11F...

"who actively trade"....those are the most important three words in your post. This is why most of us, professional and individual, fail to beat the market IMO. Because we "actively trade." Professionals are active because otherwise there is no commission to be earned. And if they just barely keep up with the market, then what's the incentive for anyone to use them? So they have to try and beat the market. Individuals fail because we're emotional creatures and tend to sell low, despite telling ourselves we won't. But that's where we, as individuals, have an advantage over professionals. We don't have to be active. Buying and selling constantly, trying to time the market, is a very difficult proposition. I'm a firm believer that markets (prices) are irrational in the short term, but over the long term, they are not. That is, today's price and tomorrow's price may go up and may go down, but over the long term, prices definitely bounce around a mean that is reflective of a valuation. If anyone doesn't have a ton of $$ and cheap commissions available to diversify their investments though, I wholeheartedly agree with Vetter that the best thing to do is passively invest in low cost index funds, periodically rebalance, and just not stress about it. 15-20 years from now, you'll thank your younger self. Just for discussion which I think this thread was all about, TGT, VFC, and maybe SBUX are consumer disc companies I like at today's prices. QCOM in tech (CSCO also, but less so). CAH in healthcare. T in telecom. Utilities are all overpriced...SO maybe? Consumer Staples I can't find hardly anything right now....WMT, perhaps. I just bought HRL recently, though I don't think it's really a steal of a deal. TD for financials (it's a Canadian bank though). But you can see none of these are big growth companies. All very boring, based on my investment style. Now, I'm also the guy who said I thought TGT was slightly undervalued last summer at $67 or so. So take my thoughts for what they're worth....not much :) My average TGT price is in the low to mid-60's so I'm definitely at a "paper loss" there. But based on an earlier comment in this thread about TGT though, I do still think TGT is greatly undervalued here. They still have tons of cash and cash flow, they don't even pay out half of it in the form of a dividend and that's even with their reduced guidance. Excellent credit rating, yield at an all time high and payout ratio still less than 50%, P/E ratio is very good, but poor leadership IMO and losing revenue to WMT and AMZN online is certainly a risk factor. That said, TGT's % online growth was more than even AMZN's last quarter (though obviously the scales don't even warrant a comparison really). I could see TGT dropping slightly even further in the short term, but I have no concerns about TGT long term, at this time. I've got a $56 put expiring next week on them and would be very happy to pick up a hundred shares at that price. (And again, for full disclosure, even if I pick up these hundred shares, TGT is still only 3.5% of my total portfolio, so unless you're willing to accept a ton of risk, buying individual stocks should be accompanied with a ton of diversification). If anyone is looking for short term gains though, I wouldn't touch TGT (or really anything else for that matter, since I don't have any confidence in prices short term). In today's market, I do think it's pretty difficult to find many companies that are undervalued. Not a ton of bargains out there right now, IMO. Great thread, by the way. I'll be interested to see the comments of others on here over time, though I suspect that most folks on here prefer (wisely) just dumping money into index funds, which makes most of this discussion unwarranted.

Don't have much input to help you other than to say ENJJPT is at Wichita Falls and I see no way that base is ever BRAC'd for that reason. I suppose it could happen at some point, but with so many countries heavily invested in that location, that seems like a darn near impossibility that it's going to be BRAC'd and if nothing else it's got to be at the very bottom of the list. Not to mention it's only a small portion of the base.

