u/Fathoms_Deep_1

So I’ve been using the Freedom Unlimited and Freedom Flex for a few months, and I’ve recently started using a Bilt Obsidian for rent and groceries. This system has worked well for me because my main airline is Southwest and my main hotels (when I stay at hotels, which isn’t super often). I had around 20k points laying around from my Freedom cards, and I wanted to transfer them to Southwest so I could get flights to visit my brother for a Football game. However, I’m running into a conundrum. Now that I have the card, I obviously wanna hit that $5k in 3 months to get that sweet, sweet 100k points.

I’m a fairly conservative spender. I make around $3500/month a month from 2 jobs, but a lot of my bills I can’t pay with a credit card (mainly car loan at $250 and Student Loans at $340). It would’ve been nice if I could just use the card to pay the next few months “in advance” but it is what it is. I absolutely DO NOT want to carry a balance on any credit cards, in fact. The major expense that could cover the $5k is my combined rent I pay with my roommates, which, for all 3 of us combines to $3k, but I would obviously have to eat the fee, which I don’t have to on built. I also am pretty aggressive with my emergency fund and Roth IRA, I put about $700-$800 a month in these combined, but again, not much I can do.

Anyone have any advice on things I can do to not tbh $5k goal by October? I was considering working on replacing my older gaming laptop with a mix of a gaming PC and a MacBook Air refurb/Neo, so one of those could help, but otherwise I feel like I have to eat that $90 fee for paying rent with a credit card to hit the $5k. Any advice would be appreciated!

Hey all. Since I got a full time job last month I’ve been trying out budgeting apps’ free trials to see which one I want to use going forward. Monarch has already stood out a lot to me due to also tracking my IRA, Brokerage and 401k. One of the main reasons I wanted to get a budgeting app is to track my Roth deposits, and I’ve really enjoyed Monarch letting me track those accounts in app.

In my current house, I have two other roommates, and they send the money to a separate bank account, and I use that to pay for rent. In reality I pay about $900 for rent and utilities, but combined it’s around $3000, which is almost 75% of my monthly income. Naturally this puts things all out of whack, and I’m trying to figure out how to properly represent my actual rent and utilities so I can get a better idea of my spend.

Normally I would just not link my that seperste account, and just count my Zelle to that account as rent. However, realizing that I could make a ton of points off paying for the combined rent using a Bilt Obsidian (plus, they code Target and Walmart as groceries). Due to Bilt 2.0s system, this has become my main Card, which has messed up the whole system, again.

Does anyone have advice on how to move around these transactions to mess up my budgeting? Any videos or overall advice would be great!

Hey all. I’ve been on here for about a month after starting a new job last month, and learning about investing for my future. I’m 22 and working two jobs, where I make around $3,400 a month after taxes and 401k contributions, so now I’m looking at bulking up my emergency fund and Roth IRA.

My monthly expenses for necessities is around $2,200, including Rent (27% income), student loan repayments, medicine, and my car (it would be less if car insurance wasn’t horrible in Florida). Otherwise, I feel like my monthly spending is pretty under control, and I get about $1100 a month for discretionary spending.

Now, I have $1,200 in my Roth IRA, and $1,000 as my emergency fund in a 5% HYSA (it’s only up to 1k, anything after goes into my other HYSA at 3.2%. Fun credit union shenanigans). The goal would be to have about $600 a month going towards either of these accounts, in a perfect world it would be both but I don’t make enough for that. My worry is that if I put all that money towards my EF, then I won’t make the contribution maximum for the IRA. And of course, if I put it all towards the IRA and something bad happens, an emergency fund less that $7500 leaves me in a rough spot. I do have my well off parents as a safety net, they’ve helped my brother through a tough lay off until he got another job, but preferably I want my own emergency fund.

I’m already having 10% of my paycheck going to my Roth 401k, I could save like $200 if I cut that down to employer match (5%). I would preferably not as I want to contribute as much as possible to my Roth 401k while I’m in a low tax bracket to get that tax free growth before I hopefully get more money and switch to a traditional 401k to save on taxes. There’s also a year end bonus to consider, although I don’t wanna rely on it.

