Social Security
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The Right Long-Term Care Insurance Policy for You
Many of you should at least consider purchasing a long-term health care policy. In high cost of living areas, anyone with net assets between $200,000 and $2 million should take a look at the policies. In lower-cost areas, a lower net worth merits a look at the policies. That doesn’t mean each of you should […]
Health Care Tax Strategies
Health care or long-term care can eat up a big part of a retiree’s budget – or the budget of a retiree’s children. Fortunately, the tax law can help pay for a big part of that burden. Deductions for medical expenses seemed to disappear when the rules were changed in 1986. Now, you can deduct […]
Beat Taxes On Social Security Benefits
The 90% marginal tax bracket is alive and well. Most people believe that such high marginal tax rates ended with the 1981 and 1986 tax cuts. For most taxpayers, they did. But those high marginal tax rates exist today and are reserved for retirees. Many of you who recently completed your federal income tax returns […]
Should I Empty My IRA Early?
It is not always a good idea to keep money in an IRA as long as possible. In most cases, it makes sense to let income and gains compound tax deferred for many years. But that can change as you get older. You might benefit by taking more money out of an IRA than you […]
Surprising Retiree Tax Havens
Did you know that you might be able to move from low-tax Virginia, retire in Massachusetts, and cut your tax bill dramatically? That’s true, if you are a federal government retiree. Your government pension annuity is exempt from taxes in Massachusetts and several other states, but not in Virginia. Florida seems like a tax haven, […]
Avoid This #1 Retirement Mistake
What’s the biggest mistake in retirement plans? From what I see, it is failing fully to factor inflation into their planning. Retirement these days often lasts 20 years or more. To be safe, you should plan on living to age 90. Over that time inflation can make a safe, comfortable stream of income uncomfortably tight, […]
The Most Common Life Insurance Mistake
Following rules of thumb can be dangerous to your wealth. Yet rules of thumb are the way many people decide how much life insurance to purchase. That’s why most people have either too much or too little life insurance. It’s one of the major financial mistakes. Buy too much life insurance, and you are wasting […]
How to Keep More of your Social Security Benefits
There’s great news from Washington. Repeal of the “earned income limit” on Social Security beneficiaries passed Congress, and President Clinton said he would sign it. The bad news is income taxes still are imposed on Social Security benefits. Under the earned income limit, a beneficiary who receives “too much” income from working loses some of […]
