[Bobby]

Hello all!… Hoping to get some advice for Cost Basis when selling from Brokerage Account.

Vanguard has several options to choose from.

Minimum Tax
Highest In, First Out
First In, First Out
Average Cost

What is the best option to sell, and if possible, the reason why.

Thanks in advance!

[Christopher]

“Best” depends on what you’re trying to accomplish. Minimum tax will match losses and gains to have minimal tax impact, which is often what people want while still working.

Highest in first out can be useful for loss harvesting.

FIFO and average cost aren’t for any specific situation, though fifo will favor long term gains over short term gains.

Like Cody says, SpecID is usually ideal for accomplishing your specific goal.

[Ed]

In a Schwab account, I sold every holding that had a loss.
Knowing the dollar amount of the loss, I went to Vanguard and sold every VTSAX lot with a short-term gain.

There was still some loss remaining, so I sold additional VTSAX lots to use it up.

In the end, I was left with about $250 long-term capital gain.

Such fine-tuning of capital gains was possible because I use SpecID cost basis.

[Eli]

Min Tax is pretty good if you don’t want to fuss around with the Specific ID one

[Author]

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