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UCGal
ParticipantOk – for those that are saying broken brain, and genetics, etc… Here’s a personal story. It’s long but please read it. Especially if you have family that might have some of the mental health labels applied to them.
Have any of you heard of the MTHFR gene? I will freely admit I never heard of it till our family came to a little crisis.
It’s linked to a whole bunch of stuff – mostly high homocysteine levels – which means bad stuff for heart attacks and strokes. But it’s also linked to brain chemistry.
Basically if you have one of the variants on this gene you don’t produce the most effective version of the enzyme that is key to the methylization cycle. Which in turn means you don’t break down folate (green leafy veggies) or folic acid (in breads and flour) into L-5-methyl folate. (B9- to methylized b9)
You’ve probably heard that b9 and b12 are inportant for mood/stress/etc. They regulate and control your neurotransmitters – seratonin, dopamine, melatonin, etc… You need the methylized version to cross the blood brain barrier.
If you have this varient/mutation you only methylize between 10% and 60%.
This mutation is linked with:
ADHD
Asbergers
Autism
Depression
Anxiety
Bipolar disorder
Schizophrenia
AutismPlus a bunch of other stuff non mental health
Strokes
Deep vein thrombosis
IBS
Fibromylagia
Chronic Fatigue Syndromeetc….
So you’d think you’d be screwed if you have this mutation. You’d be wrong. It’s correctable with over the counter vitamins. You need to get the methylized version of b9 and b12. Costco sells the b12 in the form of methylcolban (sp). Amazon sells the methyl b9.
If you suspect that you or a family member might have this it’s pretty easy to find out. You get your genome tested with 23andMe for $99. Then you can look at the raw data. (You still have access to the entire data – just not their interpretation of it). You look up the mthfr c677t and a1298c markers and see.
As a parent of a child that was having issues this has been a big deal to discover and fix.
My son had been diagnosed with opposition personality, ADHD, anxiety, and depression. They wanted to medicate him for all of this, which I resisted because something didn’t seem right. I knew there was a problem but he didn’t cleanly fit into those buckets. A friend tipped me off about the mthfr… Since my husband and I had already done 23andMe I looked up our results. We both had 1 marker of the mutation. I tested my kids – and sure enough – my son with the issues had the homozygous mutation – meaning he wasn’t methylizing more than 10%.
He’s been on vitamins for a while – and it’s been a huge improvement in his mood and social coping skills. As well as a dramatic improvement in school.
This isn’t on the radar of most doctors. Lets face it, genotyping is new.
So yes – there can be broken brains, of a genetic type… But that doesn’t mean it isn’t fully treatable.
I’m sharing this fairly personal info because if no one had tipped me off – I never would have looked it up, done the research, done the testing, and found the answer.
Participant[quote=flu]Ok, as an added bonus question.. What is everyone’s current 401k allocation (and 401k, assuming subjected to the limits of your company’s/employer’s constraints)….
And as an second bonus question. Do you plan on rebalancing in the near future, and if so, what do you think will be doing and when? And also, are you really going to rebalance equally, or are you going to nudge things slightly one way or the other toward an class of investments?[/quote]
My 401k choices are less than optimum (a lot of funds with high fees – with 2 exceptions… I’m in those 2 exceptions.)
I have 30% in a stable value fund that’s paying about 2.5%. Better than any other fixed income option for me right now.
I have 70% in a Vanguard total market institutional fund.
That said – my 401k is a VERY small piece of my overall investible assets – I rolled my old 401k out to an IRA last year when my employer spun off my division and sold us. Everything else is self directed in Schwab and Fidelity accounts.
Our overall asset mix is 60% equities, 40% fixed income.
Breaking that down further:
40% large cap
10% mid cap
10% international
25% bond funds (about half short term, half total market – with some tips in there too.)
15% cash/cd’s.I rebalance whenever it’s 4-5% out of this allocation. Right now it’s holding pretty close. None are out more than 3%.
ParticipantI wasn’t sure how to extract my contributions to get the real rate of return accurately. I took the current value, subtracted my contributions, and compared it to the value 12/31.
With that method my 401k made about 2.5%. If you start in Feb, it’s a lot better…January sucked.
My rolled IRAs did better – about 5.5% YTD.
I used the same method at the 401k for calculating 529’s… subtracted out contributions to date, then figured the gain. Not the most accurate since contributions had gain since they were added. 529’s returned 4%
ParticipantHere’s another data point for you. I rented a studio in old town/mission hills area in 1979/1980. Rent was $120/month. I was making just above minimum wage working for Wawanesa insurance ($3.90/hour – I think minimum was either 3.10 or 3.35). I could survive (albeit my diet was more ramen than steak.) The place had a fabulous view – but was a dump.
The same apartment rents for $985 now. (Just googled the latest listing.
Minium wage did not go up 8x… but the rent did.
ParticipantA couple of thoughts on the parking thing here… as well as CC&Rs and covenants.
