Category: Investments

Originally posted in The Wednesday Morning Weekly — August 7, 2024.
Updated December 27, 2024 for MEAB Guest Post :

Most of us agree how important it is to have an emergency fund — it’s often one of the first recommendations from financial planners along with tracking all of your spending each month. A three to six month emergency fund recommendation is common. Some of us, including myself prefer a one to two year emergency fund, or more. It depends on a lot of factors: risk level, type of employment, number of dependents, personal preference, etc.

In the recent past, many of us who prefer a larger emergency fund have been concerned because that money was not getting much interest — just sitting there eroding. Just a couple years ago it was hardly getting anything as interest rates were near zero. So many of us opted to just put all we had into the S&P 500.

Today, at this time of writing 4%+ APY is fairly common — around 5% just a few months back. So things have changed quite a bit.

Well even better, is that if you are in the bonus hunting game, that emergency fund can also serve as a bankroll for the bonus hunting. It then becomes dual purpose: both a bonus hunting bankroll as well as an emergency fund. I call this the BHEF — the Bonus Hunting / Emergency Fund.

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Disclaimer: I am not a financial advisor and this is not financial advice whatsoever. These are just my own opinions and personal preferences I am sharing.

I think I briefly mentioned here and there that I am into FIRE: Financial Independence Retire Early. I got exposed to this idea from the Mr. Money Mustache blog about 7 years ago. Summarizing, save as much as possible each month and invest it — e.g. 30, 40, 50 percent or more of your income.

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The Wednesday Morning Weekly — September 18, 2024

Disclaimer: I am not an estate planner. These are my personal opinions/ideas in this article, and was just wanting to share them with the community. Please consult with an estate planner for your personal needs.

In the bank account bonus hunting hobby, we open up many accounts. Sometimes we have large amounts of money in a few of these accounts to meet the requirements of the bonus. Or we have utility accounts, such as hubs, which we never plan to close; these accounts can have significant amounts in at any given time. Or we might have retirement accounts, both tax-sheltered and non-tax sheltered with large amounts in them as well.

I personally feel it is important to setup designated beneficiary/beneficiaries for every account possible if the accounts hold a significant amount of money. If you don’t set it up or the bank doesn’t offer it, when you die, it then goes to probate and the courts can decide when your beneficiary/beneficiaries get the money — which could take months or years, instead of a couple weeks.

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