If I don’t make my IRA contributions, but my company does well (and I don’t get laid off) I would get around $4k after taxes in a bonus next March, but my ideal way to use this money is to put it towards my car/student loans.

In the opinions of the Bogleheads, how should I tackle my emergency fund/Roth IRA. Should I split it? Should I put it all in my Roth IRA and keep it in MMFs as my “emergency fund?” So I don’t miss out on the contributions? Or should I worry about building that emergency fund and let the IRA fall the wayside due to my already high 401k contributions?

So as part of my new job, I’m studying for the SIE, Series 7 and Series 63. We get paid to go to work and study. We’re given a little over a month for the SIE alone. I’m a very, very fast learner, and I remember stuff insanely well and while most of my class is around half way through the book, I’m done. I’ve started taking full practice exams, and have gotten 85+ on it, including 100% on subjects like Bonds and Options. By the books own definition, I’m ready to take the exam. However, my firm has made it very clear I’m scheduled to take it in 3 weeks, and I can’t take it any earlierSo I’m asking for some suggestions on way to make this process more fun while I’m studying.

Here’s some things I CAN’T DO:

-study for the Series 7
-study for the Series 63
-study for any other FINRA licenses (66, 9-10, etc.)
-study for any outside exams (CFA, CFP, ASPPA, etc.)
-take more than one practice exam a day
-take my exam earlier
-sit and look at ThinkOrSwim all day
-find joy and happiness (probably)

So I ask you fellow finance peeps, what can I do besides studying? Because if I just sit here and study things I already know by heart for another 120 hours, I’m going to resent this exam.

So I started working full time at a brokerage about a week after I graduated. Coming from absolutely no background in finance, I thought studying for the exams was going to be the hardest part of training by far. My firm gives us about 4 weeks of full time paid training for the SIE, and more for the 7 in a few months (we have customer service training in begween, and then the 63 right after). However, it’s been pretty much the opposite for me. I’ve picked up on the content VERY quickly, and I’m really enjoying it (except for regulations and SROs, those bored me to tears). We use Training Consultants for our training, and we started training on the 8th of June. The goal for end of the week was to try to get to chapter 8 out of 13. I just finished 11.

This puts me in an interesting situation. I’m not rushing through the process and getting bad scores, I’ve gotten 80-90 on all my chapter exams and my checkpoint exams, although a few took 2 attempts. The problem is I’m scheduled to take the test on July 10th. This means that for 3 weeks I’m doing nothing but practice exams for 40 hours a week, and to me, this sounds like a quick way to get burnt the fuck out, which will put me in a bad spot when we sit down and study for the 7. I’m thinking it’s a waste of both my time and my brokerage’s time for me to sit and try to improve on an exam for a month that I really only need 1 more week on to pass.

Should I ask my brokerage if I can take the exam earlier, if possible? I know my teammates who already had the SIE are training themselves on phone calls while we’re studying, and it might be better for me to take the SIE sooner and join them to get more call time. I have no idea if they’ll let me, but I’m in a spot so far ahead of my classmates it kinda sucks for me because I don’t need 3 more weeks to pass this exam, I need 1 more.

Honestly, the whole movie is still stuck with me, especially the ending. It’s genuinely horrifying, and you need to give props to Inde for having an absolutely stellar performance.

It really sticks with me because I used to be (sort of) like Bear. I used to have a friend that felt comfortable and vulnerable around me, and I took advantage of that by becoming infatuated and obsessed with her, getting a crush and making her go from being happy around me to uncomfortable. I was clingy, manipulative, and wanted to be around her constantly. I was 15, stupid and mentally unwell. Now, I never got anywhere near to the point of Bear,I eventually realized I was making this girl uncomfortable and cut her off, but still, watching this movie really paints a picture of what obsession (ha ha) does to someone. It’s been 7 years and a lot of therapy, and I’ve forgiven myself for who I was in the past, but man, watching a movie about it really paints how bad it is.

