query: Typically how many digits are in a cheque number?

positive: Checks are normally numbered sequentially, to keep them unique for record-keeping purposes. The check number takes as many digits as it takes, depending on how long the account has been open and thus how many checks have been written.  The most recent check I looked at had a four-digit number, but as has been pointed out businesses may run through thousands  per year. I recommend storing this in an unsigned long or long-long, which will probably be comparable to the bank's own limits. I don't know whether there is an explicit maximum value; we would need to find someone who knows the banking standards to answer that.

negative: "As far as I can recall, savings and chequing accounts exist due to regulations on the banking industry that put were into effect after the depression to prevent a ""run"" on the bank.   A chequing account is a ""demand"" account, meaning you can go and demand your money, and they have to pay immediately, by means of a withdrawal or a cheque.  Banks used to get out of hand and loan out pretty much all the money they had on deposit, and of course those people with loans just put the money they borrowed into another chequing account and the bank loaned that out to someone else.  The money that people believed they had access to multiplied indefinitely.  However, when everyone goes to take that money out at the same time, you have a run on the bank.  Therefore, government regulations stipulate a % that the bank must have on-hand.  The typical number is 5%.  That effectively limits the money multiplier to 19 times. Savings accounts get around this restriction by putting limits on how much and how quickly you can withdraw the amounts.  They pay you more interest because the money in a savings account is worth more to them, because it's not subject to those restrictions. Some chequing accounts pay interest, but you have to maintain a minimum balance.  Some savings accounts allow you to write cheques, but I assume the withdrawal limitations probably still apply. There's also something to do with deposit insurance (as in, the chequing accounts are covered by government deposit insurance, but savings accounts are not).  I'm not 100% certain of that though."

negative: I would have asked for the intended recipient's account number and pursue sending the money there. If it's the same as yours (except for one digit) that would be a good sign. But even here, the crook could send money to dozens of different accounts, all off by one digit, just to make it look authentic. I'm going with scam just to be safe. As for the checksum, it's used on paper checks (next to the last digit) but not necessarily the actual account. Credit card accounts use an algorithm, but online tools create as many legitimate character strings as you want. I used to work at a credit union, and when the time was just right, I opened account number 860000 (actual account number except for the second digit). All their account numbers were sequential, so the oldest account number was 000001. Sadly, many important systems are set up to meet the simple needs of the masses, and are easy to beat if you really want to. Check out If you dare hackers to hack you, they'll hack you good.

negative: "Two comments on your calculations: I worked for many years at a community college (Ontario, Canada) where I received an annual salary for the contract period Sept 1, Year N, to August 31, Year (N + 1). For most of that time, the system was 26 pay-cheques a year, one every 14 days. Payroll made most mandatory deductions (union dues, pension, etc.) on a monthly basis, assigning them to one or the other of the two cheques each month.  So there was a fairly large variation in the net amount received in the two cheques.  Plus there were those two ""extra"" cheques each year with very few deductions. (as in the answer of @Kate Gregory) Additionally, Payroll was smart enough to make the last cheque of the contract year for a slightly odd amount, just the correct amount to bring the total gross amount paid to the actual contractual salary, evening out any extra days or rounding error. They would restart the payment schedule anew on the second Thursday in September."

negative: France is one country where cheques are common. More an more people are using credit cards for typical store payments and wire transfers are slowly gaining traction. There are several cases where cheques come handy: Sure, all these cases could ultimately be resolved with a wire transfer. Sometimes it is just simpler/faster to mail a piece of paper. This said, I believe than in 1à years from now even France will go cheque-less.

negative: Some of these answers are actually wrong. Basically if you were to cash this cheque, you are committing bank fraud.  The cheque is usually fake and ends up with them cashing it off your account--this is how cheques work, when you cash a cheque, you are the one ultimately responsible for the validity of what you're cashing.  This is why large cheques are balanced against your active account--so what happens is they essentially just take money from you and leave you red handed.

negative: "I know this an old thread, but one that caught my interest as I just moved to the USA from Australia. As per the OP I had never written a check in my whole life, and upon arriving in the US I was surprised as to their proliference. In Australia pretty much all bills you receive can be paid in a number of ways:  For small amounts between friends cash is probably used most, but for larger amounts direct transfer is popular. Your friend/landlord will give you their bank account number and BSB number, which identifies their bank, and then you transfer the money in. We don't have a SSN like some other countries. Cheques are still used by some however, esp by the older generations. Now that I'm in the US initially I had tried to set up direct transfer to pay my rent however the bank has a $1000 daily transfer limit. I contacted the bank to get this increased however I was informed that this limit applies to ALL accounts at the bank. I asked how do people pay their rents with this low limit and was told that most people used cheques. (This explains the strange look I got from my landlord when I asked for their bank account details so I could pay the rent!) I now have some bills to pay here and I use online banking. You enter the biller's name and address and then the bank actually prints off a cheque and posts it to the biller on your behalf! My first couple of pays here were also cheques, which were the first actual ""paychecks"" I had ever received."

negative: I have no idea what the traditional accounting way of dealing with this might be; but does your accounts package has the concept of subaccounts within a bank account?  If so, to me it would make sense that when a cheque is written, you move money in the accounts package from the bank account to a subaccount named 'Cheques Written'; then when it is cashed, move money from that subaccount to the supplier.  Then from a reporting perspective, when you want a report that will correspond to your actual bank statement, run a report that includes the subacconut; when you want a report that tells you how much you have available to spend, rune  a report that excludes the subaccount.

negative: "I don't think credit cards support depositing money into to begin with. Anyone could deposit money to a Credit Card acccount.  All they need is your bank's name, Visa/Mastercard, and 16 digit number.  It is done through the ""Pay Bills / Make Payments"" function in online banking.  So tell me, what does it mean that PayPal will transfer the money to my VISA card You can use the new balance for spending via Credit Card, the effect is same as making a payment from your chequing account to credit card account.  Will it simply just get transferred to my bank account by the local bank after that Some banks would refund the excess amount from your Credit Card to your Chequing Account after a while, but most don't. People keep credit balance on credit card to make a purchaes larger than credit limit. For example, if your credit limit is $1000, balance is $0, and you made $500 payment to the credit card, you can make a purchase of $1500 without asking for credit limit increase."

negative: The 7 digit corporation number can be found through a business entity search on the CA SOS website (specifically, http://kepler.sos.ca.gov/) If you have a 7-digit corporation number, then you do not have a 12-digit file number.  (A call to the Secretary of State's office revealed that they provide either a 7 digit corporation number or a 12 digit file number - not both.)

negative: "A bona-fide company never needs your credit card details, certainly not your 3-digit-on-back-of-card #, to issue a refund.  On an older charge, they might have to work with their merchant provider.  But they should be able to do it within the credit card handling system, and in fact are required to.  Asking for details via email doesn't pass the ""sniff test"" either.  To get a credit card merchant account, a company needs to go through a security assessment process called PCI-DSS. Security gets drummed into you pretty good.  Of course they could be using one of the dumbed-down services like Square, but those services make refunds ridiculously easy.   How did you come to be corresponding on this email address?  Did they initially contact you?  Did you find it on a third party website?  Some of those are fraudulent and many others, like Yelp, it's very easy to insert false contact information for a business. Consumer forums, even moreso.  You might take another swing at finding a proper contact for the company.  Stop asking for a cheque.  That also circumvents the credit card system.  And obviously a scammer won't send a check... at least not one you'd want!  If all else fails: call your bank and tell them you want to do a chargeback on that transaction.  This is where the bank intervenes to reverse the charge.  It's rather straightforward (especially if the merchant has agreed in principle to a refund) but requires some paperwork or e-paperwork.   Don't chargeback lightly.  Don't use it casually or out of laziness or unwillingness to speak with the merchant, e.g. to cancel an order.  The bank charges the merchant a $20 or larger investigation fee, separate from the refund.  Each chargeback is also a ""strike""; too many ""strikes"" and the merchant is barred from taking credit cards. It's serious business.   As a merchant, I would never send a cheque to an angry customer.  Because if I did, they'd cash the cheque and still do a chargeback, so then I'd be out the money twice, plus the investigation fee to boot."

