and efund in one account or seperate?
5. when you retire, how many sources of monthly income will you have and where would it come from!
Re: 2017 in a few months OMG!
2. we are adding categories to do the envelope system next year
3. I never had an account for evacuation , but after experiencing Matthew, we will. We evacuated and went to Atlanta, Traffic was Horrific and all rooms all over GA and some of Alabama were BOOKED
4.right now, I keep them seperate but thinking about merging them
5. we will have income from social security as well as 401 k
1. Kinda sorta. DH and I are evaluating what house projects to prioritize for next year. We're also TTC but we already pay the daycare cost to our savings account so we won't have too many financial adjustments if/when baby comes along.
2. I think both budgets will be fairly similar. Hopefully I'll get a nice raise in the new year though!
3. Nope.
4. Right now it's all lumped together but we plan on parsing it out eventually. We've been lazy. We have a short term savings for car repairs, annual bills, etc and then the long term account for the efund and excess savings.
5. Assuming Social Security is around I'll collect that plus my IRA and 401(k) funds. Hubby has a state pension and a 457 plan. We also are interested in getting a rental property to diversify our income streams.
1. has anyone started their 2017 budgets yet?
I've been looking into it a little.
2. what is different on your 2017 budget from 2016?
2017 will only have 6 months of day care payments and then DD#2 is off to kindergarten in the fall. $250/month extra will go to our mortgage principal, Roth IRA will be on auto withdrawal, probably be getting a HELOC for our exterior renovation project.
3. does anyone have an account just for HURRICANE EVACUATONS?
We do not- we have blizzards here but can usually dig ourselves out in a few days.
4. Do you keep your savings account and efund in one account or seperate?
It's all together right now, we're working on a better plan for that.
5. when you retire, how many sources of monthly income will you have and where would it come from!
My 401k, DH's 403b, 2 Roth IRA accounts, my pension (varies greatly depending on years of service- I have almost 13 right now), DH's pension (60% of his top 3 years), social security (if it's still around).
Glad you are ok!
1. has anyone started there 2017 budgets yet
Yep! I have. I usually try to budget a year out by pay check but not much changes pay check to pay check.
2. what is different on your 2017 budget from 2016
My student loans will be paid off in March! So I'll be putting $450 a paycheck in savings after March. Woo hoo.
3. does anyone have an account just for HURRICANE EVACUATONS?
Nope.
4. Do you keep your savings account and efund in one account or seperate?
Right now we only have our efund as we work to pay off debt. After March I'll fully fund our e-fund to $10K in our local savings account. And then I'll throw any savings after that into a separate account on Capital One 360 so I can categorize savings.
5. when you retire, how many sources of monthly income will you have and where would it come from!
I plan to have my TSP, Small pension, and hopefully a ROTH IRA. I'm not counting on Social Security but I'll take it if I have it. And then anything H saves for retirement.
1. has anyone started there 2017 budgets yet- No we don't really budget ahead, we budget per paycheck. We always have future goals/projects so we keep those in mind.
2. what is different on your 2017 budget from 2016- Not much, just a spendy vacation for our anniversary and putting in a new expensive fence
3. does anyone have an account just for HURRICANE EVACUATONS? Nope, we usually aren't affected in CT. But we would prepare if there is one that would be coming
4. Do you keep your savings account and efund in one account or separate?- We have a regular bank savings account linked to our checking. We keep a few hundred dollars in there for emergencies or house repairs that come up. Our e-fund is in a CapitalOne360 account which we have broken down into 3 categories (e-fund/vacation fund/house stuff fund)
5. when you retire, how many sources of monthly income will you have and where would it come from- Probably just from our 401K, ROTH IRA's, and social security. We get 2 free sessions with a financial planner so I want to see if there's any other accounts that we should set up.
No, I usually do 3-4months out at a time, our income is slightly variable and easier to predict in 3-4month bursts.
2. what is different on your 2017 budget from 2016
I'm starting a new job next month taking a significant paycut, but H just got a 5% raise and his union is in negotiations for a new contract. So I anticipate actually very little change money wise between his increase and my decrease evening out. We won't start new categories, we did a lot of that when we bought a house last spring.
3. does anyone have an account just for HURRICANE EVACUATONS?
