Earlier this year, I watched as some options plays went from +150% to -100%. I legitimately wanted to die for a solid month.

A few months later, I decide to buy back into the market. No more 0DTEs, but surely I can still pick winners right?

My portfolio has now dropped 17% in just three days. Looks like there might be blood in the water for the foreseeable future as well, but who knows. I sure as hell don’t.

A few days ago, I saw a comment in this sub talking about The Simple Path to Wealth by JL Collins. (I’d never actually bothered to read a book about finance until now, because I’m a genius and can make millions on my own thank you.) I’m only four chapters in but I think this book has already changed my life.

I spent so much time trying to get rich that I never thought about *building wealth*. It’s a complete change in perspective and behavior that requires little more than awareness and discipline, two qualities I have prevented myself from developing due to greed and arrogance.

I’m looking forward to the rest of the book, but it’s already made me feel better about how to approach things moving forward. I may need to wait years to recover the loss of the past few days (so far!), but I’d rather learn that lesson now and see a better way forward than continue to double down on my stupidity and pray for the best.

Yes, in many ways this is me mainlining copium. More than anything though I’m grateful to look at this situation in a new light and see it as a temporary setback rather than the end of the world.

1. Spend less than you earn.
2. Invest the surplus.
3. Avoid debt.

That seems doable enough. Now all I have to do is not be completely regarded.

I already shifted my investment strategy moving forward because of this book though. To whoever shared it, thank you.

Hi guys!

First off- I myself (30's) am a through and through Boglehead and embrace it fully in my retirement planning.

My father, 59, is hoping to retire around 65 years old. Located in midwest, if that matters. He has around 178k saved in his 401k due to historic low contributions and poor investment choices (gambles) that resulted in major losses.

In the last year or so, I have convinced him to take losses on his risky positions and move them into broad market funds. Here's the current situation:

Salary: around 130k

Contributions: 7% w/ 5% employer match (his contribution was at 3% until last year but convinced him to increase it. I'm working to get him to increase it even more)

Home: rents @ $1200/month

Low monthly expenses due to paid off car/modest lifestyle

Current investment mix:
401k value: 178k
97% in Fidelity 2035 Target Date Fund (I know this is a bit hyper-aggressive since he wants to retire closer to 2033 but I'm trying to hopefully help him catch up)
3% in company RSUs (I'm not sure if/what sale restrictions he has- trying to get info)

What am I missing? What could we do better? Am I guiding him in the right direction? What can we do to help him live comfortably in retirement? I expect him to receive social security at a rate of around $3k per month from my googling; plus whatever we can do with his current retirement savings.

On a personal note- have any of you been in this situation where a parent has sub-par retirement savings? Did you feel responsible for supplementing your parents income to help with expenses? My fiance and I are in the process of buying a house currently (in AZ) and wondering if we need to consider buying enough property to build an "in-laws" suit. We make plenty of money ourselves also want to prioritize our future and savings; while also being cognizant of my fathers needs and future.

EDIT* Not sure what I was trying to say when I made that title LOL sorry guys

Hello all- I’m a 49 year old woman working full-time. I would appreciate any advice as I am finally paying attention to my retirement funds. I have about $500k in a professionally managed IRA that is a roll over from my previous employer. I recently read The Simple Path to Wealth and then immediately did a deep dive on my returns in this account. My advisor has been managing it for 10 years, and my annual rate of return is under 7%. If I had invested this money in VTSAX 10 years ago, I’d have $400K more. Ugh!

Anyway I am moving this money to Vanguard. Are we still on board with 100% VTSAX? I realize the book was written over a decade ago. Am I too old for 100% stocks? I have about 15 years before I would need to draw from this.

I have another 401K with my current employer and it’s invested in a target retirement fund, outperforming the managed fund obviously.

I am still new to finance terms/ strategy and don’t understand a lot of the posts in here. Just want to know if I’m too late to implement Mr. Collins recommendations.

Thank you kindly!

I am evaluating full-service financial advisory options to assist with holistic wealth management, tax planning, and retirement execution.

