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Thread: GameOn Account Talk

  1. #1

    Default GameOn Account Talk

    I’m new here. I’ve been skimming through content for about a week now. Too much info to go through! But I wish I had joined this site a long time ago.

    I just found this long term section of the forum today. Which seems to be more of what I’m interested in. I’m not interested in making major account changes and timing the market. Or trying to anticipate short term changes. Mainly because my TSP investments seem to be on track with my retirement goals. So I don’t want to do anything drastic. But of course I’m still interested making smart tweaks where I can.

    As my first post here, I’ll give a little background. I’m 46. I’ve been with the government for 20 years (started in 2001). With about 4 years of private industry before that. I’ve been contributing to 401K/TSP since I started my career. I’ve never quite maxed it out, but I’ve been close for a while now. I did rollover my 401K to my TSP so that everything is in one account.

    I don’t know much about investing, and unfortunately I’ve mostly ignored my account up until this year. And I’ve made some costly mistakes along the way (mostly from neglect). But despite that, THANKFULLY I’m still doing ok.

    I made two unfortunate mistakes:

    Mistake 1) The first happened when I first joined the government. As you all know, the government likes to overdo the paperwork. It seemed like an endless stream of forms to fill out when I got hired, and apparently I decided I’d learn more about the TSP later and I simply put 100% in the G fund as a temporary allocation. Even though I don’t know much about investing, I did know I should be aggressively invested at a young age. So this was just supposed to be temporary until I had time to read about the different funds. Unfortunately temporary became 4 years later before I noticed my mistake GameOn Account Talk. Yikes.

    After fixing that mistake, I then mostly ignored my account again. Until 2008. In 2008 I actually did something smart. I re-allocated my investments to be a little more conservative as the market seemed to be headed for a decline. And as a result, I didn’t lose much during the crash. Yay!

    Mistake 2) I followed up the smart move with a dumb move…more neglect. I never took advantage of the smart move by moving back to a more aggressive allocation. Sigh. Fortunately my contribution allocation was a 100% mix of CSI. So eventually my account fixed itself and fairly quickly become an aggressive distribution of mostly CSI. And that aggressive distribution continued on its own as I neglected my account until this year.

    Despite my neglect and mistakes, I’m sitting at about $915K right now. I was curious how costly my mistakes have been, so I went back and compared my yearly personal rates of return against the two lifecycle funds that are relevant for me. L2030 and L2040 (assuming I retire somewhere between age 57 and 62). I used the lifecycle funds for lack of anything better to use as a comparison. Amazingly my overall average rate of return over my 20 years was better than both L funds over the same period. And even each 5 year increment was better.

    Whew. At least I hadn’t totally screwed up! Though it could have been a lot better if I had been paying a little more attention. Especially after 2008 and in 2020. Oh well, Nothing I can do about the past.

    Now my goal is to continue with the overall buy and hold mentality, while making smart adjustments along the way. And not relying on dumb luck from here on out!

    ————————————-

    So now I’d like to talk strategy with people smarter about investing than I am.

    My account was aggressively invested before and after the crash last year. About 10%C and 90% CSI (mostly C&S). So I rode out the crash and had nice returns afterwards. By dumb luck.

    Now that my balance has gotten big enough for me to take notice, I’m trying to figure out the right strategy moving forward. About a month ago I moved to a more conservative allocation. I’m currently at 25%G 5%F 35%C 20%S and 15%I. My feeling is that eventually the market has to come back down. No idea when that will happen. But it felt like the returns were slowing a little. So I wouldn’t be missing out too much being a little more conservative at this point. And having more G fund would allow me to buy during any significant dips in the future.

    With our limited IFTs, I need to determine what a “significant” dip is. I’m thinking as a general strategy, if my account balance drops about 5% or more from where it is now, then I will move roughly that percentage from G/F into CSI. So for example, if my account balance drops 10%, then I go to 15% G and move 10% more to CSI. Another 5% or more drop would trigger another shift.

    I would certainly factor other information into the equation, but I’d use that as a starting point and general strategy.

    If there is no significant drop and my balance continues to go up, then I’m thinking I’ll re-adjust at the end of each month, and slowly tick my G fund allocation higher by 1% per month. So at the end of July I’d readjust to 26%G. Then 27%G at the end of August. And continue that trend as long as my balance increases or remains relatively the same.

    Any small drops (less than 5%) I’ll just ride out without making any changes.

    Is that way too simplistic? Or a reasonable starting point for a long term strategy over the rest of this year? Am I making a major mistake with my current allocation?


    Sent from my iPad using TSP Talk Forums


  2.  
  3. #2

    Join Date
    Jun 2004
    Location
    Boiled Peanut, Georgia, USA
    Posts
    76,389

    Default Re: GameOn Account Talk

    Gameon, it appears that you are doing well, keep it up and Welcome to TSP Talk.



  4.  
  5. #3

    Join Date
    Aug 2020
    Location
    New Hampshire
    Posts
    49

    Default Re: GameOn Account Talk

    Gameon, with 10 years left before you can retire, you are in fine shape with the balance you have. I’d say you are probably far ahead of the majority of your peers. The important thing you did was contributing to TSP which many do not. I’m not a market timer myself either and there’s nothing at all wrong with investing with a diversified approach and rebalancing your account occasionally.

    Welcome to the forum!

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  7. #4

    Join Date
    Apr 2008
    Location
    Cleveland, Ohio
    Posts
    12,148

    Default Re: GameOn Account Talk

    GameOn, Welcome aboard. As you found out this is a great place to learn. Mistakes and all it appears you are in pretty good shape. Keep up the good work.
    May the force be with us.

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  9. #5

    Default Re: GameOn Account Talk

    Thanks all. I continue to read more of the great info on this forum.


    Sent from my iPad using TSP Talk Forums

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  11. #6

    Default Re: GameOn Account Talk

    Welcome Gameon! Thanks for joining us and sharing your situation.
    Tom
    Market Commentary | My Blog | TSP Talk Plus | |

    I am not a Registered Investment Advisor and this is not investment advice. Please do your own due diligence.

  12.  
  13. #7

    Join Date
    Sep 2006
    Location
    Upstate NY
    Posts
    3,874
    Blog Entries
    46

    Default Re: GameOn Account Talk

    Don't stress about it. I'd just do the entire move tomorrow.

    https://awealthofcommonsense.com/201...-market-timer/

    An allocation to bonds will bring you lower highs, but more importantly higher lows, essentially smoothing out your journey. A good reference would be to see what allocations the L Funds are at.

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