From time to time this question comes up: why can’t I use my IRA account to purchase a retirement home? After all, for many folks, the IRA represents a pretty large account, possibly even enough to purchase a retirement home outright – so why not?
No Personal Use
This is a thorny question, because there are lots [...]
Posts under ‘financial planning’
Real Estate Investing in Your IRA
Ah, Sweet Procrastination!
It’s usually best, for most things in the financial world, to act now rather than waiting around. The notable exception is with regard to applying for Social Security benefits. We’ve discussed it before (in fact part of this article is a re-hash of an earlier post) but it is an important point that needs more [...]
Index Funds: The Oatmeal of the Investing World
We know it almost instinctively, from all the information we’ve seen about it: oatmeal is good for you. For cryin’ out loud, Wilford Brimley made a living telling us “It’s the right thing to do, and a tasty way to do it.” But in general, most folks look at oatmeal as a bland, tasteless, boring [...]
The Formula for Success
Financial professionals sometimes get wrapped up in the overly-complex – retirement projections, Monte Carlo analysis, trust and estate planning, and complicated portfolio design. It often comes to mind that we need to stop and remember what the most important concepts are in successful financial planning, and that can be boiled down to a very simple [...]
Where to Get Your Annual Credit Report
As a smart consumer, you have likely heard that it’s a good idea to get your credit report every year from all three services: Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion. You’ve probably also seen the ever-present “Free Credit Report” commercials on the television (unless you TiVo everything and skip past the commercials!) – so you may be [...]
Things to Consider as You Set Up a SOSEPP
So, you’ve decided that you’d like to begin taking distributions from your IRA funds – and you’re under age 59½, so you need to structure your distributions as a Series of Substantially Equal Periodic Payments (SOSEPP). (For more background information on the SOSEPP, see this article.) It is important to do this right, because once [...]
Social Security’s PIA – What is this?
If you’ve ever looked at the information about Social Security retirement benefits, you’ve likely come across a figure called the Primary Insurance Amount, or PIA. So just what is PIA? I mean, besides the airport designation for the General Wayne A. Downing Peoria (IL) International Airport?
Primary Insurance Amount
The Primary Insurance Amount (PIA) is the projected [...]
The Dreaded “Double Tax” on IRAs
Chances are, if you hold a significant amount of money in your IRA accounts, you may have been approached by a financial professional who tells you about the “double tax” that may be a part of your account’s future. Here’s a brief explanation: when the owner of an IRA dies, assuming that the size of [...]
Bonds and Bond Funds
There is a question that often comes up when discussing investment strategies, especially for an astute investor who has done some research on various kinds of investments. Specifically the question often is: why would we choose a bond fund or a bond index fund versus purchasing a specific bond (or several bonds)?
Bonds in General
To answer [...]
Financial Recordkeeping – How Long Do I Keep This??
I often get the question – how long should I keep my _________ (fill in the blank)? So I thought I’d put together a list of the most common types of documents with some guidelines as to how long you should keep those documents. I’ll try to keep this as simple as possible – but [...]