Nope, not something that we have here. We get blizzards, but I don't have an account for it. It takes a LOT of snow to trap us in the house but I usually grab a few pantry staples and water to have on hand in the winter. We are also working on getting a snow blower right now.
4. Do you keep your savings account and efund in one account or seperate?
One bank account, separately tracked on my budget though so it's easy to see.
5. when you retire, how many sources of monthly income will you have and where would it come from!
H will have an IRA, 401K, and a railroad pension. It's a pretty solvent system so we aren't completely relying on it, but are confident in it. He will get 100% of the average of his three highest earning years. I will have social security (if it exists...) and an IRA and 401K. I also will get a 50% of H's pension. That doesn't mean that he will give me half of his pension, we don't work like that, it means we will get a combined total of 150% of the average of his three highest earning years.
2. The kiddo's arrival in February should turn everything on its head, and about half of my leave will be unpaid. It'll take some time to adjust to the new normal.
3. No-hurricanes aren't common where I live. Blizzard damage would come out of the home repair fund.
4. I have my efund account and then a bunch of little savings accounts for various other purposes.
5. If H stays with the state, we'll have his pension as well as his 457 and my Roth IRA, plus any taxable accounts we've accumulated. We're not especially interested in being landlords, but will probably have various avocations that earn us a little money on the side.
2) If everything stays on track the biggest changes will be adding a fund for travel and a fund for home improvements. Right now we pay for those things out of cash flow and "slush" money, but we need to be more firm with it so that we don't inadvertently overspend. We are also TTC so that could turn things on its head a bit if it happens right away. We have enough discretionary income to handle daycare though, so I'm not too worried about it. I will shift us to a 'baby budget' if/when we actually get pregnant.
3) I live in central Alabama, so we don't have a hurricane issue here. However, I do have a tornado plan in place. This really just means 1) making sure the house has a basement, 2) keeping some food/water/supplies in the basement, and 3) keeping our insurance up to date and keeping an updated list of valuable personal property (ideally with photos/video). I have a friend whose house literally blew away in the Tuscaloosa tornadoes, and I learned the insurance lesson by watching her try to remember everything they had previously owned.
4) I keep the our different savings accounts separate so I can visualize them better.
5) H and I each have an IRA and 401(k). My firm also has a funded pension plan, which is really unusual for a private employer. I would not be eligible for it until I am a partner, but it's a huge perk that will probably keep me around at least long enough for it to vest. Also, we will have taxable brokerage accounts, and I have an HSA that's invested.
We have toyed with the idea of having a rental/vacation property overseas. Americans can do very well with that because other American travelers like knowing that the owners have "American standards" (I cannot tell you how many times I have read that phrase on VRBO). My husband is a Belgian citizen, so he can own property in Europe without having to go through all the red tape that non-citizens encounter. The biggest question mark for us with this idea is taxes (I have not looked at this), and currency arbitrage as rates fluctuate.
Yes and no. We've played around with them for starting in June 2017 because I'm likely coming home after #2 is born.
2. what is different on your 2017 budget from 2016
Losing my income halfway through the year. It makes me sick just looking at it. It isn't going to be easy nor pretty.
3. does anyone have an account just for HURRICANE EVACUATONS?
Not hurricanes, but we get tornados here often. So we do have cash in a safe in the house as well as in our backup tornado bag in the basement. There's enough for 2 weeks of a hotel stay and food, as well as necessities we may need. My H is borderline prepper status.
4. Do you keep your savings account and efund in one account or seperate?
Separate. We have 1 savings account that has our efund and another that has our slush fund savings for things like annual insurance premiums, vacations, car savings, etc.
5. when you retire, how many sources of monthly income will you have and where would it come from!
Our plans so far are to have income from H's 401k, both of our IRA's, and our mutual fund we toss extra in here and there. We would also like to have a couple of rental properties at that point.
Another big dream. We love the Lake of the Ozarks. LOVE. Our overall dream is that if my parents are still in good health, we will retire at 50 and 52 and purchase a failing resort down there and run it together. Its been a dream of my parents for a long time, and all 4 of us daydream about it together.
If they are no longer alive then we have strict instructions that if the opportunity presents itself, we take some of their inheritance and go do what we dreamed.
Our hope/goal would be that we could run it for 10 years and not need to pull from our retirement accounts to live day to day.
