Wasn't there a thread recently where people talked about having commutes like this and thought the same, until COVID suddenly made them not have it. And they realized there life could have had hours more in each day and they missed it.

It's not just 2 hours more for a 24 hr period, its 2 hours more of awake time. So like 2/16.

maybe im thinking of wsj article.

> Seems like I need to switch to backdoor method, but what do I do with money that were invested for the past three months?

Recharacterize.

https://www.whitecoatinvestor.com/backdoor-roth-ira-tutorial/#recharacterizations

I would take a pay cut to work at home. I have driven so much in my life that Im ok with not doing it anymore.

A year ago, my commute from my garage to my locker room and back was 2.5 hours. Now its 1 hour. Its DRAMATICALLY improved my anxiety and stress.

This year the make is 6.5k not 6k just FYI. If you can max it now and still have savings for an emergency max it now. If that would eliminate all your savings then just add to it each month.

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I’ve been driving 2 hours each way for 8 years. It sucks kinda sometimes but it’s not that bad

If your company uses a VPN, they can probably see where you're remotingfrom

When my first kid was coming, my brother gave me the following reassuring advice, "Just remember that the first 6 months may at times feel like you are in prison, but it gets better and better each month."

The first kid is like a shock to your system but it's true, you'll adjust as the baby grows. Congrats to you. My 4 kids are the best thing that ever happened to me!!

Those are all nice to have but you're paying for them. Some maintaince on the older car is still much cheaper than another 5 years of payments plus interest plus higher insurance etc. Bottom line is new cars are nice but usually cost more so the financial answer is buy one when you need it. Not when u want it. You don't need one now but I think you have enough info to make an informed decision. I totally understand the appeal of the deal but this is r/personalfinance not r/Cars.

Note: Turns out OP is married and spouse earns income but this wasn’t reflected in their W4s.

Why don't you go to one of these labs in your area and find out? Ask them what it takes in order to get reimbursed and what the risks are.

I donated plasma once a week in college for extra money.

I don't believe you can sell blood or platelets. You can certainly donate those though. Both are often in short supply and are life saving.

Plasma I believe you can sell because it's then sold to pharmaceuticals that use it to make treatments and medications which are then sold back... they are also often extremely expensive.

Most locations will advertise $500 or $700 or more the first month, usually 6 to 8 collections or something in a five week period. After that it usually drops to about $15 to $30 a collection... sometimes like $15 and then if you complete another collection in the same week the second one is $30, etc.

You usually can't donate more than I think 8 times a month or something, so maybe $150 to $200/mo extra for 8 visits. Honestly when I dug into it... it didn't seem worth the 25 minute drive (and 25 minute back) eight times a month.

Edit: https://www.statnews.com/2016/01/22/paid-plasma-not-blood/ I'll be damned, much different than I thought. Still, you likely won't find somewhere paying for blood. I would be curious about the platelets though, you certainly don't want disease increasing, but as someone who has a mother suffering from acute myeloid leukemia and has probably had close to a hundred units of platelets over the last year and MANY times been told they are in short supply, she can't get them until tomorrow, or she can only have one unit instead of the two the doctor recommended, all because of supply... anything to increase their availability (safely) would be good! Same with the bone marrow!! She had a foreign donation because the registries are so much larger over there. The system is ironed out pretty well, but because of COVID it had to be transported frozen (one day of cancelled international flights could really screw things up) and the cryopreservitive is REALLY unpleasant, almost everyone becomes physically sick, including my mother, twice since it was split across two days. It otherwise is a fairly quick and straight forward process and would have been a lot less of a crappy day if she could have had that fresh. I'm surprised they don't pay $1000 or something in America for it and just spend time testing up front. The donor has to go through some processing for a few days before anyway, I would think most assays on blood work could be done in that time.

Have your own finances in order. The rest will work out. I also highly recommend that you don't go too heavily into baby podcasts/down the Internet black hole. You'll just make yourself crazy!

As others have mentioned, choose the job that's better for your career. You're essentially getting paid the same amount hourly for both jobs (math below). Definitely don't move out if you are comfortable at home. If one job is a clear winner for your career advancement, choose that. Otherwise, I'd stay at the remote job...you never know how bad the unknowns are at a new job (grass isn't always greener).

Assuming no state income tax, $42k and $60k become around $35.5k and $49.4k, so around $14k difference after tax. Subtract gas, car depreciation, etc, it'll be closer to $7k net increase in income ($35.5k vs $42.4k). Effectively 19% more income for 15% more hours (40 hours plus 6 hour commuting vs only 40 hours working).

>I wanted to move to ETFs because of their low expense ratio.

Low ERs is not exclusive to ETFs. In fact, several Fidelity mutual funds beat the ER of any comparable ETF.

Low ERs is usually far more of an issue of index based vs actively managed. Index mutual funds exist, actively managed ETFs exist.

>My 401k fund options are very limited.

That's usually the case.

>So I chose the funds I mentioned.

You only need FSKAX of those 3.

You should also look into adding at least an ex-US fund somewhere.

Hi! This sounds interesting as hell. Would you be willing to expand a bit, like what kind of education you had and how you got into the industry?

Selling plasma is real, but hundreds seems way off. I did it in college in 2010 but it was like $40 a time, and I could only go the week before my period because my iron would be depleted the two weeks after 🤣 so $80 a month LOL

Don't count your chickens before they hatch. There's no rush.

But there are lots of books and podcasts on parenting. You need to prepare yourself, assuming it's your first.

It's just a hypothetical, I have a roth 401k personally, but just was curious

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Keep in mind the only benefit is a $500 credit per dependent

I have never had a hard pull for any credit limit increase.

Trade away all you want. IRAs/401ks, with limited exceptions like owning MLPs, have their tax considerations only when money enters/leaves the account. Reitement accounts also have zero capital gains tax considerations.

It is a nontaxable event.

Who is the 401K's custodian?

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