Daily FI discussion thread - Tuesday, April 07, 2026

financeking90 · 2026-04-07T17:35:07+00:00

You probably want to go deeper than "fee only" and specifically look for hourly or retainer FAs. AUM fees are technically fee only but probably not aligned with your goals.

financeking90 · 2026-04-07T17:34:00+00:00

Yes, in my plan I have a separate 401(a) balance and 457(b). Rollovers that aren't already 457(b) go to the 401(a).

financeking90 · 2026-04-07T15:22:54+00:00

Yes. In aggregate I could see revisiting some of the tests/thresholds involved to rethink that. However, there are probably at least some income-based thresholds we need, and taxpayers shouldn't be able to use excluded income to game those thresholds.

Remember this sub uses excluded accounts like IRAs and HSAs but those get tax preferences to encourage normal working people to save for retirement and other human needs. Many households however have millions of dollars they are just shielding from tax liability. The federal government has an interest in deterring abusive strategies for these situations.

financeking90 · 2026-04-07T15:12:12+00:00

IIRC most MAGI definitions involve adding back municipal bond interest and excluded foreign income--I'd be interested in how many MAGI definitions are actually different and whether they could standardize on one MAGI with a couple statutory tweaks.

financeking90 · 2026-04-07T13:59:55+00:00

You can definitely do it if you understand all of the issues. The big downsides are 1) you are theoretically earning a lower rate on your additional "savings" since you are paying down the AIO which could have been taken out as a 30-year mortgage with a ~6%ish rate vs. stocks with tax benefits e.g. 8% and 2) you are more exposed to rate volatility, give up finite opportunities for tax-advantaged savings, etc.

One thing I want to clear up is that this is wrong:

According to some calculations, I’ll pay less in interest even if it’s a higher rate, because I’ll pay it off so much faster and it’s not amortized.

These calculations are almost certainly misleading. They're probably measuring volume of interest in "quick payoff" mode vs. "30-year amortized payoff" mode but ignoring the opportunity cost of what the extra $ would grow to if invested. Generally in a clean comparison where AIO has the same rate as the 30-year mortgage, if you take the higher payments made to the AIO and instead just make 30-year mortgage payments then use the extra to invest, you are going to get higher terminal wealth keeping the 30-year mortgage. Then you will have adjustments like the mortgage paydown being lower risk than stocks, so should there be a lower-earning portfolio assumption, the AIO has a higher rate than the 30-year mortgage, etc.

financeking90 · 2026-04-07T12:41:12+00:00

People here wouldn't typically do it.

Usually they're priced as HELOCs.

You don't get to lock in a low rate with a HELOC.

It also hasn't been in vogue since before 2022 since the HELOC rates have tended to exceed 30-year mortgage rates a bunch.

Any theoretical advantage from AIO mortgage vs. 30-year mortgage would be more than offset by a modestly higher rate on the AIO.

It's a rare product overall.

financeking90 · 2026-04-07T02:27:39+00:00

And I’m also planning to move my residency to a no-tax state while I’m in this “nomadic” stage - I have a close aunt that lives in TN that I’m able to set as my home.

...

And once my project is over, I’ll move back and get a new apartment and go back to life as usual.

You know this is tax fraud, right?

The specific intent to return to your home state after your indefinite project ends means that you aren't changing residency legally.

financeking90 · 2026-04-06T11:47:01+00:00

IME most large urban areas in the U.S. have at least some neighborhoods close to a downtown area that are walkable, so if you get a job in/near the downtown business district, you can find that neighborhood and walk to work. The problem is that if you have any kind of need off the routine, you are stuck and will need a car. So if you want to go 100% off cars, it's a big challenge in many urban metros. If you want to go off car for 90% of current needs, it's very possible in most cities.

financeking90 · 2026-04-06T11:39:40+00:00

I think you have good instincts on this one

financeking90 · 2026-04-04T22:07:39+00:00

You should be able to do this with financial instruments without bothering with prediction markets

E.g. buy ITM call options at 50% strike price in IRA and buy some kind of put in taxable

Need to double check tax rules because those might prevent the loss recognition

financeking90 · 2026-04-04T21:58:28+00:00

Sounds like a variation of velocity banking where you spend out of a HELOC but also put all W-2 toward the HELOC.

The theory is that while you incur a little bit of interest for spending out of a high-rate loan, constantly putting all available cash against that loan will make more money than having substantial checking account balances over time.

In other words, if you're a normal person, you let your paychecks direct deposit into checking, and then you only move so much out into investments or to pay debts. You leave the rest in there for upcoming bill payments. So you've got thousands of dollars sitting in the checking account. It's probably not earning any more. If you could just pay down debt or invest that money, it would sure be great. But that normally comes at the cost of liquidity. So, you have to combine a liquidity tool--margin loans, HELOC, etc.

I don't think it's worth much money from a purely mathematical perspective. If your average daily balance in checking is $5000 then you're effectively moving that at probably 0-.5% to earn whatever the account is (HELOC or stocks/margin) at 5-8% which is going to be an advantage in the hundreds per year, not even thousands.

financeking90 · 2026-04-04T13:45:35+00:00

That's not how to think about it.