TTC since 1/13 DX:PCOS 5/13 (long, anovulatory cycles)
Clomid 50mg 9/13 = BFP! EDD 6/7/14 M/C 5w6d Found 11/4/13
1/14 PCOS / Gluten Free Diet to hopefully regulate my system.
Chemical Pregnancy 03/14
Surprise BFP 6/14, Beta #1: 126 Beta #2: 340 Stick baby, stick! EDD 2/17/15
Riley Elaine born 2/16/15
TTC 2.0 6/15
Chemical Pregnancy 9/15
Chemical Pregnancy 6/16
BFP 9/16 EDD 6/3/17
Beta #1: 145 Beta #2: 376 Beta #3: 2,225 Beta #4: 4,548
www.5yearstonever.blogspot.com
2. The main difference right now is adjusting to paying in extra for federal tax withholding. We may also have to slightly adjust our 401k contributions at some point in the year if we hit our max earlier than planned.
3. No, since we're in Atlanta we aren't at a risk for anything major related to a hurricane. I think if we lived on the coast or in another high risk area for tornadoes, earthquakes, or another major disaster that I think I'd try to incorporate something extra into my e-fund. Something I've considered is keeping an envelope of cash, something like $500-$1000 on hand. I heard that some people couldn't get money from ATMs during the hurricane and I would want to be sure we had ready cash on hand in case of a disaster and we had no way of accessing our account or using our credit cards.
4. We're currently building a separate e-fund. Right now the majority of our savings are in one account. It's technically our e-fund but we've pulled on it for major expenses and then just re-funded it.
5. Currently just our 401ks, my IRA, and eventually DH's IRA once I get one going for him. If Social Security is still around then we'll take it.
Our budget won't change until March-ish when raises are announced for both the companies we work for. We will most likely have to good sized lump sums of cash (DH's bonus and our tax refund) that we will have to allocate, but that will likely go to our bathroom remodel fund that is being drained right now for medical expenses due to a high risk pregnancy.
2. what is different on your 2017 budget from 2016
We replaced our HELOC payment with a car payment. Otherwise no changes.
3. does anyone have an account just for HURRICANE EVACUATONS?
We don't live in a hurricane risk zone so this isn't necessary for us, but we do have an emergency fund that would cover us if we needed to leave our house for some reason. We also have credit cards with high limits to use until we could get to our e-fund.
4. Do you keep your savings account and efund in one account or seperate?
We keep our e-fund in a combination of mutual funds and non-retirement stocks. In case of EXTREME emergency we could tap into our ROTHs (initial investments only) and/or borrow from our parents. Our regular savings accounts are at our local bank.
5. when you retire, how many sources of monthly income will you have and where would it come from!
We both have 401k accounts and ROTH accounts and expect a modest inheritance from my parents and a large inheritance from DH's parents. Right now we are focused on building our portfolios, eventually we will start moving things around to make sure our investments are bringing in cash streams to live on. While we expect inheritances from both parents we are not relying on that to fund our retirement.
Yep, you all just have to deal with everyone else bombarding your city, lol.
1. has anyone started there 2017 budgets yet
No, I adjust my budget throughout the year as items change. Either adding more income or static bills that either increase/reduce.
2. what is different on your 2017 budget from 2016
I'll have more rental income from a duplex we are fixing up but, until it's fixed up and has tenants, I don't add the income to my budget. I'm also going to be doing a cash-out refi on it at that point. So the whole thing would just be approximations at this point.
3. does anyone have an account just for HURRICANE EVACUATONS?
I moved to NOLA about 15 years ago and have evacuated many times. I remember 4 for sure, but I wouldn't be surprised if I'm forgetting 1 or 2. Plus I've twice had the experience where, the city wasn't evacuated, but electricity was off for a week. Ha! One of those times I was actually in Miami...evacuated from Katrina. And then Hurricane Wilma blew through Miami and power was off for over a week.
So, YEAH. I don't keep a separate account and I don't keep it all year long. But, during hurricane season, I up my e-fund from $1,000 to $2,000 and make sure I have plenty of room on my credit cards if we actually end up evacuating. I also keep that e-fund in cash. Because credit cards and ATM cards are worthless if the power is out
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4. Do you keep your savings account and efund in one account or seperate?
