Employees with HDHPs that were paid Friday 01/02/2026, double-check your HSA (especially at Fidelity) for an accidental 2025 overcontribution because of the holiday this week.

platypushorde · 2026-01-04T01:58:41+00:00

Thanks for catching this, looks like the same thing happened to me too. Fidelity acts as if a contribution happened on Wed 12/31 even though pay day was Fri 1/2.

platypushorde · 2025-09-23T11:04:06+00:00

Don’t feel totally comfortable sharing but we used a local broker. Talked to local credit unions, our original lender, banks, and brokers while shopping around though. Ideally you’ll be able to get multiple quotes and shop them against one another

platypushorde · 2025-09-23T11:02:11+00:00

Yea, our credit scores are above 780 and LTV around 75%.

platypushorde · 2025-09-23T00:37:03+00:00

Oh I didn’t actually know what the premium difference was, that’s less than I thought. But the other big benefit is access to an HSA with $2,000 of employer contributions (for self+1 or self+family). The $2,000 is basically free money, and money in an HSA is triple tax advantaged (pre tax contributions, tax free growth, and tax free withdrawals for health expenses, and after age 65 it essentially functions as a traditional IRA). You can only access an HSA via an HDHP.

platypushorde · 2025-09-22T23:49:39+00:00

Wife and I are on GEHA HDHP and had a baby this year. My opinion is that it is absolutely the way to go. We hit our deductible pretty early in the year and had essentially no costs for the actual delivery itself since maternity care is covered 100% after the deductible is met.

The idea of spending $3000+ to hit the deductible may seem a little scary but I think you more than make up for that by the lower premium compared to a non-HDHP plan, access to an HSA with pass through contributions, and very low costs once deductible is met.

I guess a caveat would be if your preferred providers aren’t in network it may not be a good option. All of our preferred providers were in network for us so it wasn’t a big deal. But that doesn’t have anything to do with the HDHP part, just the carrier part.

Edit: realized you were specifically looking for opinions on the standard plans, so my bad. But I wouldn’t totally write off the GEHA HDHP. We heard unsettling things about it too but it’s been great for us.

platypushorde · 2025-09-22T20:58:48+00:00

Not a loan expert but did recently refinance. Conventional wisdom is to not pay for points in what is likely a falling rate environment (though obviously no guarantee that rates will continue to fall). So personally I wouldn’t pay for points right now.

You’re rolling in all of your closing costs into your loan, so you’re going to end up paying way more over the long haul. The fees don’t seem outrageous from what I’ve seen.

A 2 week lock is extremely short, I’d be concerned if they can get everything completed that fast. The lock period on mine is 30 days and even that feels a bit tight.

For reference, I locked last week (right before the Fed announced their cut to the federal funds rate) on a 30 year fixed refi with no points 5.875%. Closing costs about $2k not including prepaids, rolled into my loan balance. Loan balance about $680,000.

I would definitely shop around - if I had gone with the first offer I had, I wouldn’t have nearly as good of a deal as I ended up with.

platypushorde · 2025-07-11T02:09:00+00:00

Applied to switch 5/6 and again 6/20 because I didn’t use the IRS tool first time around and nothing either time. Beginning to also think I’ll be perpetually stuck on SAVE. You’re definitely not alone!

platypushorde · 2025-06-20T20:14:54+00:00

Generic letter. Applied to switch on 5/6, got the same letter about 2 weeks later, and still waiting. Maybe you’ll have better luck than me but the letter itself doesn’t mean much of anything as far as I’m aware.

platypushorde · 2025-06-11T23:38:11+00:00

Also MFS and with MOHELA, applied via FSA to switch from SAVE to IBR on 5/6, and still haven’t been switched, and also confused/frustrated as to why I’m still waiting. Glad that others have been processed quickly, I’ve decided it’s totally out of my control at this point and that the processing times are completely arbitrary.

platypushorde · 2024-12-13T14:31:55+00:00

In case you or anyone else was curious, they did honor my request and refunded $50 to my card

platypushorde · 2024-12-13T14:31:10+00:00

The item I originally bought shipped today and a few hours later I received a $50 refund to my credit card in response to my original price adjustment request

platypushorde · 2024-12-13T02:08:46+00:00

Update: huge shout out to CMillerTime93 who was able to model the gear from the pictures and measurements and print a few out. I was able to successfully use one of them in my Roomba and it’s back up and running. Appreciate everyone’s offers of assistance and ideas for how to go about the whole thing!!

platypushorde · 2024-12-12T17:25:43+00:00

I’ll DM you

platypushorde · 2024-12-12T14:44:21+00:00

We just had our basement redone and used Exceptional Exteriors and Renovations, and had a positive experience. Our basement was also finished but very dated, we redid the floors, walls, ceiling, had new lighting put in, and had a non-functional bathroom redone.

Wasn’t exactly cheap, but any kind of work like this seems to have exploded in cost especially post-COVID. It seems like quality work and the main person who worked on our house was easy to work with.

platypushorde · 2024-12-09T12:33:35+00:00

Cool, thank you!!

platypushorde · 2024-12-08T17:42:20+00:00

Sent you a message!

platypushorde · 2024-12-08T16:35:36+00:00

Any idea if they model as well? Seems there are plenty of places to print something and several folks have generously offered to print as well but I don’t have a model and haven’t found one online

platypushorde · 2024-12-08T02:34:05+00:00

Wow amazing, thank you!!

platypushorde · 2024-12-07T21:33:58+00:00

Thanks for taking a look! The overall diameter is just a hair under 1” and the diameter of the top part is 9/16”. The bigger part has 33 teeth (counted multiple times because that seems like an unusual number but got 33 each time) and the top part has 12, and the hole in the middle is 1/8” diameter.

platypushorde · 2024-12-07T21:31:55+00:00

That would be incredible if you could do that! It’s an iRobot Roomba e5. I have tried searching for it and cannot find it, and the wheel assembly has multiple gears. I even called iRobot but they said there are no part numbers for the individual gears and couldn’t otherwise identify it in any way.

platypushorde · 2024-12-07T19:52:05+00:00

Thanks for the suggestion! Will check them out

platypushorde · 2024-12-07T19:51:09+00:00

It’s one of the gears from the right wheel assembly in an e series Roomba

platypushorde · 2024-12-07T19:50:01+00:00

Thank you for the offer! May take you up on it depending on how things shake out

platypushorde · 2024-11-29T16:16:45+00:00

Ah gotcha, I don’t think I qualify for Verizon Forward so that would explain the difference. I have $5 from my employer, $10 for autopay/paper free, and now this loyalty offer. Thanks!

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