Match the Money to the Need
I did a radio show interview a few years ago and the host of the show asked me, “What’s one piece of advice you’d offer retirees who are concerned about planning their retirement?” It’s a fair question but admittedly difficult to answer in an era of sound bites. In an interview like that, I’m thinking about what the perfect answer …
Back to the Basics: Revisiting an Enduring Strategy
In a recent email from a very well-known firm in our industry, the subject line stated, ‘[this person] Shares A New Retirement Strategy.’ Always eager to add a new tool to the toolbox, I read further. What the article was sharing was a strategy that isn’t ‘New’, but it’s one that we’ve been using since the day Elevated Retirement Group’s …
Briefcase Study: Those Pesky Remaining Debts
Before retirement, most people would like to pay off any remaining debts, so they can feel good going into that next phase of life all tidied-up. That makes a lot of sense, both financially and psychologically. In a recent meeting, we not only discussed this but put a plan together that was well received by the family, so we thought …
Retirement Plan Buyer’s Guide
Car buyers use them and so do people shopping for appliances. The buyer’s guide can be an extremely valuable resource for the person who wishes to compare and contrast the options available to them. But what about retirement plans? Is it possible to test-drive various options for converting one’s nest egg into an income for life? While I’m not aware …
Is Estate Planning Only For Rich People?
I recently had the pleasure of teaching two classes called ‘Your Retirement And Taxes.’ In the classes, we sought to deepen our understanding of how our tax system works as it pertains to investments and income sources, as well as consider some strategies available to a retiree to pay only their fair share of taxes during retirement. While the subject …
Report: Funding Your Retirement
It’s extremely important that we all take our retirement into our own hands. The concept of not preparing and relying on a government-sponsored retirement is not the best plan. Financial woes combined with the fact that the U.S. population is continuing to age, means that there are fewer working-aged people remaining to contribute to our social security systems. On a …
The Roth IRA Is Taking Your Medicine
Taxes, taxes, taxes. When we celebrate Independence Day each year, it’s easy to focus on the fireworks and forget that much of our dispute was over taxes. After all, wasn’t that part of the deal when we declared to the British that we wanted to see other people? That ‘taxation without representation’ thing, right? Well, in the hundreds of years …
Foodies, Homebodies, and Globetrotters: Which Retiree Are You?
Always on the lookout for new retirement insights, I stumbled upon a 2015 J.P. Morgan study (Spending In Retirement – Roy, Carson) that provided yet another way to view spending patterns of retirees. In the past, I’ve written about something called the ‘retirement smile’ that highlights the natural changes in spending patterns during successive phases of a typical retirement, during the …
Report: Helpful Information for Filing 2019 Income Taxes
Helpful Information for Filing 2018 Income Taxes and Proactive Tax Planning for 2019 Tax planning should always be a key focus when reviewing your personal financial situation. One of our goals as financial professionals is to highlight tax savings opportunities and strategies so that you pay only your fair share of taxes and no more. This special report reviews some …
Tick, Tock: How Time Touches So Many Aspects Of Retirement Planning
If there’s one asset class that’s become much more valuable than all of the others, it’s time. It’s finite, making it scarce. It’s fluid, making it difficult to firmly grasp. It’s misunderstood, allowing it to escape the reaches of our attempts at mastery of it. In fact, time is the very asset we’ll willingly trade all of the rest of …