Vanguard’s low AUM fee (0.30%) is tempting, but I have specific needs including ACA income threshold optimization, strategic Roth conversions, RMD management, and proactive tax-loss harvesting (TLH).

For those with similar complex tax and health care planning needs:

• How hands-on and proactive is Vanguard Personal Advisor Services (PAS) with year-end tax strategies (Roth conversions, TLH, managing MAGI for ACA subsidies)?

• Do you prefer Vanguard PAS, a competitor (e.g., Fidelity, Schwab), or an independent fee-only CFP/CPA for this level of detailed planning?

• Are there trade-offs or limitations with Vanguard's automated/advisor hybrid approach when executing precise tax-bracket strategies?

So we've been investing with Vanguard for a while now and we have slowly built up our investments with them over the years. I remember a while back reaching the $50k tier and seeing Voyager show up on our statements and thinking it was a nice way to show hitting a milestone. But by the time we hit the $500k mark (Voyager Select), all of that seemed to disappear. Even the old Voyager branding had switched over to Personal Inventor or something like that on the website and our statements. I did some quick research a year or so ago and read, mostly on the BH forums and here, that Vanguard had basically done away with all of their tiers and had sunseted the names and nowadays, if you don't have at least $5M, you don't really get anything.

So I was pretty surprised a few minutes ago when I got an email from Vanguard titled "Introducing Flagship—the next level of service" and welcoming me to it. There is a link directing me to https://investor.vanguard.com/self-directed-investing/flagship and mentioning a bunch of benefits like priority service, dedicated team, better Cash Plus APR, etc. They mention some TurboTax discounts coming soon. Even logging into our account, it shows it in the top banner:

Welcome to Flagship—the next level of service

More expertise. More support. More ahead.

Honestly, I'm kind of surprised as I was under the impression this isn't really a thing anymore. Did they bring it back, or is it just some legacy thing that doesn't really mean anything nowadays in terms of the number you call? I always thought it was a nice way of recognizing their customers and was kind of sad when I read it was killed off, but I think it's cool if they are bringing it back.

A work 401k plan adds a fee of ".25% of account assets" for all funds in the plan. That's on top of the individual investments' expense ratios (low fee Vanguard total market equity and bond funds, so those fees are low).

Would you continue to max out the tax-advantaged 401k despite this add-on fee, or contribute up to the employer match and then fund other IRAs before returning to fund 401k? The question ultimately boils down to whether that .25% would be enough to change the standard boglehead order of investments.

I got an email today from Vanguard where they’re setting up a new flagship program with a $1 million threshold of qualifying funds. But only real advantage I see is a slightly higher Vanguard Cash APY. It has a link to a landing page.

My sibling and I are inheriting $2.3 million in a Roth and $5 million in a taxable account. The $5 million account is all govt muni tax free bonds that pay about $300k/year income. I’m early 50s my sibling is late 50s. Would you diversify that taxable account? I will need minimal income for another 8—10 years then want to retire fully. Thoughts?

Before I was a Boglehead, I invested heavily in VOO + some other stuff.

Since getting into Bogleheading (word?), I've exclusively invested in VTI + VXUS + BND

I currently have an almost identical amount of VOO and VTI.

Question: Should I continue on VTI only for that category? Or put half into VTI and half into VOO?

Hey everyone, I am an independent contractor (1099) (28 years old) and I make about $120k a year. In my current position I do not have a 401k option and I only have a self-managed ROTH IRA. I currently have the entire IRA in a TDF and I max it out every year. I also have a taxable brokerage account with 60% in VT and an emergency fund in money markets with 10 months of expenses.

At this point my taxable account is outpacing my IRA by about 5% YOY. Since I don’t have the added tax haven of a 401k I was wondering what’s the next best way to increase my tax deferred retirement savings?

I wanted to see how much of my portfolio came from contributions vs growth, so I dug back through 15 years of statements to reconstruct everything. This post is intended to be reflective and perhaps inspiring to fellow bogleheads who may be earlier in their investing journey, so personal details (age, income, etc.) are excluded.