negative: "In India, Can I write a multi-city cheque to myself (Self cheque) and present to non-home branch to withdraw money? If yes, Can bank deny this transaction?  Yes you can. There are limitations on the amount advised from time to time.  What is ""genuine transactions / bonafide remittances""? The multi-city cheque were created / issued to ease the clearing time. Previously outstation cheques would take max of 1 month by law. having a Multi-City cheque reduces this to max of 3 days. So what the clause says is one should use MCC to make genuine payments for parties outside your city. These should not be used as conduits for money laundering activities. No cash payment to third parties It means cash payment is not given to others except to account holder in non-home branch. A 3rd party can withdraw from home branch.  Suppose someone gave me a cheque and I don't have an account in that bank (or I am out of town, so I go to a non-home branch), how can I get the money in cash? You can't. Generally I have seen that this can be en-cashed in the same city and not necessarily the same branch. However its been sometime when I have done this. Best is deposit this into your Bank or have payer initiate an IMPS/NEFT transfer."

negative: "When banks would return the actual physical cheque, at least you had some printing / writing from the other bank on it, as some type of not-easily-Photoshopped proof. Now many (most?) banks don't return the actual cheques anyway, just an image of it - sometimes a low quality shrunken B&W photocopy-like image too.  You'd have to check with a lawyer or court in your area, but I suspect any photocopy or image, as well as a written or carbon-copy duplicate, would not be good enough proof for a law court, since they could all be easily re-written or Photoshopped. So I don't think there's a real upside anyway. Only an official bank statement saying that the name/people written actually cashed the cheque might be ""good evidence"" (I'm having doubts that the bank's own low quality ""image"" would even qualify, unless it's verified as coming directly from the bank somehow). I'd agree with Nate (+1) that a big downside could be identity theft, either online or alongside phone loss/theft."

negative: #####&#009;  ######&#009;  ####&#009;  [**Benford's law**](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benford's%20law): [](#sfw)   ---  >  >__Benford's Law__, also called the __First-Digit Law__, refers to the frequency distribution of digits in many (but not all) real-life sources of [data](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data). In this distribution, the number 1 occurs as the leading digit about 30% of the time, while larger numbers occur in that position less frequently: 9 as the first digit less than 5% of the time. Benford's Law also concerns the expected distribution for digits beyond the first, which approach a uniform distribution.  >This result has been found to apply to a wide variety of data sets, including electricity bills, street addresses, stock prices, population numbers, death rates, lengths of rivers, [physical](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physical_constant) and [mathematical constants](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_constant), and processes described by [power laws](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_law) (which are very common in nature). It tends to be most accurate when values are distributed across multiple [orders of magnitude](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_magnitude).  >The graph here shows Benford's Law for [base 10](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radix). There is a generalization of the law to numbers expressed in other bases (for example, [base 16](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hexadecimal)), and also a generalization from leading 1 digit to leading n digits.  >====  >[**Image**](https://i.imgur.com/Gx6oYsa.png) [^(i)](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Rozklad_benforda.svg) - *The distribution of first digits, according to Benford's law. Each bar represents a digit, and the height of the bar is the percentage of numbers that start with that digit.*  ---  ^Interesting: [^Gregory ^Benford](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gregory_Benford) ^| [^Logarithm](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logarithm) ^| [^Simon ^Newcomb](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_Newcomb) ^| [^Frank ^Benford](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Benford)   ^Parent ^commenter ^can [^toggle ^NSFW](http://www.np.reddit.com/message/compose?to=autowikibot&subject=AutoWikibot NSFW toggle&message=%2Btoggle-nsfw+cjun56c) ^or[](#or) [^delete](http://www.np.reddit.com/message/compose?to=autowikibot&subject=AutoWikibot Deletion&message=%2Bdelete+cjun56c)^. ^Will ^also ^delete ^on ^comment ^score ^of ^-1 ^or ^less. ^| [^(FAQs)](http://www.np.reddit.com/r/autowikibot/wiki/index) ^| [^Mods](http://www.np.reddit.com/r/autowikibot/comments/1x013o/for_moderators_switches_commands_and_css/) ^| [^Magic ^Words](http://www.np.reddit.com/r/autowikibot/comments/1ux484/ask_wikibot/)

negative: "Most answers have concentrated on this being a scam, however, it is possible this is an innocent mistake. Australian bank account numbers do not have redundant digits to be used to validate an account number; all of the numbers are data and uniquely identify a bank and branch (the BSB number) and an account (the Account number). Computer check digits are not part of bank account numbers because bank account numbers pre-date computers. It is entirely possible that someone entering an incorrect number can, by chance, hit upon an existing account. As the bank clearance system in Australia is entirely automatic there is no cross-checking of account numbers with account names.  Internet banking in Australia is not a wire-transfer as is common in places like the USA (although these can be done): here you are effectively accessing your bank's ""back office"". Nor is it like the BPay service which  is used primarily by B to C businesses as a way for their customers to pay their bills; when using this service the biller code will show you who you are paying and the customer number does have check digit validation. I run a business in Australia and it has happened to us on several occasions than an employee or supplier has given us incorrect numbers. Usually, it is not a real account and after a week or so the money makes its way back to us with a message like NO ACCOUNT or A/C CLOSED.  Very occasionally, however, the wrong number hits a live account: when that happens the person who f*&ked up needs to contact their bank and try and get the transaction reversed. If there is money in the destination account this usually happens with little fuss, however, if the destination account has been closed or emptied things get problematic. Of course, taking money that isn't yours is stealing even if it happens to be sitting in your bank account. However, unless the sum involved is significant the police are usually not interested in diverting their attention away from ""serious"" crimes like homicide, armed robbery and terrorism so the aggrieved party is usually on their own. That said, this is probably a scam because they called you rather than your bank doing so. They cannot get your phone number from your account number: they have to know who you are and what your account number is. This is not as hard to do as it sounds since both your name and account number are prominently printed on your cheques and deposit books (possibly your phone number as well which saves them looking it up in the White Pages)."

negative: "If the cheque is crossed (as almost all are these days), it can only be paid into an account in the name of the person it was written out to: it cannot be paid into another's account, nor can it be ""cashed""1 – see the rules on ""Crossed"" cheques. Note: that while the recipient of the cheque cannot (legally) alter this state of afairs, the writer of a cheque that was printed pre-crossed can – at least technically – cancel the crossing (see above link). Probably the best the OP can do is pay in the cheque on the friend's behalf (as described in Ben Millwood's answer) and then either lend the friend some money until they are mobile and can get some cash to repay the OP (or have the friend write one of their own cheques which the OP can pay into their bank account). 1 As mentioned in the last section of the rules on crossed cheques, the only exception is that designated ""Cheque cashing shops"" have special arrangements to deposit cheques which they have cashed (after deducting a fee). However, they would (should?) require proof of identity (of the original payee) and so are unlikely to be of any help (and probably not worth the cost for £35).  Having said that, I've never used one, so have no idea how strict they are in practice."

negative: "Some years ago I was in a similar situation with a CAD cheque. I did not experience any reservation period of months. Within Canada, around a week was usual, and as far as I remember that was the case also for the cheque deposited to the EUR account.  You could ask your bank whether a certified cheque (has to be done at the ""home"" bank of the sender) will have the same reservation period and what the processing time will be anyways.  I found a large variation of the (large) fees for cashing foreign cheques. It may be worth asking a few different banks for their conditions (both fees and duration for the whole process)."

negative: It is recommended that you get this using Wire Transfer. The fees is slightly high, it should be in the range of USD 20 - 30. You would get the funds faster, about 3-5 days after the payment is initiated. The Fx conversion would be applied without your knowledge so you would have very little control over it. If you are getting by paper cheque, it would take around 7 - 10 days for the mail to arrive. You would have to deposit this in local Bank, complete a form giving out the details as to why you received the cheque, along with a letter to request the cheque to be cashed ... Generally it takes around 25 days for the funds to get credited. As you would be speaking to someone in Bank, you can try and negotiate a better Fx rate, however for such amounts Bank will not go out of the way, so you may not know what rate gets applied, it would be the standard rate some 20 days later when the actual cheque gets processed. The fees are relatively less in the range of Rs 500 to Rs 1000.

negative: No you do not insure the cheque. A cheque is just standardized form that instructs a bank to transfer money. It is no more important than an ordinary letter.  A cheque carries no commercial value, especially when it has a designated recipient. No mail insurance will cover the financial loss as a result of bank fraud. It is a kind of indirect loss.   Just tell her to write your account number at the back of the paper, walk into your bank's branch and tell the teller to deposit it. There is no need of mailing.

negative: "What does it mean that the bank will ""hold you responsible""? Clearly   the money won't be credited. Will you be charged a fee like an NSF   cheque? Will they try to prosecute you? Is there any way to confirm whether a cashiers cheque is forged? Could you for example tell your bank that you were uncertain of the origin, and ask them to confirm it? Can you call the issuer and verify (from the serial number) that they did in fact issue a cheque for that amount with you as the payee? Even calling the bank might not help. The first verification is that the bank exists, and that the account number and name match and that they did issue a check. But that doesn't cover the situation where the person that sent you the check wasn't who they claimed to be. That is the theft that could take weeks to find."

