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Early Retirement Portfolio Asset Allocation, 2017 Third Quarter Update

Here is an update on my investment portfolio holdings after the third quarter 2017. This includes tax-deferred 401k/403b/IRAs and taxable brokerage holdings, but excludes things like our primary home, cash reserves, and a few other side investments. … [Read the rest]

Housing Has Higher Long-Term Returns Than Stocks?

I finally got around to reading an academic paper that looked a bit dry but had a great title: The Rate of Return on Everything, 1870–2015 [pdf] by Jorda, Knoll, Kuvshinov, Schularick, and Taylor. I wonder which of the authors came up with … [Read the rest]

California Residents: Southwest Credit Card Companion Pass Shortcut Offer

If you are a California resident, check out this special offer on the Southwest Rapid Rewards® Credit Card that provides a shortcut to the SWA Companion Pass: Plus Consumer (CA Only), $69 annual fee, 40,000 point bonus Premier Consumer (CA … [Read the rest]

Social Security Provides Majority of Retirement Income for Most Americans

The Washington Post has a rather depressing article on The New Reality of Old Age in America, which includes the following chart about Social Security: For 1/3rd of recipients age 65+, Social Security represents 90% or more of all their … [Read the rest]

Gene Hackman and Dustin Hoffman on Mental Accounting

Richard Thaler won the Nobel Prize for Economics this year for his pioneering work in Behavioral Economics. Of course, he promptly said he would spend the prize money "as irrationally as possible". Here's a light-hearted Q&A from the NY Times. … [Read the rest]

Amazon Prime: Buying Add-On Items Without Minimums w/ Alexa

On of the main benefits of Amazon Prime is that you can buy things whenever you want with no minimum purchase requirement, shipped to you for free. Mostly. Amazon classifies some of their lower-priced products as "Add-On" items, which must be … [Read the rest]

MoviesAnywhere: 5 Free Digital Movies After Linking Accounts

MoviesAnywhere is a service that links up movies that you bought online at one retailer and lets you view them on another retailer. For example, you might buy a movie from iTunes and watch it from Amazon Video. This "digital movie locker" service … [Read the rest]

Amazon Cash: Add $25, Get $5 Bonus Credit

Updated. Amazon is running a new promotion that gives you $5 Amazon bonus credit if you add $25 via Amazon Cash. Amazon ran a similar promo earlier this year that expired, so note that this one is only valid if you haven't used Amazon Cash … [Read the rest]

Barking Up The Wrong Tree: The Benefits of Being Mostly Optimistic

Eric Barker writes at Bakadesuyo.com and his talent/skill is synthesizing hundreds of different sources of academic research and historical anecdotes into actionable ways to improve your life. That's kind of a crowded field these days, but I … [Read the rest]

S&P 500 Total Return: Still Doubled From October 2007 to 2017

In early October 2007, the S&P 500 index hit just over 1,500 - an all-time high. You might have been concerned, or you might not have even noticed. Less than 2 years later, the financial crisis occurred and the S&P 500 dropped 50% down to 750 … [Read the rest]

Kelly Criterion and Your Fun Money Allocation

Do you think you're a below-average driver? I didn't think so. In the same vein, Jason Zweig had a funny tweet the other day that hit home: Admit it: You do it, too.https://t.co/DaI0DON3XK pic.twitter.com/S9F3ILMiNz— Jason Zweig … [Read the rest]

Consumer Reports: Top 10 Cars Reaching 200,000 Miles (Updated 2017)

Consumer Reports has an updated for 2017 list of the 10 vehicles (including cars, SUVs, minivans, and pickup trucks) that reached 200,000+ miles according to their big annual car survey. Here's the list based on the total number of responses … [Read the rest]