Portfolio summary (October 2026)

• Total contributed capital: $1,081,477 (50.2%)
• Total investment growth: $1,071,960 (49.8%)
• Current invested value: $2,153,437
• Overall growth multiple: 1.99×

How to read the table: Each row tracks the money invested in that year and how much it has grown from then until today, not how much the portfolio gained during that calendar year. For example, the $80.2k invested in 2017 has generated an estimated $119.1k in growth since 2017, making those investments worth $199.3k today. Data Visualized (through an LLM): Here (although I'm sure r/dataisbeautiful could do better).

Portfolio / Data Notes:

• 2011-2019: Investments were a mix of mutual funds in a managed account
• 2020+: Fired my advisor, became a boglehead, and moved 95%+ of existing assets and future contributions into VFIAX (S&P500) with the remainder in short-term treasuries (VUSXX)
• Portfolio includes retirement accounts and taxable brokerage.

Insights (r/boglehead principles, illustrated):

1. The earliest contributions have done a disproportionate amount of the work. The $264k contributed before 2020 represents just 24% of my lifetime contributions but has grown to approximately $836k, or 39% of my current portfolio and 53% of all investment growth. I remember telling myself that consistently shoveling money into the magic box would pay off (thank you, The Richest Man in Babylon) and seeing a 5x return on 2011-2013 investments illustrates that principle.

2. The crossover point is here. After 15 years, investment growth ($1.072M) has almost exactly caught up to all lifetime contributed capital ($1.081M). Roughly half the portfolio now comes from money I never directly contributed. Compound growth really is remarkable.

3. Investment returns are becoming more consequential than new contributions. With a $2.15M portfolio, a 10% market movement translates to approximately $215k in gains or losses, more than I can contribute from discretionary income in a typical year.

That's a double-edged sword. Market corrections will inevitably happen, and the swings become much larger in absolute dollars as the portfolio grows.

But the strategy remains the same to continue investing regularly, keep costs low, stay diversified, and resist the temptation to react to short-term market movements.

The biggest takeaway for me: Early contributions matter enormously, but consistency and time are what allow compounding to do the heavy lifting. Grateful to be a boglehead and would encourage any one who hasn't to read The Simple Path to Wealth by JL Collins. Finally, if you want to be REALLY impressed with big numbers, check out the net worth progression thread on the OG bogleheads forum.

--

Has anyone else tried reconstructing how much of their current portfolio came from each contribution year? I'd be interested to see how the pattern compares for people with different investment histories.

I Bonds have been a topic of discussion from time to time here. With today's inflation report, the new variable rate is set at a whopping 4.08% and the fixed rate is likely to increase to at least 1.30 on November 1st. This makes I Bonds a pretty compelling investment for many of us. Wait until the end of November to purchase since you will get the full month's interest regardless of when during the month you buy.

https://tipswatch.com/

Wife and I have a $540K loan on our primary residence at 6.625%. Both around 30 years old and work full time with first kid on way. Combined gross income is probably around $270K-$300K a year.

We have about $200K in retirement accounts, $150K in taxable brokerage accounts, $30K emergency fund in money market. We put 15% down, PMI is immaterial at $40/mo.

We just bought the home this year and I’ve been making regular payments, nothing extra towards principal. I’ve been putting about $4-5K into the market each month in taxable account, dollar cost averaging into VT. We both also contribute to our 401k beyond getting match, I close to max mine out currently.

Ive been intentional about investing instead of paying off the mortgage to this point. Thought process has been the higher returns in the market will beat the guaranteed 6.625%, plus we will likely itemize our deductions with the new SALT cap being $40K since we make less than $500K. That, and the idea of hopefully interest rates go down in the next 10-15 years and we can refi.

However, part of me wonders if I’m not really factoring in the risk-adjusted rate of return of a guaranteed 6.625%. Home payment is pretty big, that obviously wouldn’t go down if we made extra payments towards the home, but we’d be building equity faster and drastically reduce total interest paid over life of loan.

Would love some outside opinions.