negative: "I sent myself an Tangerine email money transfer. They sent me an email which took me to a website. After I entered the secret answer, they asked me for the destination bank account's details. They asked me to enter the transit number once, the institution number once, and the account number twice. They also showed a bold warning message: ""Please ensure that the details of your Canadian Bank Account (account number and bank information) are entered correctly."" Asking for the account number twice isn't a perfect safeguard, but it's better than nothing. In some countries, bank account numbers include a ""check digit"" for typo prevention, but I was unable to find any evidence online that this is true in Canada. Tangerine's system isn't 100% mistake-proof, but it's good enough that I think I'm going to use it."

negative: Just have the associate sign the back and then deposit it.  It's called a third party cheque and is perfectly legal.  I wouldn't be surprised if it has a longer hold period and, as always, you don't get the money if the cheque doesn't clear. Now, you may have problems if it's a large amount or you're not very well known at the bank.  In that case you can have the associate go to the bank and endorse it in front of the teller with some ID.  You don't even technically have to be there.  Anybody can deposit money to your account if they have the account number. He could also just deposit it in his account and write a cheque to the business.

negative: Is it standard for a bank to need the cheque to cancel it? (what about if it was intercepted, surely you can cancel before you're plundered?) Generally it makes life easy for the Bank. They can physically see the cheque and are assured that it has not been cashed.  Bank can put a hold / stop on the cheque. However given today's Banking it is complex with multiple systems and specially with international clearing taking months ... the cheque could have been cashed and the Bank that issued may only get to know about it month later. Is there any way to bypass this? Best is for your friend to correspond in writing. The rejection email from your Bank should also go into the communication. And follow-ups every 15 days all in writing. Generally after tons of follow-up Banks would pay it off.

negative: "Probably a bad assumption, but I'm assuming your in the United States. Keep in mind, that the check number is printed in 2 places on the front of each check. First, in the upper right corner, and also along the bottom edge on of the check. Since the check number is scanned by the bank from the bottom edge of the check, covering or otherwise modifying the check number on the upper left corner will have no effect on the check number that is recorded when the check is processed. And, you can't modify or cover the numbers or place any marks in the area of the numbers along the bottom of the check as this will likely interfere with processing of checks. So, modifying the check numbers will not work. Your choices are basically to:   The check numbers are not used in any way in clearing the check, the numbers are only for your convenience, so processing checks with duplicate numbers won't matter.  The check numbers are recorded when processed at your bank so they can be shown on your printed and online statements. The only time the check number might be important is if you had to ""stop payment"" on a particular check, or otherwise inquire about a particular check. But this should not really be an issue because by the time you have used up the first batch of checks, and start using the checks with duplicate numbers, the first use of the early duplicate numbered checks will be sufficiently long ago that there should not be any chance of processing checks with duplicate numbers at the same time. You didn't mention how many checks you have with duplicate numbers, or how frequently you actually write checks so that may play a part in your decision. In my case, 100 checks will last me literally years, so it wouldn't be a problem for me."

negative: Normally if the amount of a cashiers check is over $5,000, a bank (like Wells Fargo) may put a 10 business day hold on it to make sure the transaction is sound.

negative: A USD bank draft from any of the major Canadian banks is a good solution. They clear quickly in the U.S. I use them frequently and have never had a problem depositing them in a U.S. bank account.  If you carry more than $10k across the border, even as a cheque, be sure to declare it.

negative: Content is considered as the king of the digital marketing strategies, as content can attract a lot of people with the help of best local seo in Dubai and can make them stay on the website for a long time. Just like communication can help you in terms of digital marketing agency uae, content helps you grasp many people in the digital marketing world. To be a king of this world, you need to be updated on the current trends and SEO daddy loves the updates on digital marketing.

negative: Account number are Unique based on the following combinations, based on manual banking practise of early days; -Country -Bank -Branch -Location -Account Number -Currency -Account Type [Savings, Checking] With the current computerization, there are quite a few items that have been coded into the number, for example Branch, Currency, Account Number and Account Type are part of account number.  Overall there are some attempts to standardize the account number so that they can be unique across the world as described as littleadv.

negative: You can dial the phone systems of the credit reporting agencies directly to put a freeze on your credit report account. The phone systems require quick responses or the systems will fail you out, but **this work is relatively quick** and probably easier than trying to do this on the websites that try to re-direct you to buying credit monitoring services. Here are the phone entries you will make as a guide for the phone menu of each of the credit reporting agencies:  **Transunion** 888-909-8872:      enter zip code     press 3 to add freeze     enter social security number     enter date-of-birth as 8 digits MMDDYYYY     enter house number from street address then # key     choose a 6 digit security code     credit card number for $10 charge     4 digit expiration date of credit card MMYY  **Equifax** 800-685-1111:      press 3 to select freezes     press 1 to continue     say your state then 1 to confirm     enter social security number then 1 to confirm     enter house number from street address then # key, then 1 to confirm     press 1 to select a freeze     there will be a long pause at this point but when the bot comes back it goes very fast.          Write down the 10-digit pin provided XXXXXXXXXX then later,          Write down the 10-digit confirmation number provided XXXXXXXXX.          Press * to repeat both until you have it correct  **Experian** 888 397 3742      press 2 for freeze     press 2 for freeze     press 1 for add freeze     press 2 for no fraud report     enter social security number then # key then 1 to confirm     enter date-of-birth as 8 digits MMDDYYYY then 1 to confirm     enter zip code then # key     enter house number from street address then # key     press 2 for not blind     press 1 to pay by credit card     wait through list of charges by state     select credit card type 1 for mastercard, 2 for visa, 3 for american express, 4 for discover     enter credit card #, then 1 to confirm     4 digit expiration date of credit card then # key MMYY#  Cross-posted this from the megathread in r/personalfinance.

negative: So does a post-dated check have any valid use in a business or   personal transaction? Does it provide any financial or legal   protections at all? Yes, most definitely. You're writing a future date on the check, not past, to ensure that the check will not be deposited before that day. Keep in mind that this may change from place to place, since not every country has the same rules. In the US, for example, such trick would not work since the check may be presented any time and is not a limited obligation. However, in some other countries banks will not pay a check presented before the date written on it. While in the US the date on the check is the date on which it was (supposedly) written and as such is meaningless for obligation purposes, in many other countries the date on the check is the date on which the payment to be made, thus constitutes the start of the commitment and payment will not be made before that date. For example, in Canada: If you write a post-dated cheque, under the clearing rules of the   Canadian Payments Association (CPA), your cheque should not be cashed   before the date that is written on it. If the post-dated cheque is cashed early, you can ask your financial   institution to put the money back into your account up to the day   before the cheque should have been cashed.

negative: Some Canadian banks (RBC for instance), will accept the format  No spaces, no slashes. Transit number must be five digits, if it's not add a 0 to the front. Just had a situation where the European-based system would not accept anything but an IBAN, so I called my bank and that's what they confirmed.  I know this is super late, but thought I would leave it here for future generations to discover. Edit: See comments for an example.

negative: Unless you're running a self-employed business with a significant turnover (more than £150k), you are entitled to use cash basis accounting for your tax return, which means you would put the date of transactions as the payment date rather than the billing date or the date a debt is incurred. For payments which have a lag, e.g. a cheque that needs to be paid in or a bank transfer that takes a few days, you might also need to choose between multiple payment dates, e.g. when you initiated the payment or when it took effect. You can pick one as long as you're consistent: You can choose how you record when money is received or    paid (eg the date the money enters your account or the date a cheque   is written) but you must use the same method each tax year.

negative: "Let's start by saying that of all the things to solve in a mortgage equation, the rate is the toughest. It's the least friendly to solving with pencil and paper. While I never tire of expressing my love for my Texas Instruments BA-35 financial calculator, it's no longer in production, and most folk won't have access, but Excel is right there.  The financial function pops up for you with RATE as a choice for solving.   I filled in the cells to show the numbers. The -665.30 is a typical convention for money flows as it's a payment from you not a credit for interest you earn. Note, some mortgage calculators leave this entry as positive. It takes a second to see how one's calculation or spreadsheet does this.  Last, you can see the software wants a ""guess."" This is because the software has a loop, guessing and getting closer to the solution. I entered .005 to guess 6% per year. The correct solution is .006 or 7.2% per year.  Class dismissed."


query: what would you do with $100K saving?

