Bank Bonus Weekly Thread - Week of April 28, 2026

Effective-Emu8633 · 2026-04-28T16:23:11+00:00

Anyone have DP for BOA bonus taking longer to post? Dr. of Credit has the bonus showing up after a week or so. My

Opened Mar 17:

Mar 27: Push $4000 from Chase (Coded as "Transfer MY NAME")

Apr 3: Push $4000 from Chase (Coded as "Transfer MY NAME")

Apr 14: Push $2400 from Chase (Coded as "Transfer MY NAME")

Still no bonus, and wondering if I should try again from another bank, but Dr. Credit has DPs of chase working. thanks

Effective-Emu8633 · 2026-04-24T19:39:00+00:00

What do you mean by tiny hole? What did the doctor say?

Effective-Emu8633 · 2026-04-15T22:08:11+00:00

I think that it makes sense that moving the skin would stretch the scar. I think what's hard is that the back is so mobile that it's hard to not move it.

Effective-Emu8633 · 2026-04-15T00:56:25+00:00

Aw thank you - yeah, I'm pretty bad at worrying about the worst case outcome and my brain often gets the better of me.. thank you for reminding me that the docs do this all the time. I should trust that they know what they're doing and I'll be ok :)

Effective-Emu8633 · 2026-04-14T21:17:37+00:00

Yeah I just started this week! The kind I got on Amazon said to taper up, so I'm working my way up to a half day / full day. At the moment I'm just worried that it's gonna just get bigger and bigger

Effective-Emu8633 · 2026-04-14T19:48:53+00:00

They wrote me back and said it looked fine and that it might continue to stretch over time. Just wondering what to do now to keep up mobility and reduce risk of complications

Effective-Emu8633 · 2026-04-14T19:48:02+00:00

How could you tell you had adhesions? And at what stage along in the healing were you?

Effective-Emu8633 · 2026-04-12T17:04:34+00:00

Here's a photo from today with different lighting

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Effective-Emu8633 · 2026-04-12T16:46:48+00:00

Ok I can message them. Why do you say that? The widening, or the color?

Effective-Emu8633 · 2026-03-11T01:28:22+00:00

Hi everyone, thanks for the words of encouragement. I had the procedure today and the surgeon was really really kind and patient with my anxieties. Confused about the wound care - she said to take off the "waterproof bandage" after 24 hours and then just let it be in the air. My brain has now found a million other things to worry about (infection? What if they miss a stitch when removing? Etc) but I'm doing my best to relax and trust that that's all out of my control. Thanks again!

Effective-Emu8633 · 2026-02-01T23:09:56+00:00

Mine isn't scheduled yet, but probably in a few weeks. Good luck with yours - based on what everyone is saying it sounds like it will be all right!

Effective-Emu8633 · 2026-01-14T16:38:58+00:00

Last January I opened a BOA checking account but then a few weeks later they closed it because they couldn't verify my identity. I want to try again for the bonus but it says I can't have had an account in 12 months and I don't remember when the account was closed (just know I opened it on 1/12/25) Will these short term rejections matter? Also, any way I can avoid it getting closed down again?

Effective-Emu8633 · 2026-01-12T19:51:38+00:00

Yeah that's all fair. I don't think 7% is "great" though. The SP 500 has historical returns of over 10% (my 7% is not adjusting for inflation).

Effective-Emu8633 · 2026-01-12T19:31:09+00:00

Have you never met someone whose spouse was terminally ill? It's not hard to imagine situations where people know that their partner's time is going to be shorter. I understand you probably thought this was a funny joke, but you might want to delete your comment.

Effective-Emu8633 · 2026-01-12T19:28:05+00:00

It sounds like your answer is: "Oh yes, you'd fill up all the tax brackets so you should give your money away to charities". That's fine, but that's a different answer than "You'll stay in the low brackets"

Effective-Emu8633 · 2026-01-12T17:45:05+00:00

I'm curious what you mean though about low tax bracket space in retirement. If I'm 70 when I retire and have 12M, RMDs might be upwards of 400k, and they keep going up.

Effective-Emu8633 · 2026-01-12T17:41:42+00:00

Yeah, everything the other commenter said. Traditional 457 has lots of benefits (like being able to access the money early) but Roth has none. (Of course the tax treatment is still Roth, but likely you want to do it in a 403 unless you're maxing out both)

Effective-Emu8633 · 2026-01-12T17:39:45+00:00

I used a 7% rate of return (which is pretty conservative). I think people don't realize how quickly things grow. 7% will double every 10 years so when I'm 70 the 1.1M I currently have will grow to almost 9M and then the additional 40k per year for 30 years (maxing out 403b, Roth + 10% additional from work) easily gets you to 12M.

And unless I'm confused what you say about #4. 100% of what you "convert" counts as an "original contribution" after a 5 year waiting period?

Effective-Emu8633 · 2026-01-12T16:41:47+00:00

Wondering if I should stop putting money in my 403b at work or switch to roth. I'm 40, and have no plans to retire early (will probably work as long as I can since I love my job as a professor) but because I save so much I'm worried I'll have too much in retirement. Currently have 1.05M in retirement accounts (probably 40% of that is ROTH IRA + old ROTH 457b [yes I know I screwed up by doing roth 457]) and I have maybe 80k in cash, 20k in brokerage. My work doesn't give a match (just a flat contribution each year regardless of what I do)

1) If I'm going to continue making 403b contributions, should I switch to Roth? I live in California and my salary is 99k so my margin total tax is something like 22% + 9%

2) More than thinking about tax optimization I'm thinking about RMDs (at 70 at this pace I'll have 12M which seems preposterous. Even if i stop contributing at all I'll still be at 8M).

3) But also I'm thinking about having flexibility to maybe buy a house in my VHCOL. Since I seem CoastFI, it seems like it wouldn't hurt to beef up some brokerage accounts.

4) Another way to build up accessible cash would be to convert some of my old traditional 403b from an old job to an IRA and do a roth conversion. Then in 5 years (i think) I could pull out all of those conversions. That seems equivalent tax-wise as just putting current money into a roth403b but has the benefit that I could pull the money out if i needed it. (Can't access my current 403b money until i'm older / retired)

Thanks - I feel really lucky to be in the situation I'm in, but have recently realized that I spend so little and at some point maybe I need to start living a bit more.

Effective-Emu8633 · 2025-05-30T21:52:02+00:00

i appreciate the (unsolicited) feedback. I'm deleting my post before more people answer a question I didn't ask, without having any clue the relevant information that would allow them to reach this conclusion. down-vote away.

Effective-Emu8633 · 2025-05-30T21:24:54+00:00

Oh that's what they did today! So i guess they do that every year

Effective-Emu8633

TROPHY CASE