So when i turned 40, my employer started putting money in a retirement health fund. It is currently in a vanguard TDF (VFIFX). My other options are CISIX, FXAIX, SWLGX, FSMDX, VSMAX, FSFPX, FXNAX, SUTXX and some blckrock target allocation funds. I likely won't retire for at least 20 years. Would you keep it in the TDF or do some sort of mix of the others?

As the title says - I’m seeking opinions on what may be lurking in my blind spots in life. Van is paid off and we don’t have savings to buy replacement outright, so I may have answered my own question. We have 4 kids, 2 teenagers, and we homeschool our younger 3 (oldest is starting high school for dual enrollment)

Net take home with all pay, benefits, and allowances

INCOME

Pay: 9634/mo after 400 to ROTH

rental income: 1650/mo (+247 differential to savings)

Total: 11,284

BILLS:

mortgage $1403/mo

rent: 1244/mo

utilities: 300

groceries 1400

gas 400

cell phones: 48

charitable giving/tithe: 1000

Various subscriptions, bills, budgeted spendings (mom/dad day with kids, Spotify, allowances etc) 2000

Total: $8243 (3,041 remain)

DEBT

family - $5,000 (0 interest, scheduled $500/mo

- major foundation repair ($31K) erased all savings, travel, and put us pinching for a year - this was the part I didn’t have saved.

401K loan - 4834 @ 4.75% (383/mo)

SAVINGS

$1000 to HYSA (balance is ~5000)

$243 rental surplus goes to Sep savings for house

Roth 401K - $68K

the remaining 1798 usually ends up either going to savings or spent on travel while we are assigned overseas. we’ve agreed building wealth is second to giving our kids an experience we never had. Understanding a pension at 39 years old (4 years away) will help ”catch up” maxing our ROTH once they’re out of the house. Anticipate by 40 my income total will be ~$160K

Hi, just wondering what some here might do in this situation, cause I have no Idea what I want to do. Couple retiring in about 20 months. I will be 57 she will be 55. She gets a 40k Pension. No debt, own our house, both will get S.S at some point. 600K in roths, 1.2mil in 401Ks. We put in the Max every year in both. Brokerage account with 100k adding 1000/month. 98% of all accounts are in SNP index funds through fidelity.

My question is we just received a 500k windfall. Right now half sits in a discover HYSA and half in fidelitys FZDXX. Why, because I dont really know what I am doing, or what I want to do. Just curious on thoughts going forward. I have been real lazy to date on this whole thing, I know its time to start reading and figuring out a plan. Thanks!

Hi all, first time poster here, but I am puzzling over the above question.

The wife and I have a little shy of $70k saved up outside of our retirement investments that we were wanting to use to buy a house this summer. I originally had it in SPY and cashed out when it looked like we were getting serious about buying in early August. However, just as I did that interest rates exploded and prices in our LCOL, medium sized, Midwestern city have yet to come down. This all means that we are probably going to be sitting on this money until either the price of homes or the interest rates come down, which may be a year or two. We currently own a townhome that is not appreciating as quickly as single family homes in our area, but we do have about another $60-75k of equity there to think about as well.

So yeah, where should I put the cash? It's currently in SPAXX, but I worry that we'll lose additional buying power keeping it in there for too long. However, I also feel wary of risking the market right now, and I don't think our timeline is long enough to warrant said risk.

Just did my 2025 taxes. Wasn’t planning to max my wife’s solo 401k this year, but by the time the income is in the phase outs for child tax credit, dependent care credit, Qualified Business Income etc then the marginal rate gets high.

just put $25k in the software and it decreased my tax liability by $9k. Feel real good about getting that out later at less than 36% taxes.

anyway that’s all. Just a shout out to double checking marginal rate if you’re in a spot to do anything about it with that last dollar going to tax advantaged space.

Are there any allocations of the 3 fund portfolio (US stocks, ex-US stocks, US bonds) that are so unreasonable that no one should use them under any circumstances?