positive: 4) Beef up my emergency fund, make sure my 401(k) or IRA was fully funded, put the rest into investments. See many past answers. A house you are living in is not an investment. It is a purchase, just as rental is a purchase. Buying a house to rent out is starting a business. If you want to spend the ongoing time and effort and cash running a business, and if you can buy at the right time in the right place for the righr price, this can be a reasonable investment. If you aren't willing to suffer the pains of being a landlord, it's less attractive; you can hire someone to manage it for you but that cuts the income significantly. Starting a business: Remember that many, perhaps most, small businesses fail. If you really want to run a business it can be a good investment, again assuming you can buy at the right time/price/place and are willing and able to invest the time and effort and money to support the business.  Nothing produces quick return with low risk.

positive: "The real answer is ""Why do you want to waste a windfall chasing quick returns?""  Instead, use this windfall to improve your financial situation, and maybe boost you toward financial independence, or at least a secure retirement.  In simplest terms, forget the short term, go for long term.  Whatever you do, avoid lifestyle creep."

positive: I would buy an ETF (or maybe a couple) in stable, blue chip companies with a decent yield (~3%) and then I'd play a conservative covered call strategy on the stock selling a new position about once a month. That's just me.

negative: In this equation the withdrawal rate is the percent you must pull from your savings to meet your expenses. For example if your savings is $100,000 and you need $10,000 annually for your living expenses then your withdrawal rate would be 10% (where 10k is 10% of 100k).  To complete this formula, you need to know how much savings you need to be financially independent before you can use this formula to find out how long it will take you.

negative: And we're talking only about trumps tax plan which is at 15%. Everyone wants to pay less taxes doesn't mean it's affordable. The Fortune 500 need to fork up the money. You know what would save you money? Bailing out homeowners by taxing the Fortune 500 500b and dishing out refinancing 100k to 5m owners at 1% which will all be returned to the coffers. Borrowing more and more pretending like it's poor people's fault isn't solving shit.

negative: If you were going to pay off an 18% credit card and had no hope otherwise, I might agree you should do this. 5.5% student loan, I wouldn't do it.  You have multiple issues going on. I would find a bank or broker that will keep the IRA with no fee. Zero. If you buy stocks, there might be a commission, but I'd stick with a low cost index mutual fund. At 10%, the account might double every 7 years, even 35 years till retirement offers 5 doubles or 32X your money. Literally, $100K more for retirement. As a semi-retired old guy, I thank my younger self for putting aside the $3000, so we have over $100K more now.  Your student loan is manageable. Save, enjoy yourself, but don't let $7500 at 5.5% keep you up at night.

negative: Think of it this way:  1) You buy 1k in call options that will let you buy 100k of stock when they expire in the money in a year.   2) You take the 99k you would have spent on the stock and invest it in a risk free savings account.  3) Assume the person who sold you the call, immediately hedges the position by buying 100k of stock to deliver when the options expire.  The amount of money you could make on risk free interest needs to be comparable to the premium you paid the option writer for tying up their capital, or they wouldn't have made the trade. So higher risk free rates would mean a higher call price.   NOTE: The numbers are not equal because of the risk in writing the option, but they will move the same direction.

negative: "The Solicitor involved up front should be able to place constrictions as your suggesting.  I think you should look carefully at the desired wording. You deserve a return on your £100k. Say, the day after you buy (this is hypothetical, please bear with me) a developer says he needs the property and will give you £460k. Your wording here says you get £100k, and then, after the mortgage split £230k, but it seems more reasonable that your deposit doubles to £200k, the remaining £260k pays the mortgage, and the £130k left is split, £65k each.  My method accounts for the value of your £100k. Some would ask, why not apply the mortgage rate to that deposit? Because the home value may grow at a different rate. In my opinion, it's fair to apply the home value growth to the £100k deposit.  ""Fair"" means different things to different people. This is my opinion, and a suggestion. Consider it, and do what you and your partner wish. Use a solicitor. Put it in writing."

negative: IMHO your thinking is spot on.  More than likely, you are years away from retirement, like 22 if you retire somewhat early.  Until you get close keep it in aggressive growth.  Contribute as much as you can and you probably end up with 3 million in today's dollars.   Okay so what if you were retiring in a year or two from now, and you have 3M, and have managed your debt well.  You have no loans including no mortgage and an nice emergency fund.  How much would you need to live?  60 or 70K year would provide roughly the equivalent of 100K salary (no social security tax, no commute, and no need to save for retirement) and you would not have a mortgage. So what you decide to do is move 250K and move it to bonds so you have enough to live off of for the next 3.5 years or so.  That is less than 10% of your nest egg.  You have 3.5 years to go through some roller coaster time of the market and you can always cherry pick when to replenish the bond fund. Having a 50% allocation for bonds is not very wise.  The 80% probably good for people who have little or no savings like less than 250k and retired.   I think you are a very bright individual and have some really good money sense.

negative: However what actually appears to happen is that the 100k is invested into the company to fund some growth plan. So is it actually the case that E's company is worth 400k only AFTER the transaction? Is the 100k added to the balance sheet as cash and would the other 300k be listed as an IP asset? The investor gets 25% of the shares of the company and pays $100k for them, so Owner's Equity increases by $100k, and the company gets $100k more in cash. The $400k number is an implicit calculation: if 25% of the company is worth $100k, 100% of the company is worth $400k. It's not on the books: the investor is just commenting that they feel that they are being over-charged.

negative: "As for the letting the ""wise"" people only make the decisions, I guess that would be a bit odd in the long run. Especially when you get more experienced or when you don't agree with their decision. What you could do, is make an agreement that always 3/4 (+/-) of the partners must agree with an investment. This promotes your involvement in the investments and it will also make the debate about where to invest more alive, fun and educational). As for the taxes I can't give you any good advice as I don't know how tax / business stuff works in the US. Here in The Netherlands we have several business forms that each have their own tax savings. The savings mostly depend on the amount of money that is involved. Some forms are better for small earnings (80k or less), other forms only get interesting with large amounts of money (100k or more). Apart from the tax savings, there could also be some legal / technical reasons to choose a specific form. Again, I don't know the situation in your country, so maybe some other folks can help. A final tip if your also doing this for fun, try to use this investment company to learn from. This might come in handy later."

negative: The banks are required to file Currency Transaction Reports (CTR) to the IRS for aggregate transfers of over $10k. They file Suspicious Activity Reports for suspicious activity with an aggregate value of over $5,000 to the US Treasury. You're probably ok for what you're doing provided you aren't doing to regularly, but I would consider looking into alternate means of transferring funds such as a check to avoid the appearance of impropriety. Also, you should be able to call your bank to do a one time ACH transfer for up to $100k with minimal fees.

negative: "Social security and pensions make up a big part of it.  You may want to look at the source of the data.  If a person, has 5K at Vanguard, 5K at Fidelity and 100K at the bank; Fidelity will report on that person as having only 5K.  Vanguard will do the same. The opening pitch of a life insurance salesman sometimes includes the ""100 man story"".  Before retirement age:  26% of people will die, 54% will be broke, 5% will work, 4% will be secure, and 1% will be wealthy.  Then they sell you life insurance which is a horrible product for retirement savings. If you further dig into this subject you will find a great disparity between the mean and median retirement savings.  That is because many Americans have none, and those that do skew the average upward and have no where near mean or average. Its like this with other things in personal finance.  For example those with actual credit card debt have much higher than the average.  As those with none, or even no credit cards skew the average downward.  In my opinion it is like this because of behavior.  If one saved half of the average car payment over their working life in a growth stock mutual fund, they would make it to that 4% category.  If they also had a good salary, kept debt to a minimum, and saved a healthy amount they would make it to that 1% category.  It was a daily choice that was made many years prior to retirement."

