Posts Tagged ‘Retirement Planning’

A tax break with an additional benefit. Did you know that, since taking effect in 2010, you are allowed to withdraw money from a certain kind of annuity without paying taxes as long as you use it to pay for qualified long term care coverage? A tax break for these important savings will be of…

If you move away from equities with age, are you making a mistake? For some time, financial professionals have encouraged investors to lessen their exposure to the stock market as they get older. After all, a 60-year-old has less time to recover from a market downturn than someone decades away from collecting Social Security checks.…

Financially, how might retirement differ from your expectations? To some degree, it will. Just as few weathercasters can accurately predict a month’s worth of temperatures and storms, few retirees find their financial futures playing out as precisely as they assumed. As you approach or enter retirement, you may find that your spending and your exit…

Medicare enrollment is automatic for some. For those receiving Social Security benefits, the coverage starts on the first day of the month you turn 65. Your enrollment is also automatic when you are under 65, disabled, and receiving benefits from Social Security for 24 months. The exception to this would be for people with Amyotrophic…

In 1994, a financial advisor named Bill Bengen published research articulating the “4% rule”, which became a landmark of retirement planning. The 4% rule postulates that a retirement nest egg can last 30 years if a retiree withdraws 4% of it per year (incrementally adjusted for inflation), given a portfolio of 50% stocks and 50%…

Just what is an RMD? After you turn 70½, the IRS requires you to withdraw some of the money in most retirement savings accounts each year. These withdrawals are officially called Required Minimum Distributions (RMDs). You must take an RMD from a traditional IRAs after you turn 70½, even if you are still working. If…

In planning for your retirement, you may face several financial issues.  Maybe you’d like to generate retirement income, but want to minimize the taxes on investments you’ve held for several years.  Perhaps you’d like to minimize your income taxes during retirement.  You also might like to reduce the size of your taxable estate so more…

Now or later? When it comes to the question of Social Security income, the choice looms large. Should you apply now to get earlier payments? Or wait for a few years to get larger checks? Consider what you know (and don’t know). You know how much retirement money you have; you may have a clear…

Isn’t 65 the traditional retirement age? Perhaps, but baby boomers are modifying the definition of a traditional retirement (if not redefining it altogether). The Social Security Administration has subtly revised its definition of the traditional retirement age as well. If you glance at the SSA website, the “full” retirement age for Americans born from 1943-1954…

Location, location, location … It matters when it comes to real estate, and it also matters when it comes to the way you hold and invest your retirement savings. You can’t control what happens with the tax code, but you can control how your savings are held. As various types of investments are taxed at…