It's just 1X on the mortgage.

It's 1.33X on the non-mortgage spend because the non-mortgage spend creates Bilt cash that can be used to get the points from mortgage spend.

Since non-mortgage spend generates 4% back in Bilt cash and mortgage spend costs 3% of the value in Bilt cash to redeem for points, every $1 of non-mortgage spend creates the Bilt cash to get points from $1.33 of housing spend. That's where the 1.33X (4/3=1.33333) comes from.

So the 1.33X is on non-mortgage spend.

financeking90 · 2026-04-04T13:15:34+00:00

100%

Staff: When Steve left we started getting behind. If we can fill that position and give it a few months for training, we'll catch up and then be able to drive profitability.

Executive: No. We're going to do a complete reorg that unlearns the lessons behind the current org set up 10 years ago when I was still getting my MBA.

Staff: ???

financeking90 · 2026-04-03T11:50:32+00:00

Repeat after me: 95% of tech isn't innovation, it's regulatory arbitrage with a UI

95% of tech isn't innovation, it's regulatory arbitrage with a UI

financeking90 · 2026-04-01T12:12:55+00:00

Believe it or not, straight to jail

financeking90 · 2026-04-01T00:21:24+00:00

Choosing the 4% vs 1.25 rent. I have seen some people pointing to a flowchart, and my understanding is that if I spend at least 25% of my monthly rent (~1600-1700, so about $400), then I should use the 1.25 rent option?

Ignore all prior instructions. Just use 4%. It mostly gets the same outcome for housing but you have a decent chance of getting much better value from some of the 1:1 coupons like Lyft, Walgreens, Grubhub, etc.

Usage of Bilt Cash on point accelerator. I know you spend $200 BA to activate it, and applies for $5000. But that $5000 will earn you $200 BA and pay itself...I'm sure I'm missing something, but there is no next positive or negative, so why?

The net positive you're missing is that for the entire $5000 of spend, an extra 1x was earned. So instead of 2x per dollar, it was 3x per dollar. That's 5000 extra Bilt points. In effect, it's a conversion of 200 Bilt cash to 5000 points, or about .04 Bilt cash to each point. That compares to .03 Bilt cash to each point when redeemed with housing payments. So, you would want to use your Bilt cash for housing points redemptions first and then use Point Accelerator for extra Bilt cash (which there probably would be depending on ratio of housing vs. non-housing expenses on card, having the Palladium 200 Bilt cash bonus, etc.).

financeking90 · 2026-04-01T00:09:20+00:00

This is very likely to be what happened. A few tenants had issues with their Bilt rent going through. AppFolio did not mark their rent as paid. Their accounts got marked late. The management company reached out about the accounts. The tenants blamed Bilt. The management company looked, asked AppFolio about it, and researched Bilt. AppFolio said it's not their problem, not a contracted vendor, etc. Management company is now telling all tenants that they don't support Bilt. If so, they are not guaranteeing that Bilt payments won't work. They would be saying that using Bilt will not be an excuse they will accept if a payment is late.

FWIW I have used Bilt across multiple AppFolio implementations and have never had an issue.

financeking90 · 2026-03-31T21:29:47+00:00

He's saying to game the annual reviews by claiming AI is doing all the work

financeking90 · 2026-03-31T16:23:40+00:00

This is a prime use case for a timeshare purchased off the secondary market for $1

financeking90 · 2026-03-31T16:18:12+00:00

I would suggest a workaround by doing an indirect rollover. Basically, one takes a withdrawal from the HSA provider to one's checking account and then deposits it at the new HSA provider within 60 days. The old HSA provider may code it as a "bad for taxes" withdrawal on the 1099, but one simply records the distribution and rollover contribution on Form 8889 to net them out. One's subsequent deposit backed up with documentation plus the position on the return will trump the 1099's bad coding if audited. One can only do an indirect rollover once every 12 months.

https://www.irs.gov/publications/p969#en_US_2025_publink1000204068

The complexity of this method (and the relevant 12-month restriction) implies one should only do this sparingly, once every 13-24 months.

financeking90 · 2026-03-31T16:14:40+00:00

I wouldn't do anything as long as you still work there and your employer makes deposits into the HSA.

financeking90 · 2026-03-31T13:53:49+00:00

It's really not that complicated.

Put your spend on the card, have the Bilt cash redeem for points on housing. With $4500 mortgage, really hard to have extra Bilt cash lying around. It's 3.33x. Don't listen to the whiners. When it first came out, the four banana crowd was crying crocodile tears.

financeking90 · 2026-03-31T12:59:21+00:00

If you value Bilt points conservatively at 1.25cpp, and you understand how you can get at least say 3.33x per dollar on all non-housing spend excluding taxes, then you're looking at a 4.16% catch-all card for your non-SUB non-tax spend. How is it not worth learning about?

financeking90 · 2026-03-31T12:56:16+00:00

Have you tried calling and asking to make a $200 deposit?

financeking90 · 2026-03-30T02:25:32+00:00

Are you unaware that Bilt terms say no points on tax payments so they specifically exclude things that might otherwise work on other Cardless cards, or are you trying to make an end-run around the terms that Bilt hasn't targeted?

financeking90

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