negative: "You're making $100k together per year: you're not in the donut hole, you're in the top 25% of all households, and the top 10% of non-family households (as yours would be).  To be blunt, you're not in the ""rely on assistance"" area: you're in the ""save up for your downpayment"" sector. My suggestion would be to figure out a way to save more than $200-$400 a month for now.  $100k gross income means you have about $8k net income per month; $2k for rent and other necessities means you have $6k per month that you can potentially save.  Even half of that - $3k per month - means you have $24000 saved by the end of this year, and $36000 on an annual basis. As far as marriage or domestic partnership - I wouldn't get into one based on whether it helps you afford a home.  It might be a good idea because it helps you handle some of the details arising when you have joint property, perhaps, but not solely for the financial aspect. And as far as how much home is realistic?  $250k is certainly realistic if you can save up enough for a good down payment.  Try to get to the 20-25% range.  If you're already halfway there, another year of renting won't kill you, and it will mean no PMI and much better rates.   Also consider a 15 year mortgage; we're in the same general income category as you and manage a 15 year on a $250k range house quite nicely.  It doesn't add all that much to your monthly payment amount, compared to what you'd expect - particularly since the monthly payment includes property taxes which won't increase based on the length of the mortgage. Now that we have actual numbers from the OP: So, without cutting anything, you have $2k yourself you can be saving.  (This assumes your rent number of $1345 is your portion of rent, and not the 100% amount.)  That's $24000 per year, just by yourself.  On top of that, you've got another $40k or so coming from your partner, at least some of which should be available as well if he/she is going to be co-owning?  But if not, at least you have about $2000 a month you can be saving.  You could also downsize the car, cut cable TV, downsize the phone, and have another $500 or so available - but it doesn't really look like you need to do that, given how much you have available now. I'd look at what you're doing with that ~$2000 per month right now, and see how you can free most of it up.  You haven't mentioned a few things like utilities, not sure if that's just forgetfulness or if your partner is paying them; so perhaps not all of it is available.  But - even $1000 a month is $12000 to add to the $20000 you have now, which makes a big dent in that down payment."

negative: Two years ago, I wrote an article titled Student Loans and Your First Mortgage in response to this exact question posed by a fellow blogger.  The bottom line is that the loan payment doesn't lower your borrowing power as it fits in the slice between 28% (total housing cost) and 38% (total monthly debt burden) when applying for a loan.  But, the $20K is 20% down on $100K worth of house. With median home prices in the US in the mid-high $100Ks, you're halfway there.  In the end, it's not about finance, it's a question of how badly you want to buy a house. If I got along with the parents, I'd stay as long as I was welcome, and save every dollar I could. Save for retirement, save for as large a downpayment as you can, and after you buy the house, pay the student loan aggressively. I moved out the week after I graduated.

negative: The interest rate will probably be better for your primary residency, however the risk is higher too. In the event you can't pay it off - you probably would rather lose the second home and not the primary home. Re the tax benefit - it will be attached to the rental you're buying, since that's what the loan is for. However, if you have a HELOC on your primary residency, you can deduct interest on up to $100K on your Schedule A regardless of what you're doing with the money. This can be useful if the rental is losing money and you don't want to accumulate the interest deduction as passive loss.

negative: "(Really a comment on JoeTaxpayer's answer but it's too long) There's one big factor that for some people tips things strongly in favor of the Roth: While the limits on paper for traditional and Roth are the same, in practice they are not--you can contribute more to a Roth than you can to a traditional. While the contribution limits are the ""same"" in both cases, the Roth holds after-tax dollars and an after-tax dollar is worth more than a pre-tax dollar.  If you're not maxing your contribution this is completely irrelevant, but if you are maxing your contributions and would like to contribute more this is a big push in the Roth direction. Illustration:  You're in the 25% bracket, you have $100k in a traditional IRA.  What's it really worth?  $75k--because the IRS will take $25k as you pull it out.  You have the same $100k in a Roth, it's really worth $100k as the IRA won't take anything."

negative: "Thing is, it's already explained in the letter, in the end of the first paragraph: ""Tesla’s annualized delivery rate should exceed 100,000 units **by the end of next year**"" (emphasis mine).  When I first saw the number I got excited, but then I read the actual sentence, realized what they meant, and it's still impressive but it's not 3x increase in production YoY (which would be absurd to expect, esp. when Tesla's trajectory has been just-under-100% increases per year so far and into the mid-term foreseeable future).  *Then* they explained it *again* on the CC (Elon said *something like* ""we'll exit next year at a 100k rate, but it's hard to tell how steep the curve will be, but we'll probably have over 60k deliveries...I think...yeah probably"").  I emailed the author of this article and he still believes that Tesla has ""unequivocally"" stated that they will produce and deliver 100k cars in 2015...but that's simply not correct.  I have some people who know press contacts within Tesla working on hammering it out, though their efficacy at press communications has not been ideal at times in the past.  If Tesla did unequivocally state that they would deliver 100k cars next year, after delivering just over 35k this year and 22k last year, that would be enormous news and should have sent the stock to $300 today, up 30-50%+ instead of the 4% it did go up.  But it didn't send it that high, because that's just not what's happening.  I'm extraordinarily bullish on Tesla, but 100k in 2015 is just not what's going to happen.  100k+ in 2016, though, sounds about right.  And is in line with every other estimate everyone has done for the past several years, including Tesla themselves.  So yeah, this number isn't really news, but it's nice to see them reiterate it."

negative: "You seem to be treating your Roth IRA as a sort of savings account for use in emergency situations.  I would use a savings account for savings as withdrawing money from an IRA will have penalties under various circumstances (more than contributions, Roth IRA less than 5 years old, more than $10k for a down payment). Also, you mention folding your IRA into your 401k so that it will ""grow faster"".  However, this will not have that effect.  Imagine you have $30k in an IRA and $100k in a 401k and you are averaging a return of 8% / year on each.  This will be identical to having a single 401k with $130k and an 8% / year return. This is not one of your questions, but employer matches are not counted in the 401k contribution limit.  If your 22% calculation of your salary includes the match to reach the max contribution, you can still contribute more."

negative: "Many of my friends said I should invest my money on stocks or something else, instead of put them in the bank forever. I do not know anything about finance, so my questions are: First let me say that your friends may have the best intentions, but don't trust them. It has been my experience that friends tell you what they would do if they had your money, and not what they would actually do with their money. Now, I don't mean that they would be malicious, or that they are out to get you.  What I do mean, is why would you take advise from someone about what they would do with 100k when they don't have 100k. I am in your financial situation (more or less), and I have friends that make more then I do, and have no savings. Or that will tell you to get an IRA -so-and-so but don't have the means (discipline) to do so. Do not listen to your friends on matters of money. That's just good all around advise. Is my financial status OK? If not, how can I improve it? Any financial situation with no or really low debt is OK. I would say 5% of annual income in unsecured debt, or 2-3 years in annual income in secured debt is a good place to be. That is a really hard mark to hit (it seems). You have hit it. So your good, right now. You may want to ""plan for the future"". Immediate goals that I always tell people, are 6 months of income stuck in a liquid savings account, then start building a solid investment situation, and a decent retirement plan. This protects you from short term situations like loss of job, while doing something for the future.   Is now a right time for me to see a financial advisor? Is it worthy? How would she/he help me? Rather it's worth it or not to use a financial adviser is going to be totally opinion based. Personally I think they are worth it. Others do not. I see it like this. Unless you want to spend all your time looking up money stuff, the adviser is going to have a better grasp of ""money stuff"" then you, because they do spend all their time doing it. That being said there is one really important thing to consider. That is going to be how you pay the adviser. The following are my observations. You will need to make up your own mind.  Free Avoid like the plague. These advisers are usually provided by the bank and make their money off commission or kickbacks. That means they will advise you of the product that makes them the most money. Not you.  Flat Rate These are not a bad option, but they don't have any real incentive to make you money. Usually, they do a decent job of making you money, but again, it's usually better for them to advise you on products that make them money. Per Hour These are my favorite. They charge per hour. Usually they are a small shop, and will walk you through all the advise. They advise what's best for you, because they have to sit there and explain their choices. They can be hard to find, but are generally the best option in my opinion.   % of Money These are like the flat rate advisers to me. They get a percentage of the money you give them to ""manage"". Because they already have your money they are more likely to recommend products that are in their interest. That said, there not all bad. % or Profit These are the best (see notes later). They get a percentage of the money they make for you. They have the most interest in making you money. They only get part of what you get, so there going to make sure you get the biggest pie, so they can get a bigger slice. Notes In the real world, all advisers are likely to get kickbacks on products they recommend. Make sure to keep an eye for that. Also most advisers will use 2-3 of the methods listed above for billing. Something like z% of profit +$x per hour is what I like to see. You will have to look around and see what is available.  Just remember that you are paying someone to make you money (or to advise you on how to make money) so long as what they take leaves you with some profit your in a better situation then your are now. And that's the real goal."

negative: "Depends on what you call a ""middle-class"" income.  My mom makes enough money so that my dad can stay home and they raised three kids on it.  We're not rich by any stretch of the imagination.  But I do believe it's over $100k."

negative: Well I'd consider Citadel Securities a prop shop and all the others besides for bridgewater prop shops as well. And I do work FO,thanks for the appreciation, but was hired there after 3 years of trading experience.   I guess it depends on what you are comparing the loads of kids hired to because I really can't think of many professions, especially in finance, that have less kids hired straight out of undergrad.   And Evercore and Laz are making over 100k but bottom bucket at JPM and GS did not make all in salary over 100k this year.

