Retirement Planning

Your retirement may seem near at hand or far away, but one thing is certain: your future will differ from your present. Financially, that fact is worth remembering. Some of the costs you have paid regularly all these years may suddenly decrease or fade away. Others may increase. Will your insurance costs rise with age?…

Should you own your home free and clear before you retire? At first glance, the answer would seem to be “absolutely, if at all possible.” Retiring with less debt … isn’t that a good thing? Why not make a few extra mortgage payments to get the job done? In reality, things are not so cut…

$6,876. That is the average amount of credit card debt owed by an American household headed up by an individual aged 65-69. If you are newly retired or close to retiring, that figure may alarm you. It is more than twice the amount of Social Security’s maximum monthly income payment. Credit card use is surging,…

Will you receive tax-free money in retirement? Some retirees do. You should know about some of your options for tax-free retirement distributions, some of which are less publicized than others. Qualified distributions from Roth accounts are tax-free. If you own a Roth IRA or have a Roth retirement account at work, you can take a…

The Roth IRA changed the whole retirement savings perspective. Since its introduction, it has become a fixture in many retirement planning strategies. The key argument for going Roth can be summed up in a sentence: Paying taxes on retirement contributions today is better than paying taxes on retirement savings tomorrow. Here is a closer look…

Your Social Security income could be taxed. That may seem unfair, or unfathomable. Regardless of how you feel about it, it is a possibility. Seniors have had to contend with this possibility since 1984. Social Security benefits became taxable above certain yearly income thresholds in that year. Frustratingly for retirees, these income thresholds have been…

Picture an 18-wheeler, its 4,000-cubic-foot cargo trailer filled to capacity with stacks of $100 bills. The driver shuts and locks the trailer, closing the door on roughly $10 billion. Now imagine that truck driving off to a landfill, where that $10 billion will be dumped, shredded and buried, rendered useless. As the day goes on,…

No woman wants to end up impoverished, out of options, left to fend for herself on the streets. Only a tiny percentage of women from affluent households will experience this retirement nightmare, but that does not mean the risk should be dismissed. This is the financial circumstance you may fear more than any other. What…

How many words have been written about retirement? It’s a preoccupation for many, and we devote so much time, thought, and energy toward saving for the last day we go to work. Saving and investing in such a way that we no longer have to work may seem ideal at first, but it raises a…

How will you pay for long-term care? At the moment, you may not be able to answer that question – but long-term care insurance can provide an answer for you.  Why are baby boomers opting to make long-term care coverage an important part of their retirement strategies? The reasons to get an LTC policy at…