Spaceman, First of all, we're pilots so there's no shame in asking us anything. Just like yourself, we pride ourselves in knowing everything, even if we don't know shit! More importantly, I think the answers you've been given already have been awesome and spot on. mcbush, and nsplayr nailed it on the loan vs. invest questions. Rate vs what's the better return, vs what's better peace of mind for you? And I wholeheartedly agree with MtF on the decision to convert. I did this a few years ago for my wife, the second we PCSd and she had her 401K sitting there. We chose to pay a very small tax on it now (even better for you given your situation) and then that thing grows tax free for 30 years. No brainer in my opinion to convert. I would add a few extra things to think about. I'm no CPA, but I think student loan interest is tax-deductible up to a point ($2500 maybe). I'm too lazy to look it up, but 5 seconds of googling will tell you how much interest you can deduct and what the max income threshold is. With your levels of $$, you'll almost surely be able to deduct it all. $30K at 5-ish% interest is $1500 a year or so in interest, and if you can deduct that full amount, then you're really only paying maybe overall 4% or so instead of the 5%. So that would factor into my "what's the better return" question. Even in today's market and with that deduction, I'd personally still opt for paying off the debt first, then invest (with a small caveat, explained below). Also, this goes without saying, but pay off the higher interest loan first if you can. Once it's at 0 balance, then pay off the lower one. Even if it's within one account, you can still call and ask if you can apply the payment towards 1 vs the other. I suppose all they can do is say no? I also agree with MtF about not losing out on your 2016 Roth contributions if you can't pay the student loan off in full first, which you can't at $3K a month. But you have until April 17th of 2017 to make contributions toward 2016 IRAs. Basically you've got until the filing deadline. So I personally would pay off my student loans (higher interest first, if at all possible) aggressively until the point where you need cash flow going to your Roth. With 3 to 3.5K left over each month, I'd pay down student loans until around Jan of next year, then start maxing out the 3-3.5K into my 2016 Roth, to ensure it gets to the fully funded $11K by the April filing deadline, then immediately going back to fully paying down student loans until it's gone, then you'd still have until mid April 2018 to contribute to your 2017 Roth, if for any reason you guys got into a cash flow crunch. My opinion only. And nice work doing this as an O-2. Keep this up and you'll be set sooner than later.

To offer a counter to what HelloHello just posted above, I just closed with NBKC and had an insanely positive experience. 30 year VA, 3.25%, 6K lender credit, 0 random fees and lender credit was spelled out every step of the way. My originator was Amy Stuhr Paterson. Contact info for her is: 913-253-0190 800-375-8096 x 0190 email address: apaterson@nbkc.com I literally could not recommend anyone more than Amy. Never met the woman, don't get any kickback obviously, but I found her from this very forum and I've gotten great gouge on tons of stuff on here from other bros so wanted to offer the same. I'm pretty sure she mentioned that her husband was a prior Active Duty pilot, because she knew about this forum. Feel free to PM me if you want more details, but in a nutshell, I'm extremely anal and shopped around quite a bit. No one could touch NBKC with rate + credit. My eventual realtor was convinced it was BS and of course wanted me to use her "preferred lender" who couldn't come close to matching. This was my second VA loan, so I only had partial entitlement left. No issues at all with NBKC (nor should it be), but several banks refused to help me when I told them I only had partial eligibility left (including USAA, which I only called for a laugh anyway). Put an offer on one home, but I needed a 60 day close due to overseas PCS from a non-US base (so no good notary options). I didn't use a realtor (tried to get a for sale by owner direct to me on this first home), and seller used world's worst realtor. Amy actually helped out quite a bit in protecting us from a few minor issues from seller's agent. Way above and beyond what an originator would be required to do. I ended up backing out of the house less than a week to close. Offered and contract accepted on a second home. Walked away during inspection. Finally closed on a third home. I was super anal and petty about every line (as I should be, right?!) through every step of the process, and while Amy was surely irritated with me at times, she never let it show and was professional throughout the entire process. She answered every question to my satisfaction and the end result was, with a $1500 realtor credit plus NBKC's $6K, I ended up with a small overall credit after closing costs. Basically my down payment was about $1000 less than what it should have been due to the lender + realtor credits (and $0 closing costs). Anyway, non VA loan rates weren't nearly as competitive, but I would use Amy again in a heartbeat and highly recommend you at least calling her to compare terms if you're in the market.

