I don’t have a clue what Computershare is, but we used to just give our church stock directly. At the time, we were still itemizing deductions (this was before the increase in the standard deduction). Our charitable deduction was equal to the FMV on the date of the donation, so effectively getting a stepped-up basis via the donation. No capital gains tax at all if you donate the stock itself.
Selling the stock is going to trigger a capital gain (assuming the stock has increased in value, of course) to the owner whether you immediately turn around and donate the proceeds or not.
Thanks for the info. Computershare is just a centralized place that holds many different kinds of stock. (It’s used for stocks owned by me, parents/friends… assumed it was common).
Yes, many companies use Computershare services - people use to be able to buy and sell stock directly with some companies, and now they farm that out to Computershare.
Here is my understanding of the situation. The brokerage will sent the information about the sale to the IRS, and you will responsible for taxes on any gains even if you gift the entire proceeds to a charity. However, when you pass the asset to someone without exchanging it for $$, it will be treated as a gift (different rules). When in doubt, ask a RL tax pro!
Computershare works as a transfer agent. Never used them, but my folks had some stock in an insurance company which got bought out, for cash and stock in the new company. Since my folks held the original cert, they got new shares in their name but held electronically by the transfer agent. (they had no idea)
I only found the shares as Executor when I was reviewing their previous tax returns and found the 1099’s…
Lots of people buy stocks through brokers like Schwab, Fidelity, etc. ComputerShare is often used to hold stocks bought or issued directly from the company. For example, if you hold an actual stock certificate and enroll in a dividend reinvestment plan, the reinvestment (often fractional) shares may be held at ComputerShare. Or if there is a stock split, spin off, or some such, the new shares may be held at ComputerShare instead of having a certificate issued by default.
But if all of your stock holdings are at brokers like Schwab, Fidelity, etc., you may have notice that ComputerShare exists.
I used to have my Employee Purchase stock shares in Computershare, til I sold them. I do think it would have been possible to transfer to Schwab, just never did that.
We have purchased stock of an energy company who now has Computershare for buy/sell - and now the stock purchased for grandchildren with DD as the Custodian of each of the grandkid’s accounts. DD1 and DD2 both have accounts which started with a $50 gift purchase of stock (back when the company handled that themselves).
Something to think about when researching retirement places on coastal areas. Not just with hurricanes. Rainy seasons can cause trouble with area sewage systems, which has happened recently with some of Alabama areas “Foley, Bayou La Batre, Mobile, Dauphin Island and Prichard have been grappling with sanitary sewer overflows this week”.
I had been looking at top Alabama, as well as LA (lower Alabama) retirement areas with Niche scores after a ‘top 25’ listing. Then I recently saw where one of the quaint smaller communities that had good school ratings, good retirement ratings, good home ownership percentage and nice homes in price range – a developer was trying to add in a 145 lot housing addition, and there was quite a large community turn out so that it would not get through the planning proposal – the community wants to stay a smaller community without overburdened public services. They don’t want a new development like this - and hard to tell if it will get stopped.
Sometimes one has to be ‘quiet’ about how nice a particular community is.
Hmm…anyone have a clue about this, off the top of their head? I’m sure someone else has had to deal with this issue.
Series EE savings bonds. We were going through my Grandma’s papers today (she died last year), and found a large stack of legible copies of these bonds issued to my deceased Grandfather. Not the actual thing (I’m assuming they’re not, since they’re black and white), but copies. My mom has no idea where the originals are, and is convinced that they must have been redeemed, since my grandma apparently was a spendthrift.
However, these are pretty old, my grandmother had dementia for a long time, and something like this is easy to forget about. My mom had no idea they were even there, so she doesn’t know if they were cashed in. Trying to contact the treasury is tough. Two hour hold time, and they say they won’t return emails unless you already have a case. When I input my grandfather’s SS number, the treasury site says he may have treasury bonds over 30 years old.
Does anyone have any ideas? I’m looking at the paperwork jumble in order to replace them, but don’t want to go through the misery if they’re already redeemed. It seems challenging to figure this out, though I’ll sit through the two hour phone wait if I have to. I just have a feeling that when someone answers the phone, they’ll immediately hang up or have no answer to my question.
try calling early in the am? My experience with Treasury Direct folks has been excellent. When you do get ahold of them, they are friendly and helpful. Good luck.
Thanks @shawbridge for the article. I could read it as it would allow me to read under the popup to subscribe.
I love it if others would explain some things to me. I’m not sure but I think all of the retirees has mortgages, maybe the woman who moved to Florida from New York didn’t but all the others did.
They were all spending more than I expected with their portfolios, that really surprised me.
I was also confused about the first man. He had deferred compensation of 1.7 mil but then a pension of $6000/month. If he had both which I was sort of confused by, his net retirement worth was about double, seeing as he retired at 58.
The 84 year old could spend plenty as his life expectancy is lower but some of the other retirees retired before social security or were deferring claiming while spending more than the 4% that they say you should.
A lot of people don’t count their pensions in their networth, plus the 2 couples are not taking SS until later, so in effect they count on SS to reduce their 4% SWR.
Went through this with my folks holdings. If you have bond ids (?) you can head to the Treasury direct website, and input the ids, and I think it will tell you the current state. (Follow the instructions to save your holdings…). I’ll go look, but there is a form to mail in where they will send you back a list of bonds held by (name?, SSN?) something. I’ll go see what I have in my records - it’s been 6+/- years now.