negative: Yes, PMI is what the lender requires to loan you more than 8O% of the home's value. I could easily present scenarios where it's exactly the right decision to use PMI and get the purchase done. A 100K mortgage at 90% LTV will cost you $521/year in PMI.  If you are renting and struggling to get a higher downpayment, it can take quite a long time to save the additional $11K to put down. Only the buyer can know if the house is such s bargain, or if rates have bottomed, but the decision isn't so clear cut.

negative: The standard goal of valuing anything is to seek the fair price for that thing in the open market. Depending on what is being valued, that may or may not be an easy task. eg: to value your home, get a real estate appraiser, who will look at recent market sales in your area, and adjust for nuances of your property. To value your loan guarantee, you would need to figure out what it is actually worth to the business, which may be difficult. In a perfect world, you would be able to ask the bank to tell you the interest rate you would have to pay, if the loan was not guaranteed. This would show you the value you are providing to the business by guaranteeing it. ie: if the interest would be $100k a year unguaranteed, but is only $40k a year guaranteed, you are saving the business $60k a year. If the loan is to last 5 years, that's a total of $300k. Of course, it is likely the bank simply won't offer you an unguaranteed loan at all. This makes the value quite difficult to determine, and highlights the underlying transaction you are considering:  You are taking on personal risk of loan default, to profit the business. If you truly can't find an equitable way to value the guarantee, consider whether you understand the true risk of what you are doing. If you are able to determine an appropriate value for the loan, consider whether increasing your equity is fair compensation. There are other methods of compensation available, such as having the company pay you directly, or decrease the amount of capital you need to invest for this new set of equity.  In the end, what is fair is what the other shareholders agree to. If you go to the shareholders with anything less than professional 3rd party advice (and stackexchange does not count as professional), then they may be wary of accepting your 'fee', no matter how reasonable.

negative: ">Every word is true.  No, really, none of it.  >Taxpayers get tax credits for buying them. If taxpayers didn't get those tax credits then TSLA would have to lower the price of the car and they would be a loss.  In what world is $7,500 26.9% of $100k (their ASP, something close to 100k)?  Please, show me the math on that.  >See above.  See *what* above?  You picked that number out of your ass.  >I said competition is ""coming"", not that it's here.  Yeah, and name one that's coming.  Go ahead.  Nothing?  Thought so.  Not to mention, of course, that Tesla's company mission statement is to get other cars to compete with it.  That's literally the entire purpose for the company's existence.  And they recently told everyone else they can use their patents if they want to.  >TSLA has worse battery tech than the cutting edge battery companies whose batteries are coming in the new competition  Oh, the competition which is coming, which you seem to know everything about and yet can't name?  Of *course* the current battery technology is worse than the technology of the future, no shit.  That's because battery tech improves at 8-10% per year.  It's been doing this for decades."

negative: Sigh.  I knew this headline would end up being printed, which is of course wrong.  Tesla said that their run rate will be 100k annualized at the *end* of 2015.  That does not mean 100k in 2015, that means 2k/week at the end of 2015, which means 100k+ in 2016.  It will probably be ~60-70k in 2015.

negative: We can go back and forth all day if this should be illegal, should there be qualifications, standards etc. The bigger issue at hand really is what qualifies as being able to live a basic standard of living in regards to income. Can we even define this? This is the core of the issue at hand. Does someone who was making 40k a year deserve it more or less than someone who was making 1mil a year? I don't know. I do know this, if i can make 100k a year and still live a great life with the ability to save enough to have enough stashed away for 6-8 mos of unemployment, why can't people making 1 million+? It should be rather apparent why people making 40k a year can't  do that as easy.

negative: I agree with the previous comments one thing that got brought up a while back when I was looking into purchasing a Prius was the battery replacement, someone once told me it was very expensive in the event it failed and needed to be changed, I'm not talking about the 12 volt but the big nickel metal hydride one. Another thing to factor is the gas that you will save, normally the Prius get double the gas milage of that of civic or a corolla but unless you drive a bunch of miles per day you really don't see the pay off.  Also if you can pull a CarFax on the car, the 20 dollar investment is worth it because you can find out if it was in an accident or if it's a lemon! I once bought a bmw and didn't do a CarFax and later ended up finding out that the car had more owners than a taxi had customers.  Also just like said above 200k car vs 100k doest always mean the 100k is better off, especially if the previous owner never services it well. Get the car checkout before you make the deal to buy.

negative: Theft of what? ive never taken a penny of your money. My suggestion, if implemented would save tax money and t would esppecially save people the thousands of dollars they often must pay for private insurance that gets worse and worse.  Tell me, do you also want to privatize the post office?

negative: Seems like a good deal to me. You are paying less interest over the lifetime of the loan. And what I would do is take the difference between the new payments and the old, put it into a savings account each month, and when the savings account exceeds the balance of the loan pay it off.

negative: Whoever wrote this article is an idiot. $112,000 income in NY makes you barely middle class. 529 plans and 401k plans are two of very few actually sensible pieces of tax policy this burning dumpster fire of a country has. Come to Brooklyn and tell the high school janitor who makes $100k that he is too affluent to get college savings tax credits and be prepared to get punched in the face.

negative: Don't worry about minimizing taxes too much - worry about maximizing post-tax income.  Keep in mind that if you just got a job then it's likely that the taxes being automatically withheld are based on the assumption you've been earning this much all year, which could mean that you're likely going to be due a refund come April (basically, if you're making 100k/year, but only actually getting 20k this year, they'll still take taxes out as though you were making the full 100k).   If you're maxing out your 401K, you can also contribute to an IRA to reduce taxes (or contribute to a Roth to invest more if you max it out).   For investment I like Betterment, it's well diversified and avoids many common investment pitfalls.  Much better than a savings account, but you should also consider the need to have readily-accessible money in case of emergencies.

negative: I'll consent to this. I get it. But the shop itself is making about 80-100k a month in sales. I realize the wind could shift but as long as I recoup the initial 92k I wouldn't be out any monies. It would take almost a year since each harvest period is 66 days but I get what you mean

negative: "To answer the first part of your question: yes, I've done that!  I did even a bit more.  I once had a job that I wasn't sure I'd keep and the economy wasn't great either.  In case my next employer wouldn't let me contribute to a 401(k) from day one, and because I didn't want to underfund my retirement and be stuck with a higher tax bill - I ""front-loaded"" my 401(k) contributions to be maxed out before the end of the year.  (The contribution limits were lower than $16,500/year back then :-)) As for the reduced cash flow - you need of course a ""buffer"" account containing several months worth of living expenses to afford maxing out or ""front-loading"" 401(k) contributions.  You should be paying your bills out of such buffer account and not out of each paycheck.  As for the reduced cash flow - I think large-scale 401(k)/IRA contributions can crowd out other long-term saving  priorities such as saving for a house down payment and the trade-off between them is a real concern.  (If they're crowding out basic and discretionary consumer expenses, that's a totally different kind of problem, which you don't seem to have, which is great :-)) So about the trade-off between large-scale 401(k) contributions and saving for the down payment.  I'd say maxing out 401(k) can foster the savings culture that will eventually pay its dividends.  If, after several years of maxing out your 401(k) you decide that saving for the house is the top priority, you'll see money flow to the money-market account marked for the down payment at a substantial monthly rate, thanks to that savings culture. As for the increasing future earnings - no.  Most people I've known for a long time, if they saved 20% when they made $20K/year, they continued to save 20% or more when they later made $100K/year.  People who spent the entire paycheck while making $50K/year, always say, if only I got a raise to $60K/year, I'd save a few thousand.  But they eventually graduate to $100K/year and still spend the entire paycheck.  It's all about your savings culture. On the second part of your question - yes, Roth is a great tool, especially if you believe that the future tax rates will be higher (to fix the long-term budget deficits).  So, contributing to 401(k) to maximize the match, then max out Roth, as others suggested, is a great advice.  After you've done that, see what else you can do: more 401(k), saving for the house, etc."

negative: I am 10 years out of college and been debt free for 4.  My school would have cost me $180k for 4 years.  I was aware of the cost to go to the school I wanted and so I worked in highschool for every possible scholarship available.  I then went into a degree program which I knew was a good investment, engineering.  I came out of college in the middle of the recession with you guessed it, around $100k in debt.  I moved to a place where the cost of living made it so I could get a job and save.  I did not live a lavish lifestyle, I invested my money well, and I worked hard.  Garbage in, garbage out.  Go to a bad school, not worth it.  Do not work hard in college, not worth it.  Work hard in a major which has no economic value, not worth it.  Do not set yourself up for success by working hard in high school, getting things like AP credits and scholarships, not worth it.


