Using Vanguard's VBLTX for bond portion?

[AlexB]

I am currently reading "Why the Best-Laid Investment Plans Usually Go Wrong" by Harry Browne. In it he says you must use bonds of *at least*  25+ years, but VBLTX only invests in 15 year bonds.

What do people think, are there better funds to use for the bond portion, or will I be forced into purchasing bonds in non-index form in order to properly implement a permanent portfolio of my own?

Should I just learn how to do bond ladders myself and cutout the middleman?

Thanks for the help,
Alex

[Ad Orientem]

TLT or VGLT.

[barrett]

AlexB, I can only speak from experience with Fidelity and TD Ameritrade but the individual treasuries are very easy to purchase with both of those companies. Also, I think the only likely benefit to building a ladder at the beginning is if you want the benefit of seeing LTT interest payments hit your account more frequently. Otherwise you can just load up on whatever the most recent 30-year issue is. In that case you'll get half your interest payments every six months (for me on 5/15 and 11/15 for the most part). Good luck.

[AlexB]

Good points about VBLTX... I did intend to specify a treasury bond fund. Thanks for pointing that out.

However, to the intent of my original post all these Vanguard funds very specifically are going against what Harry Browne specified was necessary for the long-term bonds (25 year minimum)... My understanding is that we want high volatility choices for each of the 4 quarters of the permanent portfolio. I don't want to make the mistake of losing out on bond income when the bond quarter is supposed to be leading the portfolio.

[steve]

vglt/edv even split is about the same as tlt, Back a few years ago I took tax loss harvest on tlt and bought vglt/edv , I never got the chance to re buy tlt as long term bond just went up from the point I sold tlt. If the commentators where correct in their prediction that Long term bonds were going to keep going down I would have done another tax loss harvest and sold the vglt/edv and re buy tlt but that never happened.