1) It is most certainly a feature you can opt out of. In fact, you have to sign up for it (at least on wealthfront), and there is a FAQ section for what happens if you change your mind and turn it off. 2) I do understand the concept of tax harvesting. And I understand why it makes sense based on a passive portfolio of ETFs with thousands of investors pooled together, and they can take advantage of daily (I assume) shifts. I can't do that anywhere remotely as efficiently as an individual investor. So I understand and concede that if this was my investment vehicle, while I'd have to look into it in more detail, it is very likely that it would make no sense to "opt out." But I also understand the concept of selling low and buying high (which I get, is not necessarily exactly what's happening here, as they "shift" their ETF into "similar" portfolios rather than "sell" them per se). Obviously they sell them, but you and I both know what the process is. So they sell and buy at the same/similar price. But first of all, they can't be exactly the same ETFs, otherwise the concept goes out the window due to wash rules. But even if they are similar and you're only washing a small portion of that ETF, still by definition a tax loss harvesting strategy means you are selling at a loss. And secondly, from my previous posts one can tell that I'm more of a buy and hold investor. I don't like the concept of selling something at a loss, just because the price has dropped. If the fundamentals have changed validating the price drop, then it's a different story and it makes sense to me. Not based on automation. I think the confusion lies in that I don't like the idea of "tax loss harvesting", because I'm an individual investor but if I was just one in a pool of 10 thousand, then I'd probably buy into it. 3) That said, just like investing into a portfolio of index funds in Vanguard and rebalancing one's self, or using a service like this is not my cup of tea, thud's comment above was spot on. It's better than not investing. Way better. 4) It needs to be reiterated that this entire tax loss harvesting concept is thrown out of the window when it comes to tax protected retirement accounts (i.e., IRAs). Which is probably the highest priority for any citizen to get fully funded. Now once that's done, and folks are looking for additional ways to invest, then this is a seemingly valid option like many things out there. I've said in the past on here, I don't think there's a right way to invest, but there is a wrong way. This would be a right way for some people perhaps. There is a wrong way though.

blue, never heard of them but just looked on their site. Let us know how they do if you end up using them. My two cents...why pay them for something you can do yourself? It looks like they just invest in index ETFs. As has been preached on here before, you can do that yourself and save the .25% commission by logging onto vanguard.com or a variety of other sites. I'm pretty sure Vanguard or any other of the big investment firms have a little risk tool you can use to build your own little market of etfs if you want. Just log in once a quarter and rebalance or set up a lifecycle fund thing, etc. Further, this wealthfront site clams to brag about this fancy tax loss harvest strategy. First of all, that's the kind of thing I'm not a fan of at all (selling at a loss just for tax benefits). Second of all, that's something that will help you none if you're using them for an IRA or 401K, as those are already tax havens. But it looks like maybe you can opt out of this feature....didn't look hard enough. Good luck.

Eindecker, I've never heard of that site before but read through several of the comment streams the other day and thoroughly enjoyed it. Would give the site a plus 1 recommendation for any folks thinking of delving into real estate. Some great discussions on there, particularly from numerous people just thinking of starting out. I will caution any newbies though that some of it seems a bit "too good to be true." I see lots of investors/RE newbies on there overestimating their Cash Flow potential, or perhaps more accurately underestimating the hidden costs of RE investing. And I'm by no means an expert. Further, there seems to be a ton of folks who really over-leverage themselves and encourage others to do the same, at least according to their comments. Some of the strategies I read seem to work great right now, but there is little margin for error. As soon as a crisis hits (major MX required, vacancy, bad tenant requiring eviction which may lose a few months of rent while the legal process works)...any event like this would seem to cause a domino effect and their personal house of cards will crumble. Anyway, very cool site. Thanks for linking.

thud, I'd also add that I whole-heartedly agree with your sentiments about the dangers of non-diversification. Also the illiquidity of RE being discounted by some. Just like you mentioned, future cash flows are difficult to analyze, regardless of investment vehicle. All three spot-on comments.

