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A family might spend decades working and saving towards the goal of owning a vacation home. The memories made are priceless, but the personal, emotional, and financial costs of keeping that house in your family for generations can be very high and very painful without thorough planning.
Prepare a family retreat into your legacy plan and make sure you discuss these three points with your heirs, your attorney, your CPA, and your financial advisor.
Receiving an unexpected sum of money can be a welcome surprise, but deciding what to do with it can be a challenge. Should you save the money or pay down debt? Invest the funds or donate to charity?
While rushing to book a vacation with proceeds from a windfall may be tempting, it might be more rewarding to use the funds to shore up your finances for the long run. Here are five strategies to consider:
Spring is a time of renewal and rejuvenation, as the world awakens from its winter slumber and new life begins to bloom. As the saying goes, "April showers bring May flowers", and this sentiment can also apply to your financial life.
Just as the rain nourishes the soil and helps plants grow, taking the time to "spring-clean" your financial plan can help you grow and thrive in the months and years ahead.
Retirement planning often focuses on the accumulation phase: saving diligently and investing wisely. We spend 40 or more years of our lives focused on building the proverbial “nest egg,” but after retirement things change and so should our financial focus.
There are a variety of questions that must be answered. How much should you be withdrawing annually? Should you go with your IRA first or your brokerage account? Should you withdraw a fixed percentage or fixed amount? How much will you leave behind?
Having a well planned withdrawal strategy is important:
When can you access your savings without a penalty? When should you enroll in Medicare? At what age is it best to collect Social Security?
In the years leading up to retirement, there are a number of key milestones and deadlines to consider. Without careful attention, it's easy to miss these checkpoints and the consequences can be severe. Let's delve into eight crucial moments to help you stay on track.
In the years leading up to retirement, there are a number of key milestones and deadlines to consider. Without careful attention, it's easy to miss these checkpoints and the consequences can be severe. Let's delve into eight crucial moments to help you stay on track.
Mortgage rates have been rising steeply since 2021 and are now commonly found in the neighborhood of 7%. This is significant as you might remember rates in 2021 were often below 3%. The run-up has cooled the housing market considerably. Now, lenders are having to get creative to drive new business. They’re offering more incentives to find new buyers and to undercut the competition. Let’s take a look at some of these strategies (gimmicks if you’re a pessimist), to help you and those you know make smart lending decisions.
Making financial decisions can often be more challenging than it appears. A variety of subtle influences can cloud our judgment. Among these, behavioral biases like anchoring, loss aversion, and herd behavior have been found to shape our choices significantly. In this article, we’ll explore each of these biases and ways to counteract their influence.
If We Set Unrealistic Expectations for Ourselves, We Never Reach True Wealth.
What does it mean to be rich? Some people live by the balance sheet, some die by it. Others don’t even know what a balance sheet is. How do you define wealth for yourself? A recent article on CNN reported that “a whopping 70% of those with at least $1 million in assets that are invested or available to invest, excluding home values, don’t consider themselves to be wealthy – only when they hit the $5 million mark (did) millionaires begin to feel wealthy.”
Our feelings about wealth stem more from our life decisions and social circles than from the numbers we see on our statements.
Teddy Roosevelt once said, “Comparison is the thief of joy.” Feeling wealthy means feeling you have enough, of wanting what you have rather than being consumed with what you want.
Is Money a Supporting or Driving Element?
It's common for people who are retiring to set their retirement date in either the springtime or the early summer. If you happen to be one of those lucky folks who are going to retire next year, then "Congratulations!"
But before you start planning your retirement party, make sure you do these four things if you're retiring next year.
Investing during market volatility can be like driving through a winter storm. Your best plan of action is to focus on what you can control and keep progressing towards your destination.
As the markets have continued to adjust to rising interest rates and inflation, you might think of your financial plan as a GPS system that you can rely on to keep you on track even when it's tough to see the path forward.
Here are five aspects of your financial plan that we recommend focusing on as we wait for this storm to pass … and prepare to weather the next one.