References:

• 3 fund portfolio on Bogleheads wiki
• 3 fund portfolio efficient frontier

Examples of common allocations I've seen:

• Vanguard Target Retirement Funds: 54/36/10
• Vanguard Balanced Index Fund: 60/0/40
• Vanguard LifeStrategy Funds: 48/32/20, 36/24/40, 24/16/60, 12/8/80
• 100% world stocks at market cap weight: 62/38/0
• 100% stocks with home country bias: 90/10/0, 80/20/0, 70/30/0
• 100% US stocks: 100/0/0
• Jack Bogle: 50/0/50
• Dave Ramsey: 75/25/0
• Warren Buffett: 90/0/10
• Bogleheads wiki sample 3-fund portfolios: 64/16/20, 48/12/40, 33/33/33, 32/8/60, 14/6/80

Examples of less common allocations I rarely see:

• 100% ex-US stocks: 0/100/0
• 100% US bonds: 0/0/100
• Stocks and bonds with 0% US stocks: 0/50/50
• 100% stocks with ex-US tilt: 20/80/0, 40/60/0
• Stocks and bonds with ex-US tilt: 20/40/40, 40/30/30
• Mostly US bonds with some US stocks and 0% ex-US stocks: 20/0/80, 40/0/60

Are any of these allocations considered unreasonable, and why? Are there any allocations all investors should avoid entirely, regardless of risk tolerance, time horizon, and other circumstances?

Stats: 27, unmarried, no kids anytime soon, dream of home ownership in the next decade in a HCOL area.

I just finished paying off my grad school loans that were at 7-8% depending on when I took them out. My only remaining student loan now is one I took out in undergrad that is only at 3.73% with a balance of $8500.

Given the relatively high interest rates, I was very aggressive in paying off the grad school loans (about 40% of my paycheck). I know low interest debts are not a priority, but I also know it would feel good to just get rid of it. My Roth is maxed already for the year and I am not yet eligible for my company's 401K.

Looking for any advice or guidance from someone who has been in a similar scenario

Just wanted to check with some more experienced folks but all of my IRA is in one fund, that fund being VFIAX with $22k. Unfortunately I'm unable to maximize my contributions right now but I'm still depositing monthly. It's 100% stocks and 0% bonds. Should I continue putting what I can into this sole fund or diversify more?

I’m trying to switch my portfolio from 100% stocks (VTSAX) to 80/20 bonds. Planning to retire in about 10-15 years.

I am a little bit lost on which ones to buy. I read a bit about TIPS and i-bonds and they seem pretty good. I saw BND and VTIP are also recommended but I see that they went down in value over the last 5 years..

I’m 25, studying computer engineering and working part time. I’m trying to get serious about investing now and put more into it once I graduate and make more money.

My plan is to put all my investing money into a Roth IRA until I hit the annual limit, then put anything extra into a regular brokerage. Not all my money, just what I’ve set aside for investing. Rent, emergency savings and bills are separate. I’m still building those savings so I’m not maxing it out right away.

What I want is to spend my 20s and 30s building wealth so by my 40s I have more freedom. Maybe buy a house and support a family, but I’m not set on buying by a certain age. I’m fine renting if it makes more sense.

Ideally I’d leave the Roth alone until retirement, but I’ve also considered using some of my contributions for a down payment in 15–20 years. I understand that means losing the future growth on whatever I take out.

Right now I’m trying to figure out what to actually buy inside the Roth. I’ve looked at just doing VT or splitting VTI and VXUS. I’m not trying to pick individual stocks or constantly trade. I want something diversified that I can keep putting money into without overthinking it.

What would you choose in my situation and why? Is just buying VT enough? Would you include bonds at my age? And does prioritizing the Roth make sense if I also want financial flexibility before retirement?

I’m new to this, so if my thinking is off somewhere, tell me. I want to understand why something makes sense instead of just buying whatever ticker someone recommends.

For context:

30M , relatively new to investing just trying to not make too many mistakes. In 2021 I received an inheritance of 270k and I did what my family recommended at the time which was use a JP Morgan CFP to advise me.

In q3 of 2021 I invested a total of 370k.