thud, First of all, thanks for adding to the discussion. Your comments bring up one important question people must ask themselves. What is your goal? You speak of RE having potential costly effects during transfers. For some, this may not be a factor and for others frankly, this may not be of any concern at all depending on what their goals are. You said that trusts cost money, but so do capital gains taxes. But these are good things, as it means you have profitable assets! I find it laughable when folks argue about not selling something because of a tax...shouldn't we all be so lucky! When you asked me about looking at something from various perspectives, not just total return or income...that may or may not be relevant to me. For some people, income is their only concern. I'm not a true income only investor, but I lean heavily this way as I am a very reluctant seller of equities (and a patient buyer...I acquire many and miss out on more by selling puts). For others, it may be total return. For anyone who plans on retiring and using the "sell 4% of my assets each year", then total return is crucial for them, since by their philosophy they need return to generate $$. For even others, it may only be to outpace the S&P 500 with whatever combination of investment vehicle. Or inflation, or whatever metric one wants to use as a measuring stick. So while your comment about confirmation bias is a somewhat intriguing one, another (equally if not more dangerous) threat in my opinion is investors constantly switching their strategy because they have no goal other than to just "make money." If the market does well, some folks get disappointed that their portfolio is struggling compared to so many others, so they switch strategies. Or conversely when the market dumps, it's tough for many to swallow such a big loss so they switch. Or they hear their friend/relative/random internet forum guys doing this or that, which works great (right now) so they switch. But more accurately, I think the fatal flaw is that they don't have any goal they are trying to achieve. Come up with a well thought out goal, whatever that may be, and then come up with a plan to get there. Then one can re-evaluate (think constantly debrief yourself) on how you can improve your plan along the way. As has been discussed on here previously by several other posters, I think the dollar cost averaging/index fund/low cost mutual fund/etf approach with a periodic rebalance is one of the best plans out there for people who want to maximize their profit potential and minimize their risk and effort put into it, while having no real "goal" set in mind. Lastly, I'm not at all familiar with RS Metrics or what they are selling. Nor am I interested in a consumer discretionary/staples portfolio only. I only used Target as an off the cuff example in an effort to not just speak in vagaries, as is often the case with investment discussions (I find). There's much more worthy of discussing, but probably not worth getting bogged down in the forum over it (such as your graph you linked, which is fine and well, albeit generic and irrelevant unless someone is maybe invested in a REIT vs. Consumer staple/disc ETF). Anyway, again thanks for continuing the discussion here as I think it's one that is severely underrepresented in this community.

Okay, the looking way to deeply may be a valid point. If that's the case, I apologize. But I don't think it's honest to say this board is full of washed-up pessimists. You seem to equate pessimism with the complaining and/or disagreeing with the party line. The best leaders (by far) that I've ever had in my AF career were just like any one of these so-called "washed up pessimists" on this board. Some of them were IDE select patches that chose to quit. The best Sq/CC I ever had was this type of dude. It was amazing how high the squadron morale was in spite of all the BS because he was such a non yes-man. And for full disclosure, quite surprisingly, he was actually handsomely rewarded for constantly telling senior leadership that XX is total BS, and I'm not making my guys do this. That said, he chose not to accept his reward and moved on to greener pastures instead of continuing up the senior leadership path. It's been 6 years and he has absolutely no regrets (non-airline job). Rather than preach "must be counterbalanced with a more sensible message from leadership", what folks will respect infinitely more is just honesty. Not a BS party line to counterbalance the sport bitching on this forum.

Do it. Also, go guard, but do it. I hate my life at times. The USAF lifestyle is tough, it's unfair, it takes a toll on a marriage, you might get some raw deals. But I would do it again in a heartbeat (and I'm a leader of the disgruntled). What pisses most of us off are that we have solvable problems that are not being solved, not even being attempted at being solved, and so we're fed up and most now (look at the numbers) are choosing to say "F it, I'll at least go to a place where I can make twice as much and work half as long after serving my country for 11-12 years." No one joins the Air Force, and certainly not as a pilot, because they want to make a ton of money. That appears to the be only true fix your USAF is willing to offer future you. But pilots don't want more money. They want a better QOL, in a nutshell. But all of that said, I don't regret joining at all. Some people do, but not me. For me, I have experiences and memories and friends that I wouldn't trade for anything. My family has the same, even though our life has sucked because of big blue at times. We've also lived in places and made friends that my wife and kids will treasure forever. The USAF afforded me that opportunity, despite all the stress and suck and crap that comes along with it. I took the bonus because of a sweet assignment far away from the USAF that took me well past my commitment anyway, so I figured I only had a few years to retirement on the backside of that job. I do regret taking the bonus at times. And I regret not having ever heard about the guard or reserves when I joined. And I regret the $40,000 I've spent on scotch and beer in my life. Scratch that last one. But other than those changes, I would do it again and would recommend you do the same if this is what you're willing to endure/gain.

