I mentioned in an email update I'm planning to sell all my Series I Savings Bonds ("I Bonds") with a fixed rate of 0.3% or below next year. These I Bonds were bought during the last 9 years. The fixed rate on I Bonds was between 0.0% and 0.3% since May 2009, until it was raised to 0.5% only this month. My motivation to sell is primarily driven by the large gap between the low fixed rates on those I Bonds and the current TIPS yield. For example the current real (after-inflation) yield on [...]
I Paid Off My Mortgage But My Housing Cost Didn’t Go Down
December 2017. Congress passed a new tax law. The expanded standard deduction meant I wouldn't get any tax benefit from carrying the mortgage starting in 2018. I decided to pay off my mortgage in 2018. At the end of 2017, I owed $253k. April 2018. [...]
ACA Health Insurance: Ask For Premium Assistance Or Not
After I eagerly signed up for the ACA health insurance for next year on the first day of open enrollment, I received a letter from the health insurance exchange saying we were only "conditionally eligible." The letter asked me to submit a number of [...]
ACA Health Insurance: Different Plans For Different Family Members
California leads the nation with starting the open enrollment for ACA health insurance on October 15, versus November 1 in the rest of the country. As I mentioned in the previous post When ACA Insurance Does Not Include Your Doctor, we are switching [...]
When ACA Insurance Does Not Include Your Doctor
Since I left my full-time job in April, my wife and I get our health insurance from the ACA healthcare exchange (called Covered CA in California). We have an HSA-eligible Bronze PPO plan from Blue Shield of California. We pay the unsubsidized premium [...]
Easy Early Retirement Portfolio Withdrawals
We're in the 4th quarter now. It's time to plan for the next year. When I left my full-time job in April, I still earned enough to cover our expenses for the rest of the year. Next year will be the first full calendar year in which we will be 100% [...]
2019 Social Security COLA
[Updated on October 11, 2018.] The official announcement for 2019 Social Security cost of living adjustment (COLA) came out. The COLA in 2019 will be larger than in 2018, but it's actually bad news. Social Security COLA goes by the increase in [...]
Where To Get Vaccine Shots For International Travel
Last month we saw a good airfare deal we couldn't refuse. A round-trip ticket from the west coast to Kenya was under $900. We are going to climb Mount Kenya in January. We are also thinking of going to Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, and possibly Cambodia [...]
