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A bit of clarification here. Gary knows his stuff. When I refer to the market controlling various decisions, it does, but this does not mean that an asset allocation profile of 100% stocks and 0% bonds is in play. One mixes. As long as one has any % greater than 0 in the market, then its movements are going to matter. Another thing worth mentioning. Scams. Not the illegal kind. The legal kind. Every mutual fund manager and every 401K program Does Not Want Anyone To Retire -- EVER! They are paid out of Annual Expense Ratios. If that number is 1% and your account is, say, $200K,

I feel your pain. Earning six figures is not that big a deal nowadays, but I guess that's the old yardstick. I went past that threshold years ago and it's just kept going up. The bonus each year is substantial and tacked on. Toss in some good years in the market since 2002 and it becomes pretty clear that what used to be a hand to the forehead and a thought "there has to be some other way" has now become "that other way has arrived." Pulling the string too soon is what worries me, too, and that website I quoted above seems to be the only objective measure to tell the tale. www.firesee

Guys, This comes up often, but the question does have flavors. The first flavor is "How much does it take per month to live in Pattaya?" That information is well covered in the Wiki at the upper right of this page. Look in the Expats area. Learn to praise Soi7, Gary and Eneukman, who kindly provide data on how one lives in Thailand in various ways The second flavor is much more complex and it is . . . How much money do I have to have to last 20, 30, 40 etc years if I am spending X amount of money per month with inflation increasing that amount and with investments varying year t

I'm not a Brit and can't say if something like this is available to you folks, but in the US one of the favorite estate management tools available to people who want to protect inheritance for their family is a trust. A trust is a legal entity that people put their money into. It costs some money to set up, but once it is set up, because it is not human, it does not die. You do. It doesn't. You set up its "rules" to pay out benefits to your family under specified circumstances. Because it does not "die" it is never subject to estate tax. Now if a guy was cheating on his taxes and

Ditto. The Brits may not do dinner well, but they do a great job of breakfast.

A particularly good, and recent, article about ATM withdrawls and credit card fees used in foreign purchases. The focus is for travelers, but the details are solid. http://www.concierge.com/cntraveler/articl...articleId=10173

IRAs, Roth IRAs and 401K (paragraph number of the Internal Revenue code) are ways in the US to put money in a special account that grows tax deferred, or tax free, for retirement. Outside those accounts, the US taxes you on savings interest or stock share gains. Inside the accounts, generally not. Lots of details and complexity. I'm sure you have a UK equiv. The market is up, but only about 6% year to date. 5% last year. Barely 10% the year before that. 20+% in 2003 coming off the multi-year big declines starting in early 2000 and aggravated by 9/11. The 6, 5 and 10 numbers are not

Arghh, missing parens: Value of Later Money = (1 / ((1.0 + inflation rate)^Years)) X Value of Today's Money There. Much prettier.

I'm not a Brit, but I know something of how Cost of Living Adjustments unfold, so here's a quick and dirty formula for you folks to project the effect of inflation Value of Later Money = (1 / (1.0 + inflation rate)^Years) X Value of Today's Money The ^ symbol means "raised to the power of " and the inflation rate is annual. So if the British inflation rate is expected to average 4% for 15 years the result is Value of Later Money = (1 / (1.04 ^ 15 = 1.8) = 0.55) 0.55 X Today's Money If your pension freezes for 15 years from age 65, then your 80th year will require you to

cd Eneukman does yeoman's work keeping the board updated on living expenses. There are lots and lots of details in other posts. Recommend a search on Eneukman. Alan, you have been talking 80K baht/mo for many months now and apparently that is holding up long term? Your 20K baht 2 bdrm condo/apartment is a big chunk of course but there's always other stuff. cd has at least a valid point that the numbers are as dependent on women as on housing. If one is a drinker, one is going to have to come to terms with costs. Everyone is different so Alan's habits may not mean anything to s

No huge value to this information below, but it's easily available from expatfocus.com and provides a comparison Costa Rica: Residency for Pensioners or Retirees (Pensionados or Rentistas)- If you earn $600 per month from your pension, or $1000 a month from your investments you can qualify for these permits. Phillipines: The requirements are basic: ID documents and medical/police checks. Bank certification of dollar time deposit as followed are required: - 35-49 years old - US$ 75,000 - 50 years old and above - US$ 50,000 - Additional dependent (in excess of two) - addi

From the Thai perspective, what sense does it make to grandfather any increase? They pick a number to generate government revenue and presumably they pick a number that in their view maximizes revenue -- meaning that so much more is made by those who do not flee elsewhere that it overwhelms the loss from those who do flee elsewhere. I don't see how grandfathering is beneficial to their government coffers in this regard. Everyone would pay the same, new arrival or old arrival.

