Ross812

The culture of this board is incredible. I think some of the search, up/down voting, and organization would make it easier to rapidly find an answer to a question, but that is not really what a forum is about. A forum is meant to provide people a place to discuss a topic. It's bad etiquette to walk into a conversation and insert yourself into it without having any idea of what has been discussed; yet individuals do this on the forum all the time. I've actually seen posts where people say: "I'm not going to read all 500 pages, so what is going on?" There are a lot of gracious posters on here that are willing to bring people up to speed, but reading those 500 pages really should be the price of admission to adding to a conversation. If you follow a thread from start to finish, you can really see how the thesis is developing/changing and gage who knows what. Changing the website in the ways described might help the casual observer, but the people actually participating in the forum don't need it.

Added to LRE today and bought Willis Group

Rolled my BAC Jan '15 10-20 call spreads to Jan '16 12-25 call spreads

Thank you for all the advice! So far: CEFs: INF - 7.3% - Brookfield managed global infrastructure [4%] PFL - 9.4% - Pimco managed diversified bond [3%] ETW - 10% - Eaton managed buy/write [4%] Funds: FOCIX - 3.5% - Fairholm managed bonds [8%] DODIX- 3% - Dodge manage bonds [5%] OAKBX - .5% - Oakmark defensive [8%] YACKX - .9% - Yacktman defensive [9%] DEM - 4% - WisdomTree EM [2%] MOAT - .8% - Widemoat ETF [8%] REITs: PSEC - 12% [1%] TWO - 10% [1%] NLY - 11% [1%] VNQ - 4.3% [3%] DRM.TO - 0% [1%] PDRTF - 7% [1%] Equities: BP - 4.8% [3%] LRE.L - 9% [6%] ADM.L - 9% [3%] KMI - 4.6% [5%] KMR - 7% [5%] JPM - 2.7% [2%] MKC - 2.1% [2%] PETM - 1.2% [2%] CHRW - 2.4% [2%] BDVSY - 3.5% [2%] NSRGY - 3.6% [3%] IBM - 2.1% [2%] INTC - 3.6% [2%] AAPL - 2.2% [2%] This portfolio gives a yield of 4.24% It is composed of: REIT - 8% Equity - 54% Utility - 14% Bond - 20% Buy/Write - 4% Any glaring holes? Am I being too aggressive in the allocation?

http://blu.stb.s-msn.com/i/E7/21B623D77E8B5761464E9BF2F176F.jpg Buffett drives an 8 year old Cadillac DTS... Honestly you should buy what makes you happy if it is not a big expense for you. If buying a BMW will make you happy then go for it. Don't delude yourself into thinking you are making a value decision though. The numbers work out that if your new car costs 25k and gets 30 mpg while your old car gets 12 mpg, its going to take ~100 years to break even with all the money you will be saving in gas considering you only drive 5k miles per year (if you assume a 4% cost of capital you never break even). If you want to be frugal, pick a number that the car should cost you every year and stick to it. If you buy a 6 year old Hyundai that will last 10 years for $8k, assume $500 a year in insurance, $500 in taxes, $500 in repairs your looking at $2300 a year for a car. Personally, I don't care at all about cars and drive a 00 Honda. It's kind of nice to not worry whatsoever about my car: a dog in my backseat, laying down seats and throwing lumber in the trunk, spilled coffee, dirty shoes, driving on a potholed gravel road, parking on the street instead of a garage. I have no stress about it because I can buy another 5 of them on my way home from work and the 6k in financing expenses I save every year equal a really nice vacation.

