See Jane Get Rich

Last year I made a big fat mistake by paying $310 for my tax preparation.  This year I did my taxes using H&R Block’s free tax prep software for my federal and then paid $10.55 for DC and home state.  It wasn’t worth it to pay $10.55 each for the home state one but it did save me a whole lot of time so I forked over the money.  It feels so good to be done.

Federal $6,834

DC: $921

Home State: $24

Cost: -$21.10

Total = $7,757.90

Financial Goals for Spring 2010

1. Make my 2010 Roth IRA Contribution
2. Roll over 401(k) from my holiday job to a Roth or transfer it to my brokerage
3. Find more affordable car insurance before February 11
4. Obtain a credit report from one of the three agencies
5. Budget/Keep track of my expenses
6. Diversify my investments

Today I visited Scottrade and wrote them a big fat check for $5k for my 2010 Roth IRA contribution.  I like to make my contribution at the very beginning of the year so it can grow the entire year.   

Attempt at Minimizing Trading Fee Damages to Roth Contribution

When I first opened up a Roth IRA I was disheartened by the fees that I got charged everytime I bought something (usually $7).  This is not a huge figure but for my first contribution I made  6 trades so its $7 x 6 trades = $48.00.  That is a lot of money and if you do the math that $48 can grow to $483  in 3o years at 8% and that is a whole lot of money that is basically leaking out of my maximum $5k contribution.  Not cool at all.  I called up Scottrade one day and asked if there was any way the transaction fees could come out of another account so that my $5k contribution would really be a $5k contribution rather than $ 4952 contribution.  The answer was no.  I also wanted to buy some securities that I thought were good buys and I would want to eventually put them in a Roth IRA when I could contribute again next year. 

The employee suggested I open an individual investment account with Scottrade and then transfer the funds when it was time to make my Roth IRA contribution.  I opened an individual account and invested some money.  A few days ago I called Scottrade about how I could transfer my funds in the individual account to the Roth account.  I was told that there was no way I could just transfer those funds since the individual account is taxed and the Roth isn’t taxed.  To use the money in my individual investment account I would have to sell the securities, pay taxes when its time to do so, and transfer the cash to my Roth and then buy the funds again.  So, instead of me spending just $7 to buy a security in my Roth account now I would have to pay three transaction fees.  First $7 charge to buy the stocks for my individual account, $7 to sell them, then transfer the cash to Roth, then $7 to buy the stocks again.  Perfect, instead of $7 it suddenly becomes $21 for the transaction.  I wish I knew who the idiot at Scottrade who advised me to open an individual investment account.   I’ve had basically good experiences with Scottrade so I am not holding it against them.  And now that I think about it, it makes sense that I can’t transfer assets in a taxable account to a non-taxable accountable as simply as I envisioned.  So, I decided to leave my individual account alone to be dealt with another day and wrote the check.

 Tiny Problem with the Roth Contribution

You can only contribute money that you earn to the Roth.  So, in order to contribute $5k in 2010 I need to earn at least $5k in 2010.  There is a tiny problem in that I haven’t earned any money in 2010 and I will likely not earn any money anytime soon because I will be in school until May and then I will be doing bar stuff until the end of July.   So, instead of going on a trip to celebrate graduation I may need to get a job, any job, to get at least $5k in earnings so that I don’t have to withdraw the $5k contribution I just made. 

How do you keep transaction fees from whittling down your actual contribution?  Have you made your 2010 Roth Contribution? 

Women Personal Finance Bloggers Rock!

I have repeatedly turned to WiseBread’s List of Personal Finance Blogs by Women to find new personal finance blogs to read.  But, occassionally I find that some of the links are inactive or broken. 

This is understandable since the list was posted on August 5, 2008. While I wait for WiseBread to come out with an up to date list of personal finance bogs by women I am providing the list of blogs with links that work and that are active. The blog is considered active if there was a post for the month of October.  I am leaving out non-personal blogs such as blogs hosted by newspapers and other businesses.  Ggoing through all the blogs took quite a lot of time but I had fun reading about personal finance from various perspectives.  Please let me know if there is a blog out there on WiseBread’s list that’s not here but may have moved to its own domain name or changed its name and such other things.  Are there any other blogs that should be on this list?   

Also, I am trying to get a list of new personal finance blogs started by women in 2009.  It can be very hard starting and keeping any blog going and I want to be sure to find and support other new personal finance blogs by women.  So, share away!

• Almost Frugal

• The Baglady
• Barbara Stanny
• Beach Girl’s Budget Blog
• Being Frugal
• Being Money Smart
• Blogging Away Debt
• BlogHer
• Brunette on a Budget
• Brown Eyed Girl and Money
• BostonGals

• Chief Family Officer
• Counting My Pennis

• Debt Marathon
• Digerati Life
• Distilled Rose
• Debt Hater
• Don’t Mess with Taxes
• Dog Ate my Finances

  
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