Retirement Watch Weekly
Planning Your Spending Strategy
The spending strategy is one of the most import and yet overlooked parts of a retirement plan. The spending strategy — also called a distribution, drawdown, or withdrawal strategy — reduces the risk of running out of money during retirement by setting the maximum amount you should spend from the nest egg each year. I’ve […]
IRA Pitfalls, Mistakes and Opportunities
Individual retirement accounts (IRAs) become more complicated as balances increase and distributions are taken. It is important to understand some key rules so you won’t trigger additional taxes and penalties or miss some grand opportunities you didn’t know were available. Examples of people making IRA mistakes come my way almost every day in court cases, […]
Power of Attorney vs. Living Trust
Which is the best way to protect your assets, smooth the transition of your estate and make life easier for you and your heirs: the Power of Attorney or a revocable Living Trust? Most estate plans need both a power of attorney and revocable living trust. The real issue is which should cover the bulk of your assets? Over the years, I’ve heard from […]
Hurricane Harvey and the Economy
First, I’d like you to know there’s a little time left to make my book an award winner. The revised edition of “The New Rules of Retirement” is nominated for Best Retirement Book by Senior Homes. The highest online vote-getter will be the winner, and right now I’m in third place and need additional votes. […]
Nursing Home Care: Your Kids and Your Long-Term Care
This article has a lot of interesting data about nursing home care. It explains how long people are likely to need a nursing home stay and how much it could cost. It also makes the interesting point that elderly people with adult children are likely to need less long-term care than others. You can use […]
Portfolio Allocation and Bonds in a Low-Yield World
The investment firm AQR recently produced a paper discussing how to allocate portfolios in a world of zero interest rates. In particular, they asked whether bonds have a role in a portfolio when interest rates are near zero. Their answer is bonds do have a role, but it is a narrower one than in the […]
Less Expensive Hearing Aids Coming
Many people put up with poor hearing because obtaining hearing aids is too expensive and difficult. That’s largely because of regulations. As this article points out, that’s about to change. (Subscription might be required.) Congress directed the Food and Drug Administration to rewrite its regulations so that people can obtain hearing aids without a prescription […]
The Impact of Vanguard and other Index Funds on REIT Investing
Vanguard’s had a large fund invested exclusively in an index of real estate stocks. Recently, real estate stocks were added as a separate sector to the S&P 500, boosting their share of the index. The result is that the various Vanguard funds are now the largest shareholders in most real estate investment trusts in the […]