I am not a financial planner or RIA, I only manage money for family members. One of my inlaws recently had a stroke and is not capable of managing their money. He has a Scottrade account and was a daytrader who managed to lag the market the last few years but hasn't lost any money. His wife met with a financial planner who was more than willing to stick them in some low cost bond funds for a nice commission. The inlaw asked me to look over the accounts and put them in income producing assets that need minimal management. The couple wants to be able to cash a check every quarter for $5000 to supplement their SSI and small pension. The couple's SSI+Pension income is ~40k. They have no debt. I have never worked with someone who is aiming for capital preservation and income. My general answer to people who are in 15+ years out and have no inclination to learn how to invest their own money is to buy a low cost index fund and those closer to retirement to start blending in bond funds. Six years ago I would have put my inlaws nest egg (500k) into AAA bonds, Government bonds, and an online money market paying >5%. The extra 25-30k in income without touching the premium in addition to their SSI and pension would have made for a nice retirement. Today, money markets are paying <1% and bonds are yielding next to nothing, which leaves dividend paying stocks, mutual funds, and CEFs as potential candidates. Do you all have any advice on any longterm securities paying a decent yield without going too far down the quality curve? What about allocation between bonds and equities considering the environment we are in right now? So far I'm considering equity: KMI, MKC, PEP, IBM, BP, CHRW, LRE.L, CHRW, BAH, KO, WMT; Bond fund/etf: DODIX, FOCIX, BOND, HYS; Closed end fund: INF, PCEF My goal is a 4% yield with long term capital preservation.

The best thing you can learn right now is not to waste your early pay checks. Concentrate on saving. Check out: http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/forum/index.php Read the Berkshire letters and a book that teaches you how to think about investing. I like: http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51JNxbOk6KL._SY344_PJlook-inside-v2,TopRight,1,0_SH20_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg I'm up in the air on whether you should try investing in single companies with any less than 20k as fees will eat you alive. Rather than making any money, having a little skin in the game may help those lessons stick and losing a few thousand isn't going to hurt your future like 10s of thousands will later if you don't learn your lessons now. Its really up to you, if you are a hands on type I'd recommend scottrade, but don't concentrate on return, learn the process. Welcome to the forum!

Sorry longinvestor, I don't have the value of the COBFF for 2-Jan-2015. The fund has tracked the S&P within about 20 bps while the market was really hot so I would take the performance of the S&P from 8/19/13 to Jan 2 and use that to peg the COBFF for this first period, or just start tracking them 17-Jan-15... The fund so far seems like it holds up well during downturns and lags a little when the market is going up. I like your idea, and I really should be tracking the COBFF return for each quarter.

The fund was updated this morning. The allocation is as follows: Company %Alctn Votes % of Member Votes BAC 16.70% 87 49% FIATY 13.44% 70 39% $ Cash 9.60% 50 28% AIG 8.64% 45 25% SHLD 8.06% 42 24% ALS.TO 7.10% 37 21% GNMCA 5.76% 30 17% BRK.B 4.99% 26 15% IBM 4.41% 23 13% GM 4.22% 22 12% C 3.84% 20 11% LUKOY 3.65% 19 11% INLOT.AT 3.26% 17 10% LRE.L 3.26% 17 10% WFC 3.07% 16 9%

If you really want to be sneaky about it. Live off of non ira savings or roth savings and roll your traditional into a roth in 36k increments. Pay 13.5% tax on the taxable conversion. After 5 years you can start withdrawing the 36k from the roth tax and penalty free. This is assuming you retire early. I think the tax diversification is what you want. Unless you plan on retiring very extravagantly you should put at least enough in your traditional that your withdraws stay in a low tax bracket and everything else in the Roth.

You can put away 23k a year as an individual or 46k as a couple In Roth/Trad 401k + Individual Acct. We usually put enough in the traditional to knock us down a tax bracket then save everything else in the Roth accounts.

The most shocking thing to me about the poll so far is how bullish the board has become. Only 25.5% of members have selected cash so far as opposed to ~40% the preceding two quarters...