What really stands out to me is how we never get to really know the real Nikki, instead, we just see what Bear “imagines” her to be. A lot of the time you’re not obsessed with someone, you’re obsessed with the concept of them, and the movie does a great job of portraying that through Evil Nikki. Even before she’s possessed, the image of Nikki in Bears head is different then who Nikki (presumably) is. When he makes the wish, this version of Nikki takes over her. A Nikki who isn’t in control and who is obsessed with Bear is he something he wanted, and he takes advantage of her being like that (the deleted scenes and the script really show how fucked up it is). Even if he’s riddled with guilt and shame when things start to go wrong, the wish is really what he wanted out of Nikki.

I know both Curry and Inde talked about in interviews how Nikki would’ve given him a chance if he was honest, but it’s easy to see how this would end. Maybe Bear would’ve changed for the better, but I really, REALLY doubt it. He most likely would’ve been possessive and obsessive over Nikki, trying to make her be like the version of her he has in his head, and all that would do is make them both miserable and push her away from him for good. While we obviously don’t see this, Bears action while Nikki is possessed show that this is the most likely outcome if the wish never happened.

The concepts around this movie are so fascinating, and after leaving the theater I still haven’t been able to stop thinking about it. That’s how you know a movie is fantastic.

I quit MH4U three times because of this fucking quest, it’s that much of a pain. I know it’s probably an issue of “it’s a multiplayer quest dumbass, play with other people” but I’m hella stubborn and wanted to prove to myself that I could do it. And fucking finally, I beat those two fuckers

For those of you not familiar with G-Rank MH4U, this quest has you fight a Stygian Zinogre and a Brachydios, two of the toughest monsters in the game. Stygian is the real issue here, in G-Rank he has hella combos, and oh my god the homing dragon balls. Those things are genuinely my most hated feature in a monster hunter game, they always find a way to hit you and do more damage than most other monsters in the game.

I loaded up my first run of it today in a while, and I had a perfect run with Stygian. No deaths, captured him, and still had some portions left. Brachy killed me once because he’s stupidly fast in G-Rank, but I got him.

By far the biggest wall I’ve had in this game (so far), so now I’m on to even more painful pastures!

I love MH4U

So I’m (22m) originally out of state (Ohio), moved to Orlando 4 years ago to attend UCF, and recently got a job making $53,000 a year after graduating. Last year me and my parents (who have supported me during college, but I want to be as financially independent as possible going forward) got a new car since my old one was on the verge of falling apart and needed constant oil refills (thanks GM). We got a great deal of the car, less than $400 a month with a ~4% interested rate on a slightly used 2024 Hyundai Sonata Hybrid. Due to the monthly payments being low I thought paying for the car would be the least of my worries. Boy did I not realize how hellish Florida insurance is.

Now part of this is my fault, 3 years ago I was in an at fault fender bender, there was little minor damage and no injuries, but clearly that’s part of the reason my premium is so expensive. My quotes from Progressive and Geico for $50k/$100k/$50k and $50k/$100k Uninsired was a lovely check of $400+ a month, and State Farm was similar. Nothing like paying insurance premiums as much as the fucking car. I heard travelers is cheaper insurance for young people, so I got a quote through them and it was $700 a month for the premium. For comparison, my rent is $800 a month.

I get it, Florida is hell, but this is insane. Is there anything I can do to not my car payment or more in car insurance? I can go with minimum coverage for $200 a month but if I get in a wreck I’m financially ruined. The only other option I can think of is asking my parents for help, and I know they would, but I wanted to try to be as independent as possible, but having to pay this much would make it so I could barely save any money or invest in my future.

Hey all. I’m new to investing at 22, but I recently got a few bonds and cash from my grandparents after investing, and since I just started working at Schwab training to be a Financial Services Advisor, I decided that this would be what I use to start my portfolio.

So far I’ve come up with this split for my Roth IRA:

Stocks:
30% SWTSX (stock baseline, deciding on this or SWPPX)

25% SWLGX (for growth)

20% SWRRX (for targeting 2070 retirement)

10% SWISX (international baseline)

10% SFENX (emerging market diversification)

Bonds:
5% SWAGX (just to have a few bonds for stability and piece of mind)

My question is: are the higher matinence funds (SFENX and SWRRX) worth it? Are their other alternative I should be focusing on, or should I be cutting down my portfolio to just a few index funds.