I have one savings account and a few checking accounts. I don't keep more than $100-$200 in any of them. As said above, my e-fund is usually $1,000. However, I also have a Home Equity Line of Credit I can tap into if something super major happens.
5. when you retire, how many sources of monthly income will you have and where would it come from!
I plan to retire fairly early (mid 40s) through investing in rental properties and building up my monthly cash flow. I also have a part-time job that, from all appearances, will last far into the future (I sure hope!!!). Those would be my two sources of retirement income, at this point.
I have a chronic medical condition that will probably shorten my life somewhat (it's fine, came to terms a long time ago). If I live to 65, I guess I'd maybe have some SS and 401K pittance, but all of that is just too big a question for me to count on or care about. Especially SS. I mean, will it even exist 20+ years from now? Or will the age be pushed up higher with the monthly draw drastically cut? Who knows? I'm not counting on that.
- We have decided on our 2017 goals, but we haven't outlined our budget yet.
2. what is different on your 2017 budget from 2016?
- We're actually going to work on our budgeting skills. We're not the best budgeters, we just work toward monthly goals, but we don't budget to every dollar.
3. does anyone have an account just for HURRICANE EVACUATIONS?
- No. We're in the Midwest.
4. Do you keep your savings account and efund in one account or separate?
- One account for us. It's one bucket of savings.
5. when you retire, how many sources of monthly income will you have and where would it come from?
- H and I each have a 401(k), a portion of each is pre-tax and a portion is post-tax. We each also have traditional IRAs, I have a Roth IRA. We both also have pensions. My company pension I'm likely to cash out in lump sum, but like @kmurphy2131, H's pension is railroad retirement. When he retires, we'll be looking at 150% of his top three years. We're very likely to be better off in retirement than we are now.
I don't really budget by the year, I do it per paycheck, but keep in mind things in the future I'll need to have money saved for (ie vacations or large purchases)
2. what is different on your 2017 budget from 2016
See above
3. does anyone have an account just for HURRICANE EVACUATONS?
I live in Colorado so the possibility of a hurricane is pretty low
4. Do you keep your savings account and efund in one account or seperate?
Separate
5. when you retire, how many sources of monthly income will you have and where would it come from!
Mainly just 401k, and our plan is to sell our home we are in now when we retire in 30 years to downsize to a less expensive area, so assuming values stay at least the same as they are now, that'd be at least half a million dollars since it should be paid off by then. And, one can always hope for a bit of social security income, although I'm not holding my breath
We don't budget annually or monthly but create a mini-budget for each paycheck.
2. What is different on your 2017 budget from 2016?
No major changes at this point, though it will be interesting to see what happens with our 2016 taxes. We may need to update our withholdings in 2017.
3. Does anyone have an account just for HURRICANE EVACUATIONS?
No, we live in the Midwest. We do keep a small amount of cash in the safe and water in the basement in case of a tornado.
4. Do you keep your savings account and efund in one account or separate?
We don't have any liquid savings outside of our emergency fund.
5. When you retire, how many sources of monthly income will you have and where would it come from?
We both have ROTHs, I have a 403b and an annuity and H has a 401k. We're already maxing out all available retirement accounts, so I'm sure at some point soon I'm sure we'll be investing outside of those. As for Social Security, we're not banking on getting any and I hope our parents spend every last dime they earned on a life well lived and traveled.
1. has anyone started there 2017 budgets yet
not yet. It will be very similar to our current budget as we are saving up to pay cash for a new car for dh.
2. what is different on your 2017 budget from 2016
Once DD starts kindergarten in September I will have my daycare money to put towards other savings goals.
3. does anyone have an account just for HURRICANE EVACUATIONS
no...we generally do not have to deal with them. Hurricane sandy we were without power for 9 days but we still stayed at home as were weren't in danger.
4. Do you keep your savings account and efund in one account or
separate. In fact I have different accounts for our various savings goals...cars home repairs, college savings, etc.
5. when you retire, how many sources of monthly income will you have and where would it come from!
At this point, social security, my simple Ira, a Roth IRA, and my hubby's 501k.
Health insurance is going up
We will have more cash each month in 2017 overall because right now we are super heavy on retirement savings and that will be more spread out next year.