hello, new here, trying to learn. lots of learning needed...

[fordtruckn]

been in the TSP system for 15 years, never paid any attention to it, 5% matching, all in the G fund,

about a year ago, I was talking to a guy who had been in the system for about 5 years, and how much he had made, and I looked at my balance, it was not even close to what his was,
decided to take some of his advice and move some money around out of the G fund, took everything I had and placed it into the F fund,
and moved all futures
50% into F
20% into S
20% into C,
split the rest between I and G,

since March I have had added $10k to my balance,
I've decided to move from my 5% contribution and JUMP to a 10% (about $500 a month)

any advice would be greatly helpful,
I'M NOT A STOCK MARKET MAN AT ALL.... this is all new to me.

Thank you.

[fordtruckn]

BTW, I came into the system at 19 years old, and still have over 20years before retirement.

[evilanne]

Welcome to the forum. Best info on this site is Seasonal Musings 2016 which explains the different seasonal mixes. The 1st few pages, starting at page 1, will give you a good overview.
see viewtopic.php?f=14&t=12089 beginning at page 1
Site basic overview for seasonal http://tspcenter.com/seasonal.php I'm still learning and very cautious but with 20 years to go, you can take more risks. Not everyone does seasonal, some do buy & hold/dollar cost averaging, use charts or combination. Open a fantasy TSP and you can use it to play or to track you own TSP. Good Luck

[jdoma]

Learn, learn, learn, and then learn some more to figure out what is best for your situation. Best advice: max out your contributions ASAP and let time do a lot of the work for you.

[rcozby]

I'm a '95 F-150 trucker myself, so welcome fordtruckin!

If you want to know how to really screw yourself up, feel free to review my account. Playing around without seriously deep knowledge can get you killed in this manipulated market.

I'm not a stock market man either. If I had it to do again, I'd put it all in the L Fund appropriate for my retirement date (probably L 2050 in your case since you started so conservatively) and come back in 2036 to find yourself a happy man. The L Funds are definitely not the most optimal solution, but they sure beat buying high and selling low. As for seasonals, I'm still waiting for last year's Santa Rally...and you never want to be in the I Fund in September...unless it's today...or yesterday...

[wisepierre]

50% in the F fund, at your age, and years to retirement, is way too conservative. If you aren't really sure what you are doing, definitely do the L2050 or whichever fund more closely matches your planned retirement date. When you do know what you are doing, or at least think you know what you are doing, then make the switches and allocations.

[evilanne]

Make sure you understand Interfund Transfers (2/month unlimited, always can move to G)
https://www.tsp.gov/PlanParticipation/A ... /IFTs.html
Don't follow anyone blindly...learn some basics so you understand what you are doing with regard to your TSP--it is your retirement.

There is a lot of information in this forum (search feature is helpful for specific topic) and out on the internet. Here is a reading list from another site http://www.tspallocation.com/tspresources/#reading You can probably pick up some of these at the library or a used book store.

.

[mjedlin66]

I agree that parking your money in F with 20 years to go isn't ideal. You should probably look for something higher risk. L2050 would be a good set it and forget it option. 10% is a good start but it really ought to be higher. The maximum contribution of 18,000 per year works out to $692 per check. Many of us do contribute that much. You don't have to, but if you can afford 15% or 20%, you will be thankful for it later.

[sgtnichols]

Welcome to our site!

I agree with mjed: the best thing you can do is up contributions. You probably need to up this beyond 15%. You have some catching up to do. Doing the math for myself, I have 30+ years to go and my minimum contribution is 12% for an income consistent with preretirement.

The second best thing you can do is getting deeper into equities.

One of my co-workers lost half his earnings when the market went down over vacation. He paniced, sold, and missed the rally back up. This is a good argument for buy and hold and seasonal over chart watching and technical analysis. You'll notice most folks on here underperform the C Fund. This is typical: 80% of professional brokers underperform this as well.

Seasonal
I just started the seasonal plan. In theory, this can beat buy and hold. These are based on seeking funds with higher averages each month - even G and F some months.

Here's a link to some seasonal charts and my account notes. This is on here mostly for my benefit. I way underperformed the S&P 500 this year but average 7%.

viewtopic.php?f=13&t=12044

Buy and Hold
If you are not interested in moving funds each month, I recommend reading the following guide. It's written for newcomers by a well respected author on equities at efficienttfrontier.com. Personally, I feel the "I fund" is overrated and always shun G for F when I get the chance.

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/290 ... %20Can.pdf

For buy and hold, I like going 60/40 in C/S after reserving 20% in F. Return on your birthday each year to add 1% to F and rebalance.

Financial Fitness
Dave Ramsey recommends 80/10/10 in C/S/I. If you haven't done so already, do yourself a favor and read "The Total Money Makeover" and follow its teachings. Encourage your wife and everyone else you care about to do the same. This will pump you up about investing and getting out of debt.

Given this out to coworkers and family members.
https://www.amazon.com/Total-Money-Make ... 159555078X

Dave also has a daily podcast "where debt is dumb, cash is king, and the paid-off home mortgage has taken the place of the BMW as the status symbol of choice."

https://www.daveramsey.com/show/archives

I also like "The Millionaire Next Door". You'd be surprised by how wrong your idea of a millionaire lifestyle really is. I found my priorities shifted towards higher net worth and appreciating assets over status symbols and luxuries.

Watchdog Service
Something you can do if you don't want to look at charts every day or week is set up alerts on timetotrade.eu. At a minimum, you may want to know when the S&P 500 crossed it's 200 day moving average. This is a free service.

https://timetotrade.com/buildalert.php? ... bol=US:SPY

[crondanet5]

Also take a look at Mr. Money Moustache

[mjedlin66]

Also take a look at Mr. Money Moustache

I've read some of his articles before and my situation is similar to his, which re-affirms that I'm on the right track. But he and his wife both retired at 30... wow. I could probably pull that off, but... wow.

[mjedlin66]

Something in your numbers doesn't add up, though.

If your coworker of 5 years contributed $692 per check, his salary is $70k, and his investments returned a steady 8%, then his current balance would be $128k.

If you put in 15 years worth of 5% per check, and your salary was 70k, and your G fund returned 2% (The annual compound rate over the last 10 years is actually 2.9% for G), your current balance would be $122k.

He must have done really, really well in stocks if your balance isn't anywhere close to his.