I think this statement above confirms that Chang is pulling our chain. And job well done. And not only does it seem to be fun for folks to argue with him, but there seems to be something healthy about the airing of grievances, especially when so many others say the same thing. But read the couple of sentences I quoted. That isn't the kind of talk any GO would spew. "leadership will fall over themselves to give you the choice assignments you want"...come on. That kind of statement, including the next sentence, is 100% intended to rile up the masses. Again I say: Job well done. And I, along with others, will continue to argue with this troll for no reason other than my own self-healing.

This is the killer for me. I don't understand why more people didn't like this post. 69 people will like a post telling General Chang to piss off, but no one wants to acknowledge that with our income, from day 1 in the military, none of us should ever have to work another day in our lives (if you stay until 20 anyway). I think military officers are typically embarrassingly bad money mangers (guilty), and part of it is because we know (at least for a time) that we have guaranteed income while in the service, and most likely guaranteed once we're out. But I'm with you on this decision of work a bunch/make a bunch or work none/make some being a no-brainer. When I was in ROTC, a First Command (I'll buy you a drink AND save you $20,000 if anyone is actually still investing with them...PM me) and a USAA sales pitch were the only 2 "mil sponsored" $$ briefs I ever got while in school. That is embarrassing and borderline criminal for our service members. I was too busy eating chicken wings and drinking beer (amongst other things) to pay much attention in college, but if I would have had half a brain and mapped out my financial life at age 22, I would be set for life by now. If I didn't have a family now, I would never work a day after retiring and live the exact same lifestyle/standard of living as I do now. Because I do have a family, I will continue to work, and maybe for the airlines one day. But not by choice, and certainly not for 20 more years. I'm attempting to build a passive income stream, and that's where I 100% agree with your philosophy. Mil folks, enlisted for sure, but certainly officers, have absolutely no excuse to end a career, whether that's 5, 12, or 20 years, without a solid foundation of passive income built up already. I assume, like you, I can't live off my passive income once I quit right away, but I can definitely take a job at McDonalds if I want to, for fun. Or take 6 months off. Or coach high school baseball and teach "maths" or something. Pretty much until I don't want to anymore. One quick half-drunken proofread of this leads me to say 2 things. 1) I use a lot of commas. 2) target is again slightly on sale today closing at $67.06 (reference my random stock example in a previous post). This is only posted for future accountability/ridicule/disclosure, and since most free stock advice is rarely specific. Also, TGT increases their dividend next month...2003 is the last time they haven't had a double digit dividend increase (that includes that great recession we had from 08 to 09). For those looking at a reasonable long term investment, the transgender bathroom sensation is a perfect example (IMO) of how to take advantage of buying stocks on sale.

What a huge crock. The only thing truthful in this statement is "money in the airlines isn't everything." Which is ironic coming from you. WTF is wrong with someone deciding to go on to a different career path, especially after serving 12 years of his life in honorable military service. I understand you're always ganged up on this forum and thus feel the need to be defensive at every turn, but what is wrong with a guy getting out to earn more money and have a better QOL with his family. He may very well find out that it was a mistake on the outside (and god forbid continue to serve in our guard or reserve force), but shake his hand, or on the message boards of the interwebs version, wish him good luck. He's already made his choice, so no need to tell him what a dumb ass he is for making it. Instead, why not say "thanks for your service, please tell all the kids that you give wings to to fly for the USAF, and I'm sure the guy that gets your spot at IDE will be grateful and kick ass since 99% of us do." That's how you tactfully respond as a leader. Even on the anonymous internet. Not by being a dick. A WG/CC of mine years ago made an 11F who just quit (and not to join the airlines mind you, but just to go AGR) report to his office for a severe ass chewing for being a quitter and effectively gave him a much more foul mouthed version of what you basically just told wolfpack. Then he finished and said, "I want you to go back to the squadron and tell every MFer what just happened here in case any one of them is thinking of quitting." And he did. Immediately. The effect of this crossfit loving 1 star did not go as intended. No one felt threatened. Everyone did though have their "he's a dick" suspicions validated.