Also, is SCHD good for a retirement portfolio, or is its slow growth not really worth it unless using it in a taxed brokerage waaaaay down the line for income a better strategy

It’s a little silly for me to be training to be a call center finance guy and knowing nothing about investing, but it’s better to ask now while I’m young and have a lot of time to research during my training.

• Current cards:
  • Chase Freedom Unlimited, $5,000 Limit, December 2025
  • Chase Freedom Flex, $1,900 Limit, February 2026
• FICO Score: 744 Exp, 752 Equi, 728 TransU
• Oldest account age: 3 Years, 8 Months (loan, not credit Card)
• Chase 5/24 status: 2/24
• Income: ~$61,000-$67,000 (varies based on hours I work at part-time job, full-time is around $55,000, but will go up to $61,000 when I get out of training in October/November.)
• Average monthly spend and categories:
  • Still figuring that out, just coming out of college, where my parents supported me. They're still helping, but I want to wean off when I can.
  • Spending is mainly on dining, since my parents agreed to help with groceries if need be.
    • Roughly $400 on Dining, about the same on Groceries, but it really can vary.
  • Travel is not much rn, the whole point of this card is to build points for it.
  • Gas: ~$84.00+, Costco (thanks, Trump)
  • Rent: (if I get Bilt) $2,600 (I'm not paying this solo; I only pay 1/3, but since it's a house, my roommates/their parents send me the rent, and I pay for it all since it's in my name).
• Open to Business Cards: No, not really
• What's the purpose of your next card? Points, Travel, Transfer Partners
• Do you have any cards you've been looking at?:
  • Chase Sapphire Preferred,
  • Bilt Obsidian (palladium fee is high, so idk what I think of it)
  • Fairwinds Signature Visa
  • Schwab Investor Card (potentially, mainly because I work for them now, but there are better options if I get rid of the CFU)
  • Sofi 2% unlimited (if the fuckers send me an offer, I'm still waiting)
  • Disney Inspire (I work part-time at Disney, and go fairly often, so it's one I've partially considered, especially since I can use the points to buy clothes from my store, Tommy Bahama, but the points are used only for Disney)
• Fine with either Category or General

Additional Info: I recently started a full-time job at Charles Schwab, and because of that, I'm looking at getting a points card. CSP was the first thing to come to mind, since I like the Chase Ecosystem (my whole family uses it, and we stay at Hyatts and fly with Southwest), and I've already been using the CFU and CFF. Bilt has similar travel partners, but the points system... well, it's something. The Rent is nice but a bit of a bitch to access; it would pretty much have to be my everyday spender. I would get out of the Chase Ecosystem, though. Fairwinds is my Credit Union. I use them alongside SoFi, and I've heard great things about their Signature Visa, but also, I've heard it's an absolute bitch to get. Any advice or suggestions would be appreciated.

Hi all. I’m 22m, I graduated college two weeks ago with a B.A in History (I was in the ceremony at UCF who booed the speaker), and I just started working for Charles Schwab to train to be a call center financial service representative. Not the flashiest finance job, but it pays good, has fantastic benefits, and it gets me in the door with my licenses. Now, I didn’t get this job from financial experience, I got it because I’m very good at customer service, and I enjoy helping people. They know this, obviously, I got the job without and background or knowledge of investing. I’m proud of myself since this is my first full time job, and I got the position 100% by myself. No connections, no networking, no friends of friends, no parents friends, just me, my interviewing skills, and a lot of luck.

Anyways, I wanted to work in finance after taking a personal finance class at UCF (shoutout Paul Gregg, one of the best professors I’ve ever had). I realized I like talking about finance with people, and that I enjoy helping people with it as well. I’ve done a lot of public facing jobs, retail cashier, tour guide, server, etc., and I might be insane but I like talking and helping the public. So this job was a good fit for me.

I have a great team around me, and over the next few months I’ll learn a ton, but I want to get started now with learning about investing. I’ve done deep dives and know tons about Banking and Credit Cards, but I’ve stayed away from investing. When I opened up ThinkorSwim for the first time, I was completely and utterly lost. Since then I’ve invested some money in my new Roth IRA in ETFs and Mutual Funds to sit around and get money, but that’s about all I know about investing.