query: Is there any emprical research done on 'adding to a loser'

positive: "This is basically martingale, which there is a lot of research on. Basically in bets that have positive expected value such as inflation hedged assets this works better over the long term, than bets that have negative expected value such as table games at casinos. But remember, whatever your analysis is: The market can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent. Things that can disrupt your solvency are things such as options expiration, limitations of a company's ability to stay afloat, limitations in a company's ability to stay listed on an exchange, limitations on your borrowings and interest payments, a finite amount of capital you can ever acquire (which means there is a limited amount of times you can double down). Best to get out of the losers and free up capital for the winners. If your ""trade"" turned into an ""investment"", ditch it. Don't get married to positions."

positive: "It works if after the price has halved and you buy more the price then rises, however if you are attempting to do this you are basing you ""doubling down"" on hope, and if you are basing a purchase on hope you are gambling. In many cases if the price has halved it could be because there is something very wrong with the company, so the price could easly half again. In that case it hasn't worked. You are better off waiting to see if the company makes a turn around and starts improving. Wait for confirmation that the stock price is heading back up before buying."

negative: You're using WIX, that's your first problem...but too late for that.  Then you've got to look at the basics of SEO. There are a lot of fundamental things missing, such as content and backlinks.  For content, your products need unique descriptions, for links, try to work with influencers that have blogs (that would be willing to showcase your products).  For a new clothing start-up, your best bet to grow your business from the ground is going to be FB and Instagram ads.  As far as SEO, have you done any research to determine how competitive the market is in regards to organic search?

negative: I completely agree, but this is not different from going to make a coffee or get another beer, go to bathroom do any number of 2 minute tasks that would traditionally be done in the ad break on TV.

negative: When you’re getting any sort of painting job done, you want to make sure that you get the highest quality paint for the job. Do your research ahead of time and find whatever it is that you may be seeking when it comes to paint and you will have a much better result when we come to take care of the job at hand. http://barwickpainting.com/

negative: I find most ads completely ineffective.   I feel that many of them try to hard to grab my attention without convincing me that: 1) I need their product; and 2) that their product is superior to the competition in terms of value and quality.  Sometimes I watch an ad and am absolutely bewildered because I don't even know what was being advertised. It's as if these marketers think that witty humor and catchy music will convince me to buy some unknown product at an unknown price. And there are some ads that are just poorly placed. There is not a single Arby's or Golden Corral within a 100 mile radius of me yet I see a commercial for one at least 3x a day.  Also I'm guessing I'm not the only millennial with loads of student loan debt that is adverse to spending and does some quick research before making any major purchasing decision.

negative: Perhaps they shouldn't stray from their core competencies (as they've clearly done)?  Plus, consider their competition--bad software interface isn't one of the problems their competition has.  Microsoft really stands out as a loser as a direct result of these continual blunders.  Seriously, if they'd put a touch-based Windows 7 option in their Surface products, I'd consider a purchase right now for the RT (or whatever has the Wacom sketching capacity built into it).  That would work great for what I do, particularly when traveling.

negative: "> ""ads don't work on me, I use research"". You think marketers don't know that and influence that?   Yep. What research are you doing, reading reviews? What's the motivation of the reviewer? Did they get paid for it? Are they an affiliate for the company? Did they receive the product free in order to review it?  How did you even end up on that particular reviewer's page? Did you google them? Did you click an ad result? Ever since Google made the differentiation between ad results and organic less noticeable (and put 4 ads on highly competitive keywords, thus dropping the first organic result below the fold) the CTR on ads vs. organic has been quite a bit higher.   There are so many factors, and people that think they're immune to ads strike me as a bit naive."

negative: Through talking with the head of our finance department yesterday and a few BI guys, i think i'm gonna learn SQL and Python so I can then move on to something like Tableau with a strong base.   The company will pay for my training of it so I'm lucky with that. Do you have any specific ways you recommend I learn SQL/Python?   I know of CodeAcademy but haven't done too much other research.

negative: An idiot wrote that story. Right out of the gate they are plain wrong. Interns must be paid (federal law) unless they are SOLELY learning and not performing any work to the benefit of the company. The author should have at least researched one fact. Any fact would have done fine. It's a purely ignorant article.  Source: I've owned multiple business for the last 20 years.

negative: LOL!!!!! Another clueless Trump hater.  I will ask again:  > **What does Trump has to do with failing of OBAMA(!!!!)care?**  Those issues just started when Trump became a president?  > Trump is a shit negotiator,   Sure! Obama did a great job negotiating Obamacare.  **Let's do this: we will wait for the fixes done by Trump to this failed Obamacare, and we will talk after that?** Ok?  > Trump is creating a lot of jobs in criminal defense legal service  LOL!!!!!! LOL!!!!!  Trump is not under a single investigation, while Hillary was and is under several investigations.  Trump is a winner, and liberals like you are losers!!!!

negative: "Research on drugs should be publicly funded in universities. The private sector only invests when the ""hard work"" has been done. The internet it's a good example.. massive public funding in the beginning, when there were profits to be made, suddenly the private sector woke up.. the researchers that work in those pharma companies were mostly trained and educated in top universities with a mix of their tuition fees and public money. Then the pharma companies hire them and make billions off of their knowledge. Fuck that. Universities should do the research, own the patent, price it fairly according to a public/Democratic decision, and let any compan y produce the drug, competing on how efficiently it can produce it. Besides, there is too much of a vested interest for making profit for private pharma, so they continuously push drugs that are detrimental to society like opioids. Only the public sector can ""afford"" to loose money in dead end research and make up for it later."

negative: I started my account with $500 so I know where you're coming from.  For the words of caution, in about 2009 we entered a pretty significant bull market.  During this period you could basically buy almost any big name company and do pretty well for yourself.  So don't be too cocky about your ability to pick winners in the middle of a bull market.  Over the last few years you'd have to try pretty hard to consistently pick losers. I absolutely think you should put real money in the game when you have this sort of interest.  However, at your $400-600 level broker fees will eat any sort of active trading or short term profit you could muster.  Stock trading is not a great way to make money in the short term.  If you're looking to save for something specific you should put that money in a zero risk savings account.   You should do more research on brokers.  Find the lowest possible trade commission at an organization where you can meet the account opening minimum.  A $10 commission is 11% more than a $9 commission.

negative: International equity are considered shares of companies, which are headquartered outside the United States, for instance Research in Motion (Canada), BMW (Germany), UBS (Switzerland). Some investors argue that adding international equities to a portfolio can reduce its risk due to regional diversification.

negative: >Facebook is going down hill as a site. It's constantly cluttered with ads on the news feed,  Not just ads, friends' likes, which you can't shut off. It's becoming unusable to me. I counted the other day - there were 22 statuses or pictures from people I DON'T EVEN KNOW because a friend that I know clicked like on that status/pic. Interspersed with ads, it takes forever to see anything I care about, and I'm ready to be done with it.

negative: > Finally, she found notice from PayPal that a new e-mail address had been successfully added to her account! As far as she can tell, nothing was stolen, and she's changed and increased security for all her passwords. What's really weird is that PayPal looked into it, and reported that the request to add the new address came from (or had been well spoofed to look that way) our ISP, and our address. PayPal could say to within a few seconds when it happened, and it was at a time when all the humans here were asleep. The cats disclaim any interest in the computers  Any hackers out there?  If this was the doings of the insurance company, how would they have done this?

negative: "It's been pretty crazy here, every YouTube pre-roll, every banner ad, etc. It's really annoying hearing people say, ""we at big tobacco support cancer research and think it's great, but this bill is flawed."" As if they would stand behind a cigarette tax law with slight changes...  I enjoy clicking them just to cost the No on 29 people $0.16. Take that!"

negative: You don't even know what an ad hominem is. Hilarious.  >And you still haven't explained what on earth could possibly replace the concept of government.  And now I'm not going to, because you decided to be a turd and I'm done wasting my time.

negative: "I will be attending an ""Information Session"" today with a BB firm with reps from back office/middle office divisions. I've never attended one of these before, but have done a fair amount of research on the firms and divisions that will be there. Can anyone give me any insight on how these events usually go? Should I try to introduce myself to a few people from the divisions I'm interested in, and then follow up with them right before/after I submit my application? Or just ask them some general questions or something. Sorry if this seems like a silly question, I've just never attended any event like this for finance before."

