Risk Tolerance: What does it mean?
In layman’s terms, Risk Tolerance is how much you can stomach the up and down values of your investment accounts as the stock market moves.
Divorce and Estate Planning
Wills for both spouses are often drawn up sometime during the marriage. When divorce is contemplated, the selection of beneficiaries and executors will likely be revised to reflect the absence of your former spouse.
Annuities and Retirement Planning
It pays to shop around for the right annuity. In fact, doing a little homework could save you hundreds of dollars a year or more. Why? Rates of return and costs can vary widely between different annuities.
Health Insurance in Retirement
When you retire, you will probably focus more on health care than ever before. Staying healthy is your goal, and this can mean more visits to the doctor for preventive tests and routine checkups.
Beyond Traditional Asset Classes: Exploring Alternatives
Stocks, bonds, and cash are fundamental components of an investment portfolio. However, many other investments can be used to try to spice up returns or reduce overall portfolio risk. So-called alternative assets have become popular in recent years as a way to provide greater diversification.
Concentrated Stock Positions: Considerations and Strategies
Whether you inherited a large holding, exercised options to buy your company’s stock, sold a private business, hold restricted stock, or have benefitted from repeated stock splits over the years, having a large position in a single stock carries unique challenges. Even if the stock has done well, you may want more diversification, or have new financial goals that require a shift in strategy.
Retirement Plans and Estate Planning
When you die, what will happen to your retirement plan benefits? In general, your retirement plan benefits pass to the beneficiaries you designate on the plan beneficiary designation form. Your benefits will generally be subject to estate tax at your death and to income tax when benefits are distributed from the plan to your beneficiaries.
Creating an Investment Portfolio
It is an almost universally accepted concept that most portfolios should include a mix of investments, such as stocks, bonds, mutual funds, and other investment vehicles. A portfolio should also be balanced. That is, the portfolio should contain investments with varying levels and types of risk to help minimize the overall impact if one of the portfolio holdings declines significantly.
Taking Advantage of Employer-Sponsored Retirement Plans
Employer-sponsored qualified retirement plans such as 401(k)s are some of the most powerful retirement savings tools available. If your employer offers such a plan and you’re not participating in it, you should be.
How Can I Reduce My Spending?
Start by keeping track of all of your expenses for a month. None are too small or insignificant: the daily newspaper, coffee on the way to work, an extra gallon of milk, that burger at the fast-food outlet. Next, categorize the expenses so you can see what you spend and where you spend it.