Good books, websites, videos, blogs, subreddits, whatever, I love learning about new things and can take in knowledge quickly, but investing is such a behemoth I don’t know where to start besides what I’m being trained on, and I want to be prepared for that as best as possible.

So, me and my roommates have lived at a house in the Rio Pinar area for about a year. We all really like the house, I just found a job that I’ll have for at least the next two years, my other roommates is in college still next year, and the third is interviewing for jobs in Orlando, but is interested in staying. The rent is through progress, who we heard not so great things about, but they’ve been good for the most part. Besides some issues with moving in due to renovations, any issue we’ve had they fixed the next day. The neighbors are good, there’s no HOA, and we all are pretty well settled here, so we want to re-sign a 12 month lease.

Originally, they were going to increase our rent from $2,795 to $2,870. I was fine with the increase, honestly, since split 3 ways it’s not much of a difference. However, they sent us two offers to renew our house.

One would be a discounted rate, now being $2,580/mo for the entire lease

The other offer would be a concession of $3450 split 3 ways, so around ~$1,150 a person, but I’ll change that to give the roommate in the master bedroom some more, probably.

What would you guys pick in this situation? I’m leaning heavily towards the discounted rate to keep my monthly prices down but my other roommates think we can save more by taking the concession.

Man, it feels weird it’s been 4 years since I stopped talking to her. She was like a big sister to me, and someone who was always there for me, and super proud at the person I was becoming. But yeah, I messed up. I was too attached, too overwhelming, it was making both of us uncomfortable. I feel bad looking back, I apologized a lot, but it was too late for me to make the changes. I told her I couldn’t be her friend anymore because it wasn’t good for both of us, and we got in a huge fight, and a lot of nasty things were said. Saying I was ridiculous tor talking to my friends and fraternity brothers about my issues with her. Gaslighting me into thinking we were never close friends. Blaming me for everything. I didn’t even know how to respond, other than to tell her to have a good life, and burned every bridge. Friends were dragged in, it was a mess.

I haven’t said a word to her in 4 years. I still see her pretty often, too, but nothing has been said. She’ll come to my house for parties, or come around to my fraternity events, but anytime we’re around eachother, we both do everything to avoid eachother, and when we make eye contact, it usually is just looks of sadness.

Since then I’ve changed so much as a person. Got the therapy I desperately needed, got two jobs, have multiple amazing friend groups and support networks around me, I’ve gotten much healthier physically, and I’m about to graduate college in a month. But even after all this, and after all the time that has past, I still find myself thinking about her here and there. Especially her smile, that’s priceless. Sometimes I have dreams about it, but nothing ever happens. It’s just her ignoring me again, even in my dreams.

I don’t know why I’m writing this, I think just to remind myself I’m not alone on this, and I have to remember all the negatives and the reason we don’t talk, not just all the happy memories I have.

Honestly, it’s been more than 3 years since we last talked. Sometimes I go months without thinking about you, and then you just… appear again. I don’t know how it happens, either you just show up randomly to an event I’m at, or a party at my house, hell, sometimes I just have a dream about you. Part of me wishes we could talk again, but there’s no good to that.

I had my problems, I was too overbearing, overwhelming, attached, name it. I told you I didn’t want to have feeling for you, but at the time, there was nothing more important to me. I know we fought a lot when I said I couldn’t be friends anymore, and I burned every bridge I had with you because I couldn’t stand the insults and gaslighting. But I still miss you. I miss your smile, or your caring words, or how you always found ways to make my day better. I meant it when I said you were like a big sister, especially with you happy you were when I did something that made me proud.

But there’s no point in reminiscing. We’re both completely different people now, we have our own lives, our own careers, and you have someone in your life now that makes you genuinely happy. Sometimes I wonder why I still think about, or if you’d be proud to see the person that I’ve become, but that won’t happen. All I get when I see you is the cold shoulder, or a look of sadness. Even after that, I still wonder why I still think about you