– It’s not just Boston that it’s bad mojo to steal someone’s shoveled out street parking space. I lived in a suburb of Philly (old neighborhood that was a dense mix of single family homes, twin homes, and a few row houses.) Lawn chairs and trash cans were used to mark ownership… Didn’t matter if it was the spot in front of your house… if the neighbor shoveled it – they had the right to use it. Fortunately I had a driveway and garage… so my roommate and I could park off the street.
– My neighborhood was subdivided in the 1890’s. My title restrictions, dated from that time, restricted me from having a tannery, a stable, or a boarding house. I was semi worried I’d be busted on the boarding house since I had a roommate for about 6 of the 8 years I lived there. But I guess 2 people in a 4 bedroom twin was not quite a boarding house.
– I was probably labeled undesirable. I wasn’t Irish (though I look it) and the rest of the neighborhood was. Even worse – my roommate was black. But they were nice and accepted me, and later my roommate.
– My current neighborhood has no HOA/CC&Rs etc. Every house has a 2 car garage. Of the approximately 40 house on my street probably 5 of us park both cars in the garage. Many park in the driveway… but probably 50% or more park on the street. They’d rather keep their expensive cars (mercedes, lexus, bmw’s.) on the street, so they can keep their boxes of crap in the garage. Makes no sense to me.
– We had a neighbor ask us to ask our tenant not to park in front of their house. No problem. Another neighbor is aggressive about getting parking control out to chalk tires if he sees a car parked too long. Again – that’s his business and doesn’t affect me.
ParticipantI would make sure there’s a problem before making a big deal about it. I live in a single family neighborhood but rent out a granny flat. We worked with the neighbors when they complained our tenant was parking in front of their house. It was resolved with no issue as soon as it was brought to our attention.
In other words – my advise is don’t make waves if there really is no problem.
That said – if they are renting out 4 or more rooms, they may fall under rooming house rules.
http://www.sdcaa.com/Mini-dormsFACTSHEET.pdfRooming House Ordinance
The second ordinance, the Rooming House Ordinance, was adopted by the City Council on April 15,
2008. The Rooming House Ordinance mandates that landlords cannot rent out three or more individual
rooms of a home under separate leases. Additionally, rooming houses are only allowed as a permitted
use in certain residential zones or commercial zones. It also only allows continued use of the property as
a rooming house for three years (April 2011). Finally, with the exception of certain specified situations,
the ordinance requires one parking space per tenant for all rentals that meet the criteria of a rooming
house.What to do: Because this ordinance only applies to rentals with three or more separate leases, landlords
may still rent to three or more individuals under one master lease. If one tenant moves out, the new
tenant may be added to the master lease. For more information about this, call SDCAA Membership
Services and Screening Compliance Director Nancy Robertson at (858) 278-8070. You may also read
more about the Ordinance at http://www.sandiego.gov/development-services/industry/landdevcode/minidorm.shtmlParticipantsdlookup seems to have new listings.
sdlookup.comParticipantProbably a combo of facts.
Distressed homes were harder to sell because of the bank sellers being a hassle…
Add in a dose of sketchy short sales where someone close to the seller or the selling agent purchased the home for below market rates.
2010 there were a lot of underwater/in foreclosure sellers – and that put downward pressure… But if a home was in good shape, and a traditional sale, the price might me more in line with what you’d expect.
ParticipantThese fires are weird… Not jumping in a pattern that makes sense with the winds. I really hope a firebug isn’t setting them.
ParticipantAs far as I know you can’t do 529-Roth. For us – future contributions are going to Roth. The salary limitations have gone up and my husband retired so we’re *well* under the limit. (That’s good and bad… I guess.)
Have you looked at doing a backdoor Roth?
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304104504579375432214126664You could also do Roth conversions on your T-IRA.
The nice thing about Roth is you can withdraw penalty free for qualified education expenses… just like a 529… but it’s not limited to education like a 529 since you can also use it for anything you want once you reach 59.5. So any unused education $ can be used for retirement.
ParticipantHalf my coworkers live in 4S – they left a while back because of the school evacuations.
Drought plus Santa Ana winds is bad stuff.
Participant[quote=flu]
I’ve been pretty happy with my kids 529 plan @ vanguard…. Passive indexes slow and steady.. I use the Nevada plan, since I don’t like the CA one that isn’t done by vanguard, and there is no state tax benefit with a 529 in CA
[/quote]
This – all of it.That said – we’re switching our investment, this year, to ROTH IRA so we have more flexibility.
If they do Jr. College or don’t go to college, that can be used for our retirement.
We used to be income restricted, but that has changed and we qualify for Roth contributions again.
Participantdup
ParticipantHere’s a related question –
Do husbands have any obligation to acknowledge Mother’s day to the mother of their children? I’ve heard the line “But she’s not my mother” from someone and always thought ‘ouch’.Enjoy your mom’s while you can. I miss my mom.
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