OT - Money / Investing Thread (aka financial no stupid questions)

[MikeDeTiger]

Where would you stash short-term holdings (<1 year) for potentially planned expenses?

Assume it's a taxable account and you're in a state with high income tax (which applies to capital gains / dividends) like CA.

I've been stashing things short term (1-3 months) in SGOV when I've sold stock and needed to hold back for cap gains estimated tax payments. Figure it's a fine way to get a 3.5-4% annualized yield with basically zero risk. Better than a HYSA because the dividends are shielded from CA income tax.

But I'm looking at next summer being the optimal time to buy a house. And I'll have a decent chunk of vesting RSUs over the next 4 quarters (which if sold at vest aren't going to have material cap gains) between now and then. I've been thinking of just rolling those into a safe yielding investment until I decide what I'm going to do house-wise. It's more about recession protection, because if I weren't worried about that, I'd just drop it in VTI.

SGOV is easy, gives that 3.5-4% yield, is safe, and at least avoids the CA income tax (possibly 12.3% this year). I see other vehicles, like JAAA/JBBB/CLOZ, which have higher yields (5.34%6.95%/7.2%, respectively). But I don't know what the risk profile is, and I know they're not tax-advantaged like SGOV. Will the principal value markedly decline in a recession? I don't really know, but that would make them no better than VTI. I have some risk tolerance, but it's like the 5-10% level, not the 50% level.

Thoughts? Is there anything better than SGOV in this situation?

The annoying answer (or opinion, input, whatever) is "it depends."  I keep funds like what you're describing in a high yield savings account.  I could do slightly better in some of the options you and Marq mention, but I view those as emergency funds.  I save for specific categories, some of which I know when they are coming around, but some are SHTF categories and I needed the $ rightnow.  It's quicker for me to get it out of the savings account than any other source.  If I knew for sure when I'd need those funds, then as mentioned, I know I could do a tad better with some CD's at a local credit union, or a short term bond.  But I think Marq is on the right track....admittedly I'm not used to factoring in state taxes because I don't have them.....MarqH is likely far ahead of me in thinking through that off the top of his head.  And it sounds like you don't anticipate needing them emergently.  

[Cincydawg]

I stash "cash" in a money market called SWVXX.  This money is available in a day if needed.  My checking account is with Schwab also, so it's very easy to shift funds to pay bills.  The money I have in SWVXX is in my IRA so the tax issue is not relevant.

One of my goals when I retired was to get all my accounts in "one basket", which I managed.  I have a Roth, an IRA, a brokerage account, and a checking account all with Schwab.  My wife also has accounts there which I manage.