Your last sentence is a false statement. Not all online MBAs are created equal. Many of the AF square filler online degrees are exactly like what you speak of, but the world is a busy place today and there are lots of online degree programs that are challenging and filled with full-time working career minded students, just like those of us in the military. I would argue that one of the biggest perqs of my "online" degree was the networking it built. 2 unsolicited job offers from on-line student peers (not the random headhunter crap on link'd in), and I have connections that I've used multiple times. Bottom line, like everything, do your own research as there are pros and cons to both, but to dismiss all "online" MBAs as a waste of time is big false stereotype. Many do fit that description though and I would completely agree that if this is for square filler purposes, ACSC, ERAU, Touro, and the like are all excellent choices at achieving the desired result with minimal time, effort, and $$.

It's just a philosophy shift for me. The rebalance approach was previously my strategy, and I think it's a great one, but it just doesn't fit my goals anymore. I prefer to be much more hands on now, and try to view my investments as individual ones rather than a broad market of stocks. I'm not concerned about bull or bear markets, but rather which of my companies are under vs overvalued. This is only within accounts I have lots of flexibility and control over, however. For my TSP, for example, I do subscribe to the re-balance theory exactly as you describe. For my personal Roth and taxable accounts, which I obviously have much more control over, I don't want transaction costs and market timing efforts by rebalancing to erode gains which I feel I have better control over by utilizing buy and sell decisions individually. And I buy way, way more than I sell. But again, there's nothing right about my plan and wrong about someone else's. Well, there are lots of "right" and lots of "wrong" ways to invest in my opinion. Definitely no perfect one-size fits all approach, which was meant to be my original point.

Ping, Haven't listened to your podcast yet, and I'm still just slowly getting addicted to this site, but wanted to say I appreciate your commentary on here recently, and I'm impressed with your passive income stream you're building. That said, I think you summed it up best with your comment "nothing is perfect" above. Long term RE is great for some, but you claim it's either that vs. "speculation" in the market, which clearly aren't the only two options one has for trading/investing. I tend to agree with you that long term RE is an awesome investment plan, and I love the passive revenue stream it can build. That said, for me personally, there's only so much of my asset/investment base I want rooted in any industry, RE included. I am not a market speculator. I am an investor. When I buy equities, I am buying businesses. Just like when you buy real estate. You plan on long term buy and hold with RE and I view my stock purchases as the same. I don't sell them when I need money, or "rebalance" to maximize my stock vs. bond weight. I bought ownership in those business, and I expect them to pay me for it. Just like a renter. And most of them do quarterly. I certainly don't sell them if the market is crashing (just like you don't sell RE during a housing crash). I may reluctantly sell them if they get overpriced, because just like in RE, sometimes folks offer you a deal that you just can't pass up. And every once in a while, I might sell when I see the company is starting to suck. Neighborhood is getting bad, rent is decreasing, I would assume same would apply to RE. RE has some significant advantages, specially when it comes to taxes that you can't find in equities. And I think it's more work and seems scary/difficult, which keeps people away which likely gives people willing to do some due diligence a huge advantage. But I feel I can take advantage of the stock market so much easier and with much easier research than RE. That's me only though, plus I have neither the time nor the interest to do any "fixing up" in any RE and I know many folks eat this up and it's great profit potential. What's easier for me is to watch the news when I see Target has credit card numbers stolen...oh crap, everyone hates target, sell, sell, sell. Nothing is wrong with target to me, except it's on sale. Target has paid me rent every quarter since that disaster. My target rent has gone up every year. They've paid me back almost 10% of what I paid to own it, and far outpacing my RE rent increases. Their rent will go up again Sept of this year. If the stock market crashed tomorrow, people will still buy crap at target, who will still pay me rent. I'm not a speculator in target. I'm an investor in it. But that's not to say one can't be highly successful speculating/trading stocks or doing the same with RE. No right or wrong answer. Bottom line, I think the major takeaway is as you began with..."nothing is perfect." Some folks may be uncomfortable with RE, some with active investing, some with passive investing, some with bonds, some with using technical analysis, etc. In my opinion, the most critical areas for anyone is to have squared away is to 1) live within your means leaving some left over for investments, 2) diversify those investments so as not to piss everything away when the shite inevitably hits the fan, and 3) a well thought through plan for liquid funds if you need them. Anyway, bit of a rant but I look forward to listening to some of your shows in the near future. I've learned so much crap on here the last few months from trolling these forums that I have to give a big thanks to all the dudes writing crap on here. Almost every post is either instructional or comedic...and most of the time both.