Gio, I'll make a note to subtract 1 vote from ALSK and add it to ALS.TO. I don't want to open the poll to changes because I don't want people changing their vote based on what others have chosen. Regards, Ross

Above are a collection of 64 companies recently discussed in the investment ideas forum and suggestions from board members. I am starting to hone the voting process, dropping names that received 0 or 1 vote in the last poll as ~10% consensus is needed before the idea is added to the portfolio. Each member gets 5 votes. Choose the companies you believe will have the best total return. The 15 companies (cash is an included asset class) with the most votes will be bought in the portfolio (balance stands at $1,118,000). Allocation will be determined by the number of votes each company receives. The portfolio will be public for anyone to see at the following link: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AivVdWOTQE2JdGQzYkFSQUg2eUR3UVRTcThFYWpBelE#gid=21 Edit: Missed LUK, AIQ, SSW, PWT, and PSD.TO

Laurent Perrier. Symbol LPE.PA. Sorry typed it on my phone and got auto corrected!

Sold Fiserv. I still like the company, is just ahead of itself. Bought Laurent Pierre and discovered Remy Cointreau when researching the former. I have a bit more work to do understanding the implications of Chinese regulation on the Remy's long term growth, but it looks interesting.

This is really good advice. All the threads started about leverage are just confirmation. The process is far more important than the result. Pay attention to what SharperDingaan said as well:

Altius has the potential to pop this year if Alderon gets the green light and secures financing. In the oil space, BP is still undervalued by 20-30% when compared to other majors.

I was going to take another tranche of KMI @ $30 but it popped on me. Added Kinder Morgan to my portfolio as well at $33. Finished selling Express Scripts, Chesapeake Preferreds CHKDG, and Auto Nation.

This is one of about 5 threads talking about increasing leverage over the past couple weeks. This should be an indicator.

Companies with production, sales, and/or distribution advantages giving them a valuable 'network effect'. Examples: McCormick - Controls the entire spice aisle including special value store brands. They can stock pricey specialty spices and give away cheaper spices to grocers as a package. They can buy smaller spice brands and expand their product availability all over their network. LKQ - Their buyers can purchase wrecked autos all over the country using real time software showing them inventory, orders, and maximum bids for autos. They are the only one stop shop for body shops and they recycle unused inventory for profit after putting the salvaged auto at a retail location for small body shops and DIY types to pick over the leftovers for 60 days. Bidvest - buys all sorts of businesses and provides them with vertical integration via the conglomerate while letting management do their thing autonomously. This would be like Berkshire sourcing Heinz ketchup at cost for DQ and shipping Lubrizol chemicals at cost on BNSF.

I am at 30.03% for the year. 18% cash, 16% Bidvest, and 11% Altius didn't help me. Bidvest is performing well and the Altius story is starting to materialize so hopefully 2014 looks better for this half of my portfolio. I suppose I give up a bit of upside for smooth sailing: Sharpe Ratio: 2.95 Sortino Ratio: 5.22 Calmar Ratio: 13.04 Standard Deviation: 2.63% Downside Deviation: 1.06% Mean Return: 2.24% Positive Periods: 10 (83.33%) Negative Periods: 2 (16.67%) These ratios have been pretty consistent since I started tracking them at IB a few years ago.

Doubled my position in Air Lease Corp. yesterday after hearing the Fed decision to keep interest rates low. I initiated a position in CHRW earlier this week.

+1, I know we have a lot of Canadians on here, but its really hard for my poor brain to follow: 1b, 1c, 2a, 1a, 3b.......... As Charlie says: "I feel like I'm playing battleship." Yeah I'm looking at you Trap. LOL ;) 6a- Fabricating quotes from full interviews and papers. Summarizing an interview into a quote is not a quote!

If you are contemplating a tablet, I would suggest getting a chromebook instead. I've had an iPad2, Nexus 7, and Kindle Fire. I bought the chromebook and would never go back to a tablet. You have a keyboard to get real work done, instant on, good battery life, and if you need to use a full OS you can use Chrome Remote Desktop. Only $250 to $300. http://www.amazon.com/HP-Chromebook-14-Ocean-Turquoise/dp/B00FGOTA6K/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1385135968&sr=8-5&keywords=chromebook http://www.amazon.com/Acer-Chromebook-11-6-Inch-Haswell-micro-architecture/dp/B00FNPD1OY/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1385135968&sr=8-3&keywords=chromebook