I talked with a Client this week about what to expect as his granddaughter (for whom he has established a custodial account) approaches her twenty first birthday. Let’s take a closer look at custodial accounts as many of your have children in your lives you care about – and the future will be here before […]

As interest rates fell last week (and with talk of Fed rate cuts coming in September), I talked with two clients about real estate related questions this week. Let’s take a look at these important topics Selling a Home Without a doubt, lower mortgage rates spark increased home buying (and selling) activity. As rates come […]

A client referred her mom to me for help with an essential task in her financial journey – the selection of a financial advisor. Her mom had a long-standing relationship with a local advisory firm and her designated advisor left very abruptly. She was faced with a decision – leave and follow her prior advisor […]

A client asked a great question this week about an often-overlooked strategy to utilize tax-deferred IRA funds to make donations directly to charity. Let’s take a closer look at this strategy and determine when it may make sense for you to consider it as well. What is a Qualified Charitable Distribution (QCD)? A QCD is […]

In working with a client this week on an inherited account, the topic of step-up in cost basis arose. This is an important item to understand when someone passes away (and you inherit their assets) so I thought it was worth covering it herein. What is cost basis? As a reminder, cost basis is the […]

I recently worked on a financial planning project for clients who were quickly approaching their retirement years. The ultimate goal of the exercise was to determine the estimate of annual spending their portfolio can support in retirement. As you can imagine, this calculation relies on many assumptions concerning items such as asset class returns, asset […]

I talked with clients this week regarding their savings plan for the year. The question of timing came up – ie: when should they deploy cash they now have on hand into their various accounts. Let’s look at the items we discussed Roth IRAs One of the accounts my clients are able to fund in […]

We’ve talked about the term Safe Harbor before (in regards to estimated tax payments – you can revisit that post here). This week, a client reached out regarding another type of Safe Harbor. She said her friend had brought up the concept of Safe Harbor retirement plans and she wondered not only what they were […]

A client reached out this week with the exciting news that she had been offered a new career opportunity. She asked for a call to discuss the opportunity and sent me the offer specifics to review. Since this is a situation others may find themselves in amidst this active job market, I thought it was […]

This past week, I spoke with several clients in the middle of a career transitions for a variety of reasons (transitioning to a new role, opting to take some time away, and entering well-deserved retirement stage). With each of these clients, the items to consider during a career transition vary but there are some common […]