A helpful addition, Alf. The whole Commodity Trading Advisor world has always had a taint to it in that the statistics of success, at least in the US, are so poor. My recall on this is vague but I seem to remember something like "80% of all commodities traders lose money" or something like that. Now, I understand that 80% are not within the professionally advised category so it may not apply, but that is the source of the taint. I do think, and this can be important outside IRAs, that commodities trading still has favorable tax treatment on profits. My recall is 60% of commodities

I don't want to fight or do credentials. Anyone can list lots and lie. I could claim an MBA from the Wharton School and be lying. I could claim an MBA from Northwestern and be lying. Or Stanford. Or Harvard. So I will list nothing. I take no offense at US's posts. I don't care who says what about my text. I don't seek a following. I'd be a nutcase if I did -- and chose a Pattaya board as the place to start. No one should believe anything without checking things a lot of places. Hell, no one would. It's a posting board. Maybe it can give you ideas to investigate, but who bel

Gentlemen, I got no desire to fight about this. Do whatever you want. No one rational was going to do anything without double checking the concept anyway. Eneukman returns from Vietnam, I see. I kind of knew this thread was on its way to boring the UK guys. They probably have IRAs and Roths, but named something different with different rules. Eneukman, how goes the retirement so far and are you on budget and has the FTSE mirrored the Dow to date?

Okay, let's take the optimal case rather than typical. You're 56 years old and kicking back on the beach in Jomtien or Phuket for a few years. In your portfolio you have $100K in completely taxable accounts. You also have 800K in a retirement-oriented, tax-advantaged acct. The proceeds on that 800K acct generates zero taxable income because it is, after all, an IRA. You don't spend it. It just grows there. In year 1, you need $35K for housing, barfines, wimmen, food, and trips to the US or wherever. You take that from the taxable account of 100K. That 100K is sitting in CDs an

Whoa, that hit a nerve. This incremental Roth recharacterization technique is to be used post retirement. There is indeed a 100K income limit beyond which the government constrains recharacterizing, but I suspect most do not expect that level of taxable income post-retirement. If they do, then they may not see a lower marginal tax rate in retirement and a Roth conversion may not help them. (unless they think those rates are going even higher) I doubt that is the norm. I would suspect the norm is that post retirement there is a sharp reduction in income. This technique i

FYI concerning Roths. If you ever had a 401K that you rolled into a traditional IRA, or that you will have in 401K form on day of retirement, there is a strategy not widely understood that is advantageous. When you retire, your income should drop sharply. Your tax rate does the same thing. This might not always be so. Tax rates can be changed and the likely direction doesn't look favorable. So given that you have low income and low tax rate, that would be the time to start re-characterizing your 401K/traditional IRA into a Roth. Roth withdrawls are tax free forever, as you

I know nothing about the condos or photography. My impression is the condos are small. The square meters are what they are. Supposedly there's something that can be done decor-wise or color wise to create the impression of more space, but I know nothing about decor, either. They just look small. Shrug.

A distinct ratchet upward in the post sophistication as folks understand rightly that this is Very Serious Stuff. Might I offer a website of interest. www.fireseeker.com This website has nothing to do with investing decisions or stock picking. It embraces a recent array of academic studies indicating that asset allocation is the most powerful predictor of portfolio performance intermediate and long term, and withdrawl magnitude is the most decisive parameter in the question Will I Run Out Of Money? It's an excellent implementation of historical norms and tells you what Your Numbe

leemo, you're still down 25 cents on identical % rises and losses. The loss was more powerful mathematically. A rise identical to a loss did not return you to the same place. It left you lower. As for selling at the top, I approve of this concept and encourage everyone to do so, provided they don't sell when it's not the top. As for those folks pointing to all the reasons why this is a false rally and like the Crash of 2000, see Rule of Thumb #1. There has never been a time in my memory, and probably ever, when you could not sit down and examine all the data and generate an

I started the thread in a fit of celebration, but now I have to go into my dreaded lecture mode. I bought my first stock at age 21. I never stopped since, even for a single month. I'm 51 now. Does this mean I have rules of thumb? Sure. Here they are. 1) There are no rules of thumb. No one has any idea what is going to happen. Ever. No exceptions. This includes me. 2) If the market fluctuates in a way best modeled by some percentage rational and some percentage random, is the mix more random then rational? Or the reverse? If it is more rational then everyone would make m

Those folks invested in the US had a Good Day today! 1.75% days don't come too often. That's more than 1/3rd of an annual 5% Tbond earned in 8 hrs. As everyone really knows when they look at reality, planning to be in Pattaya or actually being there is all about money. This stuff matters a whole helluva lot more than people try to persuade themselves. To all US investors, celeberate. And you UK guys, you'll likely follow suit at least partially tomorrow, so thumbs up to you guys too. (Don't expect an equivalent post when the Dow is next down 1.75%)

Scroll down to the the Meeting and Ride Share section here on the board for taxi options. There are two titles worth reading "New driver available" and "1200 baht BKK to Pattaya". The first is run by a BM (lostinspace). The second by a gentleman named Mr. Toom. Both get good reviews from BMs with the first costing more but providing some extra procedures that make things safer and with the driver English speaking and able to help you out of unusual jams that might occur at the airport. The second is well regarded too. Read both threads and you'll get a feel for it.

For drugs of this type, alternatives are ALWAYS possible. There is never any one drug that is the only drug that will work for you. Talk to a doc about alternatives that are easily and cheaply available where you are. There has been an attitude propagated by pharmaceutical companies over the years that once you find a drug that works for you, do not continue to explore. This just means they can keep prices higher by not enduring competition. Docs will generally always be willing to prescribe some equivalent. If you find one that does not want to be bothered, look up the side effect