<prompt> Human: Hello! Im about to start a PhD program and am looking for advice about how to start preparing for the future. My yearly stipend will be around 26k before taxes and I anticipate having extra money to be able to save since I will be living in a relatively cheap area upstate NY. Someone suggested Roth IRAs in another thread, but Im conflicted whether I should go for that or just set up a savings account somewhere. Id like some sort of emergency fund I can draw from when needed. Im pretty inexperienced with these matters so any advice would be much appreciated!  <response>: I finished my PhD this summer in Fort Worth, TX and took a postdoc in Miami, FL. Let me just give you a warning: please for the love of god save up 5-7k for moving expenses for when you finish your PhD. I got 1k from my postdoc for travelmoving, but that didnt come close. Between the apartment deposit, vehicle registration, actually moving my bedcouch I got a Ubox and had it all shipped, it was 1200 alone, driving 1500 miles with all of the hotel and gas expenses, buying stuff to make your next place livable, traveling to where you are going to live to find an apartment this cost me 600 for airfare and hotel for 3 days, and buying foodpaying all of your bills at your new place until your next paycheck it was well over 7k. Depending on what kind of institution you are at, and where your next career move is postdoc or directly getting a job or something you may move across the country. Will you take everything you own with you? My graduate school paid me monthly. I moved 0708 and started my new position 0711, and they pay monthly. That means I got a full stipend paycheck 0701, and had to wait until 0801 to receive a tiny paycheck from graduate school and half of my postdoc paycheck, which combined was about what my stipend was a month. The change in cost of living from Fort Worth to Miami made that money just disappear.So please set aside money for your eventual relocation for whatever step comes after your particular PhD path. Make sure that this is also on top of whatever you set aside for emergencies. I had 5k saved for my move by the end, and I always had 2k for emergencies sitting around. I used that emergency money for a bad car accident two years ago and for my dogs vet emergency. I just filled it back up to 2k and kept everything else in a savings account for my postdoc. 