Good stuff. Thanks Ping.

Agree that this probably isn't the thread for other investment strategies, but to your point on USAA only charging $10 for your Roth deposit, that was part of my original point/question. That's assuming you save up $5500 during the course of the year and dump it once into the ETF, right? Can you make $200 deposits weekly with USAA like you can with Vanguard with no fees? I'm guessing you can, but only if it's within a small group of funds/etfs? So if that's the case, I think USAA would be a terrible place to invest. You are way right for active investors USAA is terrible. Tons of firms waive fees or discount them. I've bounced around and use Scottrade currently. It takes one phone call every year or so to get free trades. I like their FRIP (flexible dividend reinvestment program) and buy a lot of stocks via options, and their fee structure works well for me. Vanguard I still vote is far and away the best place for folks to put investments in if they're into passively investing. No one has their TSP money with USAA, so the "all my money in one place" is total BS. Vanguard takes 10 seconds longer to pull up your account than doing it on USAA's website. And it's quicker than seeing your current portfolio in TSP, IMO.

That's valid, and I know you previously mentioned it in this thread. Good for guys to know. That said, the options (from what I remember) are pretty limited and even then, you're still charged a commission of $9 or $6 depending on your assets I guess for each purchase, right? Vanguard, for example, allows folks to just dollar cost average blindly each month like TSP, and one isn't charged any commissions as long as they are Vanguard ETFS, funds, etc. Then if your asset base is large enough ($500K) trades are only $2 a pop. Since I don't use USAA as a brokerage firm, but some of the folks on this thread may, I'm curious if USAA offers that option (waive commissions if you set up recurring deposits into funds, etfs, etc.) Also, I noticed that their step up from Gold to Platinum status, when trades drop $3 a pop, is only $50K in assets. There's a note that alludes to the fact that lower commissions can be negotiable depending on amount of assets. Anyone have any experience in doing this with USAA, and if so, would you mind giving us a ballpark asset base and how much they charge you for trades? The note specifically stated that family members' assets were pooled to count as a higher number for this deal.

+1 on the Vanguard recommendation. I don't use them anymore as I'm more active in my investments now that I've grown wiser and drink less, but USAA is probably one of the worst places to put investments. Other than First Command? Do those guys still even exist anymore? Anyway, until you figure out how to invest, have the time to actively manage your investments, actually have the interest to manage your own investments, Vanguard is a great place to park your money. Lots of different options for the average consumer to pick risk tolerance, timeline, etc. (basically have some control over where to park your cash) and then just ride it out for 20 years. Not guaranteed to make you a ton of money or even any money, but I can guarantee that they will steal less of your money in admin costs/fees than USAA and many other banks/firms. $200 a year doesn't sounds like a bunch of savings in the scope of a $40000 IRA, but that money reinvested every year and compounded over 20-40 years ends up being a huge pile of cash that's not worth pissing away just because someone "likes USAA's customer service" or is too lazy to make a phone call to Vanguard or somewhere better than USAA.