negative: There do not appear to be any specific legal measures to prevent bankruptcies.  In fact, they seems to be part of the means for which rates are raised, for the consequent aim of lowering inflation. See:  The Budgetary Implications of Higher Federal Reserve Board Interest Rates by Dean Baker, Center for Economic and Policy Research. The Federal Reserve Board (Fed) is widely expected to start raising   interest rates some time in 2015. The purpose of higher interest rates   is to slow the economy and prevent inflation. This is done by reducing   the rate of job creation and thereby reducing the ability of workers   to achieve wage gains.

negative: Yes, I've done this. Just added the borderless account into Paypal as a new bank account and the money has now showed up in my borderless account. I used the ACH Routing Number for my USD account.

negative: "Ok, let's revisit some of the things you *did* say then.   >[If they weren't losers and were actually responsible, it would be a different situation](https://www.reddit.com/r/business/comments/6pujj4/economy_needs_workers_but_drug_tests_take_a_toll/dksx7c2/)  >[they are weed smoking losers living at home and getting paid minimum wage, that is if they even have a job.](https://www.reddit.com/r/business/comments/6pujj4/economy_needs_workers_but_drug_tests_take_a_toll/dksv33x/)  > [Stop with the smoking at home bullshit. Most [marijuana users] smoke a few times a day. Even before work.](https://www.reddit.com/r/business/comments/6pujj4/economy_needs_workers_but_drug_tests_take_a_toll/dksu660/)  > [More pot smokers smoke several times a day than drinkers who aren't alcoholics](https://www.reddit.com/r/business/comments/6pujj4/economy_needs_workers_but_drug_tests_take_a_toll/dksu9ad/)  > [That's he problem. These weed smokers do it all the time. Not many only do it on their own time](https://www.reddit.com/r/business/comments/6pujj4/economy_needs_workers_but_drug_tests_take_a_toll/dksumrg/)  > **[These people are entitled losers that don't want to be responsible for their actions. They still live at home at 30 and don't have a real job or make minimum wage, but it's not their fault according to them. They blame it on everyone else ](https://www.reddit.com/r/business/comments/6pujj4/economy_needs_workers_but_drug_tests_take_a_toll/dksupyt/)**  *Those* are the statements I was hoping you would have some research to back up. Clearly, you don't.  Finally, your reply to my statement about your generalizations of marijuana consumers being utterly fallacious is a non sequitur. I have expressed no opinion on the topic of the health of ""escaping reality by doing drugs all day everyday."" If you're curious, I do **not** think that's good. But it has nothing to do with the fact that your generalizations are just...dumb, for lack of a better word.  I'm going to go ahead and depart this conversation now; arguing with raw ignorance is exhausting. Plus I need get ready for my minimum wage job by smoking some the devil's lettuce in my bedroom, which is obviously in my parent's basement."

negative: Google is about to get a kick in the ass. They're trying to compete against a company that fought with many industries on price and yet still won. This is a last effort from traditional retailer to save their business. Google hasn't really done anything great in the past few years, just relying on their ad revenue too much.

negative: Employer match doesn't incur FICA tax (social security, medicare) for you at all - either current year or when you withdraw. All you have to pay is income tax when you withdraw after retirement age. (Disclaimer - I'm not tax professional but has done my research)

negative: CEOs, CFOs and Board member are over-rated.  A company runs mostly because of a lot of gray people taking care of the various day-to-day functions needed and done by the company.  CEOs, CFOs and Board member mostly take credit for work done by others.  But, yes, someone needs to make the top **new** decisions or address new top unexpected situations. This is rare, and to begin with, companies with CEOs and CFOs and Board members are very slow in to make such decisions, and their decisions are mostly based on research and recommendations done by those gray people behind them.  So, no need to sweat over a company running without a CEO, CFO and Board members for a while. It will be just fine.

negative: > The government can stimulate innovation yes, but only at the expense of someone else.  I don't agree with this. There's a very good ROI on investments in innovation. I have applied for subsidies for research and innovation myself. For my government, a ROI of 2000% (!) in 5 years is what they are looking for. But they use a different metric: when I say I create a new job that did not exist that pays 50.000 Euro/year, this is added to the expected profit. New jobs at suppliers and customers are also counted. Everything is taxed between 30% and 50%. So the ROI for the government is there.  The reason innovation in the States is slacking is because the Obama administration failed to invest in research and innovation.  >The actual price of money itself is manufactured  Of course it is.

negative: "To be fair, while he was harsh and over-critical, he was realistic.    Based on your vague wording (understandable, you think you have a unique proprietary idea) but the other stuff you mentioned, I don't think you can confidently say it'll make ""way over $200,000"".  It doesn't seem like you've done much research at all, have a business plan together, or any credible experience to evaluate your idea without personal bias.    Hope you continue to pursue it, but do your homework.  Learn how to put together a business plan, etc.  Because obviously if you came to an investor with your idea explained in the style of your original post, you'd more than likely be laughed off as a delusional kid."

negative: "Get a will completed ASAP.  It sounds like you are not doing a standard inheritance, so you will want to have it down in writing.   If money is an issue, I would research were you can get a will done for cheap, but I would avoid doing a ""fill out the form yourself"" kind of a thing given that this is non-standard."

negative: There are specific cases where you are required to use ADS: Required use of ADS.   You must use ADS for the following property. Listed property used 50% or less in a qualified business use. See chapter 5 for information on listed property. Any tangible property used predominantly outside the United States during the year. Any tax-exempt use property. Any tax-exempt bond-financed property. All property used predominantly in a farming business and placed in service in any tax year during which an election not to apply the   uniform capitalization rules to certain farming costs is in effect. Any property imported from a foreign country for which an Executive Order is in effect because the country maintains trade   restrictions or engages in other discriminatory acts. See publication 946. If none of those apply to your property - you may elect ADS. Why would you elect ADS when you're not required to use it? If you can't think of a reason, then don't elect it. For most people the shorter the depreciation period - the more they can deduct (or accumulate in passive losses) each year, and that is usually the desirable case. If you plan on selling in 10 years, keep in mind the depreciation recapture and consider whether the passive losses (offsetting regular income) are worth the extra tax in this case.

negative: It's not just the US based mailing address for registration or US based credit-card or bank account: even if you had all these, like I do, you will find that  these online filing companies do not have the infrastructure to handle non-resident taxes. The reason why the popular online filing companies do not handle non-resident taxes is because: Non-residents require a different set of forms to fill out - usually postfixed NR - like the 1040-NR. These forms have different rules and templates that do not follow the usual resident forms. This would require non-trivial programming done by these vendors All the NR forms have detailed instructions and separate set of non-resident guides that has enough information for a smart person to figure out what needs to be done. For example, check out Publication 519 (2011), U.S. Tax Guide for Aliens. As a result, by reading these most non-residents (or their accountants) seem to figure out how the taxes need to be filed. For the remaining others, the numbers perhaps are not significant enough to justify the non-trivial programming that need to be done by these vendors to incorporate the non-resident forms. This was my understanding when I did research into tax filing software. However, if you or anyone else do end up finding tax filing software that does allow non-resident forms, I wil be extremely happy to learn about them. To answer your question: you need to do it yourself or get it done by someone who knows non-resident taxes. Some people on this forum, including me for gratis, would be glad to check your work once you are done with it as long as you relieve us of any liability.

negative: For every seller, there's a buyer. Buyers may have any reason for wanting to buy (bargain shopping, foolish belief in a crazy business, etc).  The party (brokerage, market maker, individual) owning the stock at the time the company goes out of business is the loser . But in a general panic, not every company is going to go out of business. So the party owning those stocks can expect to recover some, or all, of the value at some point in the future. Brokerages all reserve the right to limit margin trading (required for short selling), and during a panic would likely not allow you to short a stock they feel is a high risk for them.

negative: "Good for them.  Look how much time different countries spent competing over the Blue Riband (awarded to the fastest trans Atlantic crossing) before the Jet Age took over.    Fixed rail infrastructure for passenger transportation in anywhere other than highly dense areas is a money loser.  On the other hand, we're on the event horizon of a new age of AI capable of powering vast ""trains"" of automated individual modules on the infrastructure we've already built (roads and interstates).  Wasting any more money on passenger rail isn't the way to go."

negative: Which I 100% agree with. Opiates are awful horribly addictive substances that are an issue, I'm just saying I don't like the argument that anyone who smokes weed on their time off is a loser. There is a huge divide between opiates and marijuana

negative: This.  You nailed it.  TJs is pretty much the grocery store equivalent of the Lincoln Mint for hipsters.  If every product is limited-time only special, then by buying it you can promulgate your self-image as the sneering exclusivist sophisticated consumer.  TJ has done a lot of very detailed marketing research and strategy has gone into parting hipsters from their money and it's working.  Good for them.