I started to feel like products suggested were more in the best interest of JP Morgan rather than me and have found myself with an annualized 6.65% return since inception. Even though the S&P was ripping. Couldn’t help but think I needed to make some changes.

I sought a second opinion from a fee only CFP and am hoping I could use you all as a sounding board and let me know if I’m on the best path towards FIRE.

There’s a couple of options I suppose I have. 1.) Sell out of JP Morgan mutual funds completely, take a 90k cap gain tax hit to rebalance into the new CFPs recommendations. 2.) Sell over time to rebalance. 3.) Ditch both recommendations and do VTI/VXUS/BND or something else.

———

Total taxable brokerage 860k

JP Morgan:
OLGAX
ONGAX
OGIAX
MJLXX -142k
JUEAX

Fee Only CFP (recommends 80/20 asset allocation)
SCHX - 40%
VO - 20%
VB - 20%
VEA -10%
SCZ -10%
Fixed income (AAA muni bond & MM/HYSA) -172k

Hi Bogleheads,

My wife and I are currently managing two separate TIAA retirement accounts from our respective employers. We are looking to approximate VT (Vanguard Total World Stock ETF) weights (~60% US / ~40% International) across both accounts without rolling over funds between plans.

I’d love your thoughts on our proposed plan for each account.

Retirement Plan E (Husband)

• QCGRFX - CREF Growth R4 (0.07%)
• QCSTFX - CREF Total Global Stock R4 (0.11%)
• VFIAX - Vanguard 500 Index Fund Admiral (0.04%)
• VMAX - Vanguard Extended Market Index Fund Admiral (0.05%)
• VTIAX - Vanguard Total International Stock Index Fund Admiral (0.09%)

Proposed Strategy for Plan E: Put 100% into QCSTFX (CREF Total Global Stock R4). * Why: At a 0.11% expense ratio, it provides a single-fund, set-and-forget global equity solution (US + Developed + Emerging) matching VT's breakdown without requiring ongoing manual rebalancing across multiple funds. * Alternative option: I could build a 3-fund split (VFIAX 49% + VMAX 11% + VTIAX 40%) for a weighted ER of ~0.06%, but 0.11% for all-in-one simplicity seems worth the 5 bps premium.

Retirement Plan F (Wife)

• QCSTPX - CREF Total Global Stock R2 (0.29%)
• TCIEX - Nuveen International Equity Index Fund R6 (0.05%)
• VIEIX - Vanguard Extended Market Index Fund Institutional (0.04%)
• WFSPX - iShares S&P 500 Index Fund Class K (0.03%)
• (Plus active/style funds like VIGIX, VMGMX, VMVAX, VSGAX, VSIAX, VVIAX)

Proposed Strategy for Plan F: Skip QCSTPX because the 0.29% ER is too high, and split into three core low-cost index funds: * WFSPX (S&P 500) — 52% * VIEIX (Completion / Small-Mid Cap) — 9% * TCIEX (International Equity Index) — 39%

Weighted Expense Ratio: ~0.038%

My Questions / Doubts for the Sub:

1. Missing Emerging Markets in Plan F? TCIEX tracks the MSCI EAFE Index (Developed Markets ex-US/Canada), which means Plan F misses Emerging Markets exposure compared to VT. Is shifting ~10% from International over to S&P 500 acceptable to keep things clean, or is missing EM not a big deal in the grand scheme?

2. CREF R4 vs. DIY Indexing in Plan E: Is anyone else using QCSTFX (0.11% ER) as a single-fund VT substitute in TIAA, or would you still recommend manually splitting VFIAX + VMAX + VTIAX to shave off those ~5 basis points?

3. Rebalancing Preference: Since we'd prefer to avoid annual rebalancing if possible, does relying on QCSTFX in Plan E and a fixed 3-fund mix in Plan F hold up well over a multi-year horizon, or does the lack of rebalancing in Plan F eventually skew the target VT weights too much?

(Note: We maintain a separate, liquid 1-year emergency fund in USFR, so our retirement accounts are intentionally targeted at 100% equity for long-term growth.)

Thanks in advance for the feedback!