Category Archives for Retirement Advice
How Much Money Makes You Wealthy, Wealthier, or Wealthiest?
Sure, having such a high income means you can afford to buy a lot of things. More importantly for our purpose here, it means you can save and invest a lot, which lets you build wealth far more easily than
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Investing in Uncertain Times
After taking a closer look at interest rates and inflation we come to the heart of the matter: When interest rates, inflation, or both are on the rise, what’s an investor to do?
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Has rising inflation got you down?
Inflation is the rate at which money loses its purchasing power over time. As you might guess, there are many ways to measure such a squishy figure. There are various economic sectors, such as energy,
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Fed Takes Center Stage
At its March 15–16 Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting, the U.S. Federal Reserve raised its federal target funds rate by a quarter-point. It was the first increase since December 2018, but it
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You Want the Size, Value, and Profitability Premiums … But How?
Capturing the size, value, and profitability premiums in real-world portfolios requires expertise. Investors should be cautious about favoring one premium over another or one region over another based
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Fighter Planes and Market Turmoil
Have you been reading the daily headlines—watching markets stall, recover, and dip once again? If so, you may be wondering whether there’s anything you can do to avoid the motion sickness.
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Market Review 2021: A Recovery Amid Challenges
It was a year of uncertainty and anticipation, of hopes for a return to a degree of normalcy following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. And it was a year that showed, again, the difficulty of
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A New Year Conversation
This is no surprise. The world is enormous. To cope with information overload, we engage in what behavioral psychologists refer to as heuristics. These are rules of thumb or mental shortcuts that take
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Reading Fed Tea Leaves? Watch Market Prices Instead
Yields reflect the aggregate expectations of all market participants, including opinions on how and when the Fed will act. And even if a crystal ball could reveal the timing and direction of the Fed’s
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Swing in Small Value Stocks Shows Benefits of Staying the Course
Value stocks, or those with low relative prices, have outperformed higher-priced growth stocks in the US over the long term. Similarly, the stocks of smaller companies have fared better than the stocks
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Is Inflation Haunting Your Financial Dreams? (Part 2)
The Federal Reserve has been suggesting rising rates should wane. We hope they’re right. But we also know the future remains uncharted. Nearly any outcome is possible, and none is inevitable. This means
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Is Inflation Haunting Your Financial Dreams? (Part 1)
Recent headlines have been reporting a noticeable uptick in inflation. Superlatives like “best” and “worst” grab the most attention, so outlets have been abuzz with reports of how a 5% May consumer
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Don’t Let A Market Timer Gamble with Your Life Savings
The prediction game may be a losing one for many investors, and each year there are published reports that highlight the difficulties conventional managers face.
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Tax Planning In Retirement
There is one major tax-planning principle that changes in retirement that is often overlooked by retirees and their advisors alike, which results in paying more taxes than necessary. Entering retirement,
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6 Tax Planning Strategies to Optimize Your Retirement Wealth
You’ll benefit from the tax planning strategies in this post, whether you are currently retired or are still counting down the years, months, or days until retirement. Being deliberate about your
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10 Steps to Easing Financial Anxiety During Major Life Changes
Life happens and, sometimes, it can be incredibly worrisome from a financial standpoint. You’ve struggled through a divorce. Perhaps you’ve faced a life-threatening illness. And, you look at your bank
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The Tao of Wealth Management
The path to success in many areas of life is paved with continual hard work, intense activity, and a day-to-day focus on results. However, for many investors who adopt this approach to managing their wealth,
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A Focus on Fixed Income
It’s been approximately a decade since the Great Recession began. By year-end 2008, the U.S. Federal Reserve (the Fed) had lowered the target federal funds rate to near-zero and embarked on an aggressive
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What’s Social Security Got for You?
Building the best strategy starts with pinpointing your benefit at different ages. Back in the late 1980s, when much like today there was mounting concern about the future of Social Security, Congress
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Timing is Critical for Boomers Preparing to Claim Social Security
Make the Most of Your Benefits It has begun. America’s largest generation, the 79 million strong, post World War II baby-boomers has begun cashing in on its Social Security benefits. And, just as history
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Avoiding Financial Scams and Identity Theft Fraud
Young or old, wealthy or poor, online or in person … Nobody is immune from financial scams and identity theft fraud. No matter who you are or how well-informed you may be, the bad guys are out there,
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The Uncertainty Paradox and Planning
“Doubt is not a pleasant condition, but certainty is an absurd one.” — Voltaire “The market hates uncertainty” has been a common enough saying in recent years, but how logical is it?
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Designing a Retirement Income that Works for You
If ever there were an appropriate analogy for how to invest for retirement, it would be the classic fable of The Three Little Pigs. As you may recall, those three little pigs tried three different structures
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Divorce and Social Security Benefits
Even if your ex-spouse has not applied for benefits, you may qualify to collect spousal Social Security payments based on his or her earnings record. When looking at divorce and Social Security remember,
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Make the Most of Spousal and Survivor Benefits from Social Security
Even after the crackdown, special rules can pay off handsomely for husbands and wives as survivor benefits come into play. Social Security smiles on married couples, with special rules that can richly
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How to Save Taxes in Retirement
When you take money from savings for retirement, you’re generally advised to tap taxable accounts first, then tax-deferred retirement accounts, and finally your Roth IRA. Here’s why: If you hold an
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Taxes Never Retire, but Benefits Escape
Congress’s complicated rules for the taxation of Social Security benefits open the door to opportunities to save. It used to be so simple. From the time the first checks were issued in 1937 through the
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The Truth About the Earnings Test
You need to know how continuing to work will affect your benefits. The good news is that the reality isn’t nearly as nefarious as critics complain. It sounds like a cruel joke: After a lifetime of working,
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Smart Social Security Strategies for Married Couples
Figuring out the best time to file for your Social Security benefits can be surprisingly simple or hellishly complex. If you’re retired—voluntarily or not—and need the money to live on, you may have
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Structured CDs: Buyer Beware!
Most investors are familiar with Certificates of Deposit (CDs). You purchase one, and the bank pays you a bit of interest on it, plus your principal back. They don’t yield much, but they’re nearly
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