Don't pay off the student loans in advance. I had a similar amount and I paid it off over 20+ years at somewhere between $100-$150 dollars a month. It really is not going to impact you that much, especially decades later when you're earning way more.

I imagine it this way. Imagine if someone assembled 20k from your earnings over 20 years. That's quite an assembly of capital and a decent interest rate. You might as well do something with it you can't otherwise do because you're never going to get a 20k loan with 4% interest ever again (credit cards? LOL) except maybe a new auto loan or a mortgage.

My apologies, although not sure why it matters.

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I'd prefer to keep it in cash as I contribute and build up to the max and then rollover all at once. This prevents me from losing money in investments (and having to sell to rollover) if the market goes down. Essentially this is short term savings so ideally i'd love to reap the high yield of the money market fund before rollover and investing in ETFs for long term savings.

The former.

If you do stagehand work, I'd look into exhibit design for sure. A lot of companies do work for the big trade shows and conferences if you're near the area where those happen. They basically build sets in the exhibit hall and need the same kind of building and managing folks.

The applying is really the most soul crushing kind of grind, may you have good luck and endurance going through those job apps.

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Any advantages to choosing a shorter term at the slightly higher rate?

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If you don’t pay yourself first what incentive is there to not just file chapter 11

Communication from the IRS is always via snail mail.

"Filing taxes for W4 employees" ?

Huh.

You are a W2 employee.

You fill out the W4 form so your employer knows how much to deduct from your paycheck. https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/taxes/how-to-fill-out-form-w4-guide

It sounds like a real lack of knowledge on your end.

>watch out for keywords often used by scammers, such as "HYSA."

It's a relative term. There are options with higher interest rates than the debts OP has.

>This is not correct

How so? If rates drop again, below the debt rate, then it would make sense to pay the debt.

Edit: Typo

In your OP you never mentioned you were doing a backdoor Roth IRA. You should edit your OP. Even then I don't understand why you are keeping it in essentially cash before doing the conversion. https://www.investopedia.com/terms/b/backdoor-roth-ira.asp

As mentioned above the interest goes to shares not dollars.

Can’t say for sure about everywhere, but the bank I work at it’s just giving up interest

We don't exactly split things down the middle. I pay for some bills, she pays for others, and it all comes out to roughly the same, give or take.

We have a joint savings account for travel, home improvement, and other things we're saving up for. I've added her to one of my credit cards and I'm one one of hers. As far as shared finances go, that's it.

You make over $200k and try to capitalize on a quick gain from selling a house that’s not much more than your salary?

This is not correct. In addition, watch out for keywords often used by scammers, such as "HYSA."

Fact that you’re 16 and already mindful of finances and savings is more than enough. Nothing wrong with your current approach as you’re not earning huge amounts. Use the learnings and discipline to your benefit and adjust as your earnings increase. Good luck

Talk with the IRS and get on a payment plan. Then, get on a budget to tackle that credit card debt. You've been living above your mean, even with that impressive income.

And sister fund (lower risk) VYFXX

What rate can you get now for your new vehicle. We just got Hyundais 0% rate. If you can’t get 0% for the particular vehicle you’re looking for Id imagine cash is the play.

Well...

I was going to ask, too. Because it isn't unusual for an at-fault driver's insurance company to offer you $500 here.

While Michigan is a no-fault state, if one party was clearly more than 50% at fault (usually indicated by having received a ticket for a moving violation associated with the accident) the other party can sue in small claims court under mini-tort for up to $1,000.

I've had three accidents where the other driver's insurance cut me a check for my deductible just by calling them and politely asking to save everyone the time of going to court. In each incident, their customer had either been ticketed, or was obviously at fault (by hitting my parked car while I was standing next to it).

How will marriage help in this situation? I don't see any complications that OP is facing that marriage would preclude.

My wife and I bought our house two years before we married and split the tax stuff equally.

It was bad advice and will just prolong the pain.

What's your annual profit? That's incoming revenue minus your necessary business expenses.

Hmm, I mean, I would never lean that way. I can't realistically have negative income next year. That's just not a thing. You can have losses if you look at it that way. I don't think that's really the spirit of the question at all.

As for what you found about businesses, I mean, you're not a business. It's a vastly different context.

It's a weird one. That said, there must be "an answer" somewhere. You're not the only person living off of investments afterall.

>how is it ok for you to pay extra 575 ( interest is 2.5%, not 0 %) for your debt, 9100 for interest on your mortgage

They can get a better return, risk free, by tossing that money into one of many HYSAs and only paying minimums on those debts.

Edit: Typo

Well since you know you have a pregnancy/birth coming up next year, if you do choose the PPO you should certainly contribute something. You know you will have out of pocket medical expenses. May as well get an effective 22% (+whatever your state tax rate is) discount on them.

That said, the math here makes it so that in virtually all scenarios you come out ahead with the HDHP, so long as you do actually max out the HSA.

If you have $0 in healthcare expenses, the PPO will cost you an effective -$3401, while you will actually be +$1510 better off on the HDHP. As in, with the employer HSA contribution plus your tax savings from contributing, you will make money on the HDHP as a starting point.

In the maximal care scenario where you hit the (shockingly similar) out of pocket max for both plans, the PPO effective cost will be -$6,851, while the HDHP effective cost will be -$5,290. So in the worst case scenario you'd be $1,561 better off on the HDHP.

Things can get a little hazier in the middle though. In theory, if most of the care you need is in the form of visits that require a copay rather than cost sharing, it's possible that there's a zone of moderate healthcare usage where the PPO makes you better off. At least in terms of direct out of pocket expenses.

For example, say you have 10x visits to specialists. On the HDHP this might be $2,000 out of pocket towards your deductible (assuming $200 billed per visit), but on the PPO it might only be $350 out of pocket in copays (assuming a $35 copay per visit).

Though even then, while the that extra $1650 out of pocket for the same care might sting your checking account, your overall effective cost accounting for the employer HSA contributions plus your tax savings on the HDHP would be $1561 - $2000 = -$490, while the PPO would be -$3401 - $350 = -$3751.

So still much better off on net. The difference would be even starker if instead of office visits you had coinsurance-eligible care on the PPO, since the 20% rate is the same.

On the other hand contributing to an FSA with the PPO would moderate the differences somewhat.