I did an ASU "online" MBA from Tempe. We had to go to campus for a 3 or 4 day inbrief thing, then the rest was virtual. It took 2 years...crushed my life at times, but in the end I actually learned a shit ton. Was it worth it? Meh, probably not as I doubt I'm going to "use" that degree for anything other than personal finance decisions that I likely would have learned anyway. That said, I took 1 ERAU class using TA and dumped that program down the shitter as it was the biggest waste of time, taxpayer money, etc. My 5th grade math class was more difficult I think. Most important question, as has been addressed many times, is what one is looking for from the degree. Box checker?...lots of cheap, easy options that are likely very good options for what some folks are looking for. If that's not what you're looking for, there's also a ton of brick and mortar schools that make a Masters program doable online, executive, weekends, etc. FWIW, there were probably 15 active duty guys in my ASU program of maybe 100 or so students. And many in my program were full time workers somewhere, traveling abroad all the time...so it was flexible enough to make work even with our schedule. Feel free to PM me if anyone is looking for an "online" brick and mortar option and wants one man's experience.

Just got my official notification on 17th of April. RNLTD 15 June. I'm currently on an exchange in BFE, nowhere. Can't wait to finally get a RIP and start the outprocessing process (department of redundancy department) 1000+ miles from my "base."

Only took a week for me for the entire process, beginning to end, to have money in my bank account. For reference, I started my application 2 days after the official release, so I'm not sure what kind of backlog has built up since then, but there were at least 2 days for folks to submit before me, and it clearly wasn't backlogged yet.

Also FWIW, I've filed my own taxes every year of my life with moderately complicated returns (at times), and I ran the numbers a few times and figure that taking the half up front option costs me right around $1000 over the total 9 year period. The extra money in year one can be stuck in a freaking savings account even at today's rates and make that interest back in 4 years. 11F, I don't know your personal situation and the extra $10K cost may be completely accurate for you, but for anyone else considering the two options I just wanted to offer an opposing viewpoint and don't want anyone to come on here and take it at face value that the lump sum is the wrong choice, because in my case (married w/ non-working spouse and 2 kids) it is definitely in our best interest to take the money now. Not to mention another key point you make is that all of this is assuming tax rates stay at current levels. I'd bet a million dollars that tax rates stay the same or go up. No way do they go down over the next 10 years (meaning I'd prefer as much of my money taxed now at a potentially lower rate). Plus my income will only go up over the next 9 years, not down or stay the same. All of these factors made it a no-brainer in my situation to take a lump sum. And for my personal situation, I am a non-school dude who had one foot (actually 1.75) out the door based on everything that's been discussed ad nauseam on here. The allure of a retirement at 20 years and a very good assignment (outside the pain of the USAF) are what kept me in, and without the sweet assignment, there was a 0% chance I was staying. Even with the favorable assignment, it was still an incredibly difficult decision, and I can say that in my situation the bonus played zero role in my decision. Had there been no bonus this year, I would've stayed in (because my next PCS will be at around the 16ish yr point and my family and I have decided that I/we can endure 4 years of pain for the big retirement prize at the end). We'll see if it's a decision I/we end up regretting, but I don't think that's a question I can answer until 20-30 years from now. To Rusty's point about all the bonus-takers being school-selects, while not necessarily true, his point is valid. There will surely be guys who take it and are not school selects/fast-burners/whatever. But the real question is what percentage of ARP takers were staying in for 20 regardless of the bonus? I'm a beneficiary of $225K, but I'll be the first to admit I think it's an absolutely terrible, lazy, expensive, and completely inefficient retention tool. It's frustrating as hell to me, because I think the majority of folks who take the bonus are/were staying in anyway (not to mention the multiple posts on here discussing the root causes of the problems, none of which the bonus fixes or even addresses). If the AF took all this freaking bonus money and was able to subtly funnel it into a pool of money that could hire a bunch of civilian schedulers, day laborers, and generally all around queep do-ers (that apparently the Pentagon thinks we already have?), you'd have a helluva lot more morale going around the squadrons, and with a few additional tweaks in the way we collectively manage our people and our operations, there would no longer be a need for an effing bonus because folks would enjoy coming to work everyday. It'd be a win/win.