|
|
Information
Financial Planning
Visit ESPlannerBASIC which asks what you earn, what you spend, and how your financial obligations will change over time. (For example, when will your youngest kid graduate?) It then assumes that you’ll want your family to maintain the same living standard from today on, and figures out how much you can afford to spend,
Continue reading Financial Planning Resources
The cost of long-term care can destroy net worth and a lifetime of savings.
It’s difficult, but not impossible, to do estate planning that protects assets from long-term care costs.
One option is to use an irrevocable income-only trust in situations where the objective is to pass on a house or other asset to a child. By
Continue reading Protecting Net Worth From Long-Term Care Costs
Using an ETF strategy may help you achieve better investment returns than the overall market.
Start by buying ETFs that mimic broad indexes. Then use 200-day moving averages and sector rotation shifts to balance and rebalance your portfolio as needed – not daily, but at least several times a year.
This is what large investment firms can’t do, for
Continue reading How do you Beat the Street?
Every portfolio should contain exposure to international equities to take advantage of growth and currency opportunities.
As investors go international, they should look beyond the usual emerging markets.
Here, Forbes contributor Alexandra Zendrian advises us on how we should approach the use of emerging market equities within your international equities asset class:
“Emerging markets” has become an unfortunate
Continue reading Emerging Market Equities – BRICs and Other Considerations
Is gold the best investment for protection against inflation.
Here’s an excerpt from an insightful post by Bloomberg columnist Matthew Lynn.
Dec. 8 (Bloomberg) — Economic chaos? The dollar crumbling? Central banks printing money like crazy?
Gold ingots
In reality, while investors are right to be nervous about inflation, maybe they are catching on that it’s wrong to
Continue reading Gold As An Inflation Hedge
If you are maxing out your 401(k), IRA and any tax-deferred or tax-exempt retirement account, or you want to diversify across taxable and non-taxable holdings, you are in luck.
There are investments that can give you a diversified global portfolio at very low cost. If you are diversified, you don’t have to worry about your wealth
Continue reading Index Funds, Tax-Managed Funds and ETFs – Low-Cost, Diversified
There are three defenses that should limit the damage a bubble can do to you: common sense, diversification and rebalancing.
The first is common sense. Stepping back from the excitement of the investing scene and applying a little old-fashioned independent judgment can often provide a helpful bit of perspective.
Be aware of reversion to the mean. In
Continue reading Asset Allocation Strategies to Avoid Investing into a Bubble
Investments and Psychology
Traditional concepts of finance are built upon the idea of efficient markets in which investors are rational, unbiased, logical, and risk-averse. When investors act in accord with these qualities, a stock’s price equals its value, and no trading strategy should beat the market.
For decades, psychologists have been studying human decision-making. And contrary to
Continue reading How we Invest – Improving our Investment Success
When markets turn volatile adapt to the changing conditions by adopting rules that can carry your investments through turbulent times.
Too many people get distracted by benchmarks, well-meaning friends, media reports or information from people that know nothing about them.
They forget why they are investing in the first place. The clearer and more specific one is
Continue reading When Markets Turn Volatile – How to Respond
Diversification across asset classes can allow our asset allocation to protect us from more than volatility – it can protect us from our emotions.
Sometimes we are afraid of what the markets are doing or might do and, as a result, we want to pull our funds out of the market.
The best approach in uncertain times
Continue reading Diversification and Our Emotions
Over time, riding out the markets’ inevitable ups and downs has proven much more effective than selling into panic or chasing the hottest trend.
Even missing only a few of the markets’ best days can significantly diminish investor returns.
Patience also affords the benefits of compounding – of earning interest on additional income or reinvested dividends and
Continue reading Invest for the Long Term – Staying the Course
You can manage risk through diversification.
Today, more than ever, geographic diversification should be taken into account.
Studies indicate that asset allocation is the single most important determinant of a portfolio’s long-term success.
The right mix of stocks, bonds and cash – aligned to our particular risk tolerance and investment objective – is very important.
Age-appropriate rebalancing is also
Continue reading Managing Risk – Diversification
Market timing makes more sense with individual stocks. Three out of four stocks move in the same direction as the market. And a stock can dart way above or way below the market average.
Failing to trade in step with the market can be ruinous to those not committed to keeping losses small. A stock can
Continue reading Volatility – Market Timing – Buy and Hold
One of the most fundamental decisions an investor must make is whether to “buy and hold” their investments or to make active asset allocation changes as their perceptions of the markets change. We think “buy and hold” works for many investors who don’t have time, temperament or talent to manage and reshuffle their assets every
Continue reading Buy and Hold or Active Asset Allocation
“Anyone can call themselves a financial planner or adviser,” says Sheryl Garrett, founder of the Garrett Planning Network, an association of fee-only planners, and author of the Personal Finance Workbook for Dummies. “No minimum experience or education is required by law.”
A legitimate financial planner will be able to assist you with asset allocation, using your
Continue reading How to Find a Financial Planner
Some investments have risks to avoid.
Leveraged Funds
Funds that use futures and options try to amplify their returns. They try to return two to three times the daily returns of their target index. The funds mirror daily returns, not long-term performance.
Natural Resource Investments
Fake oil deals show up when the price of gas or oil begins to soar.
Gold and Gold
Continue reading Investment Risks to Avoid
When you’re putting money away for college and retirement simultaneously and both goals are near, you might be tempted to split the savings between a 529 account and an IRA or 401(k).
If you near retirement the retirement account should get the bulk of your saving dollars. Especially when you consider that money withdrawn from
Continue reading Balancing Retirement and College Saving
Let’s say you have no net worth, or very little of the estate you want to leave behind to your heirs should you die. How do you create an estate where none currently exists? The answer is life insurance.
You may be getting by now but know that if you died there are some financial objectives
Continue reading How to Generate Wealth and Quickly Build an Estate Where None Exists?
Services
Fee-Only Financial Planners
Visit these sites in your search for a fee-only financial planner:
The National Association of Personal Financial Advisors is the nation’s leading organization dedicated to the advancement of fee-only comprehensive financial planning.
The Garrett Planning Network Inc. is an international network of fee-only financial advisors and planners.
Information
Asset Allocation Mix Within Your Portfolio
Visit Morningstar
Continue reading Strategy: Asset Allocation Resources
One of the most basic and important investment decisions we all make is trying to figure out how much to invest in the two most popular asset classes: stocks and bonds.
Getting this right is important. Bonds are less risky which is more important the older we get. However, stocks are going to give you a
Continue reading Figuring Out the Ideal Asset Mix – Stocks, Bonds, or Both?
|
|
