Sailor Swift ⚓️

Navy Personal Finance.
Pay, benefits, TSP, and the boring moves that actually build wealth in uniform.
Not financial advice. Just the map.

[Sailor Swift ⚓️ @jerome_s]

The money playbook most active-duty Sailors ignore until it’s expensive

You’re paid twice a month, you move when the Navy says move, and a lot of “normal” civilian advice does not fit a ship, a barracks, or a 9-month deployment. Here is the version that does.

1. Read your LES like it’s a qual sheet
Base pay is only part of it. BAH and BAS are tax-free. Sea pay, sub pay, flight pay, and special duty pay are not. BAH and BAS do not count toward TSP matching or a future pension. If BAH is wrong after a PCS or marriage, that is free money walking out the door. Fix it in MyPay / your admin office, not six months later.

2. The 5% rule is non-negotiable
If you came in after 2018, you are on the Blended Retirement System. DoD puts in 1% of base pay automatically and will match you up to another 4% if you put in 5%. That is a 100% return on the first slice of your paycheck.

Do not front-load TSP so hard that you hit the annual limit mid-year and then contribute $0 in November and December. The match is monthly. Miss those months, miss the match. In 2026 the elective deferral limit is $24,500. Spread it.

3. Roth vs traditional is a Navy-specific decision
Most junior sailors are in a low tax bracket. Roth TSP is often the better default: you pay tax now while the rate is low, then never again on qualified withdrawals.

Deployment changes the math. Combat-zone pay can be federal-tax-free (enlisted: generally all of it; officers: capped). Put that tax-free pay into Roth TSP and you get something civilians cannot copy: money that was not taxed going in, not taxed coming out, including growth. Roth is still capped at the $24,500 elective limit. Extra combat-zone contributions above that go traditional. Do not sleep on Savings Deposit Program either: 10% on up to $10,000 while deployed, if you enroll.

4. Your legal residence is a financial decision
You can keep a low-tax or no-tax home of record even if you are homeported in California or New York. That can save you state income tax on military pay for an entire career. Do not casually change it because a roommate said to. SCRA also caps interest on pre-service debt at 6% and gives you real protection on leases, evictions, and some court actions. Use it. Lenders near base are counting on you not knowing.

5. The base economy will try to eat you
Car lots, jewelry stores, and “easy approval” lenders around Norfolk, San Diego, Jacksonville, and Pearl exist because young sailors have steady pay and no credit history. Military Lending Act caps many products at 36% MAPR. If the deal only works with add-on warranties, GAP stacked three times, and a 72-month note on a used Dodge Charger, walk. Navy Federal or USAA plus a used reliable car beats a new payment that follows you to the next command.

6. Housing: BAH is not a down payment on a lifestyle
If you pocket BAH and live cheap, that spread is the highest-return “investment” a junior Sailor can make. Buying a house at every duty station is how people get stuck with a tenant, a property manager, and a PCS they cannot afford. Run the numbers and see if it makes sense for you. Buy when the tour is long, the numbers work after taxes and vacancy, and you can still move. Otherwise rent, keep cash, invest the rest, and do not confuse house-poor with “building wealth.”

7. Build a portable stack, not a fancy one
Priority order that survives deployments:

1) One month of expenses in cash, then three. You will get surprise bills on a PCS.
2) 5% TSP for the full match. Every pay period.
3) Kill high interest (7%+) debt. Use SCRA where it applies.
4) Roth IRA if you have extra ($7,500 in 2026).
5) More TSP.
6) Taxable brokerage only after the above is on autopilot.

Keep the investing boring: C Fund / S Fund / I Fund or a lifecycle fund. You do not need a stock-picking hobby on midwatch.

8. Use the free help before the expensive help
Fleet and Family Support, Command Financial Specialists, Military OneSource, and Navy-Marine Corps Relief Society exist so you do not learn budgeting from a title loan. Relief Society is for a real emergency, not a weekend in Vegas. SGLI is cheap; do not drop it to free up beer money.

The actual flex
It is not a truck payment. It is leaving the Navy—at 6 years or 20—with no high-interest debt, a funded TSP, an emergency fund that survives a PCS, and the option to stay or go. That option is the whole point.

[Sailor Swift ⚓️ @jerome_s]

@MillPrue I am. 6% still showing on my account.

[Sailor Swift ⚓️ @jerome_s]

@CGInvesting10 Within 5 years, I’d keep it in a HYSA.

[Sailor Swift ⚓️ @jerome_s]

This ensures you get your full match and you maximize your TSP for the year.

[Sailor Swift ⚓️ @jerome_s]

If you’re under BRS, DON’T FRONT LOAD and maximize your TSP early in the year. You will lose out on valuable matches later in the year.

Here is what I would do instead..

[Sailor Swift ⚓️ @jerome_s]

3) use that percentage for your contribution rate monthly!

[Sailor Swift ⚓️ @jerome_s]

@militaryrei Only fastest way out is through

[Sailor Swift ⚓️ @jerome_s]

Instead of trying to beat the market, BE the market.

[Finance Guy @GuyTalksFinance]

This is why owning the S&P500 is so great.

You get the most exposure to the best stocks and the least exposure to the worst stocks.

You can’t beat it

[Sailor Swift ⚓️ @jerome_s]

This is true. As a prior Navy RDC I always used to tell my recruits “the fastest way out is through” typically. Don’t sign on the dotted line if you’re not fully committed to it.

[Military Millionaire @militaryrei]

What happens if you quit bootcamp?! 👀

[Sailor Swift ⚓️ @jerome_s]

@NotA_Bull Definitely $VOO . Its the foundation for me.

[Sailor Swift ⚓️ @jerome_s]

Maybe its because Californians are also suffering with the higher costs of living.

There's also tip fatigue. Literally every thing you pay for, it seems that tipping screen is there whether warranted or not.

[New York Post @nypost]

Californians are the worst tippers in America - ranking dead last in a national survey https://t.co/1c0ws61t28

[Sailor Swift ⚓️ @jerome_s]

@money_cruncher I never thought of it this way. This is actually brilliant by Vanguard if it's true.

[Sailor Swift ⚓️ @jerome_s]

@AgencyBlin23425 @GuyTalksFinance It almost sounds like a sales pitch.

[Sailor Swift ⚓️ @jerome_s]

@goooonnney I always DCA. Its just more simple that way,

[Sailor Swift ⚓️ @jerome_s]

@IndexAndForget AMEX HYSA is currently at 3%

[Sailor Swift ⚓️ @jerome_s]

@NotA_Bull I think this might be too little unless you have something else as the foundation portion of your portfolio. Depending on your age.

[Sailor Swift ⚓️ @jerome_s]

@GrulkeLamonte Good deal at 0% interest. Take extra payments that was gonna be for interest and invest it.

[Sailor Swift ⚓️ @jerome_s]

@cadeinvests And if its still on your mind after the week, you might actually derive pleasure from obtaining the item!

[Sailor Swift ⚓️ @jerome_s]

If you’re in the Blended Retirement System (BRS) in your Thrift Savings Plan and you’re not contributing AT LEAST 5% to get the match you’re basically refusing a monthly bonus.