Your Wealth Reserve: This is why you can’t afford to ignore fees

This is why you can’t afford to ignore fees

When returns on investments are low, paying your advisors fees can kill your account growth. If your investments are earning 6% but your fees, commissions and expense ratios total 2%, your account will grow HALF as much as it could have over time. Example: You invest $250 a month for 35 years with costs of 2% per year. You end up with only $229,194. If your 6% a year on average only cost you 0.07%, you would end up with $352,216. That is $123,022 more—HALF again than with advisor fees. You can always hire an advisor when you have a problem. Your advisor pockets the $123,022. Most of us are correct in assuming advisors are a luxury item. We can’t afford to give away that much of our nest egg. Plus it could be tax-FREE.

https://www.amazon.com/You-Can-Afford-Retirement-TAX-FREE/dp/1517738253

Is your employer’s 401k right for you?

There are situations where you are better off NOT using your employer’s pension plan. Your employer may have picked the wrong fund options or they do not match your contributions. If the only options are expensive funds and there are many extra plan expenses, you can gain the same tax advantage with lower costs elsewhere. Your total accumulations will be greater. If there is no match, there is no advantage to using a 401k or 403b. In fact, some types of employer plans may end up losing your money. Single-employer pension plans are better protected than multiemployer plans by using available pension insurance. Use Brightscope to assess your plan. If you are paying more than 0.15% total costs (fees, charges, expense ratio, bookkeeping, annual statement fee, etc) and you do not receive a match to your contribution, you will be worse off in retirement. A Target Date fund may be the right choice. And you can avoid retirement income taxes too by using a special IRS account available at the largest fund firms.

Consider the better options: https://www.amazon.com/Robbing-You-Blind-401k-fees/dp/1493588966

Is a robo right for you?

A robo-adviser is a computer algorithm that invests your money based on your answers to a few questions, such as when you need the money, your tolerance for risk and how much you have to invest. You pay for the website process and you pay for the funds the robo puts your money into. So you must decide your risk tolerance (how much market volatility you want) and when you need the money (when you will retire or buy your dream vacation). You must also decide how much to invest even though this is one of the hardest decisions to make. You can pay extra for “tax-loss harvesting” although mutual funds pass on gains and losses every year without much control over your taxes. You can pay up to 1% a year for a robo account. An easier alternative is a Target Date fund which does the same things for 0.14%. Save yourself $ thousands over time.

https://www.amazon.com/Best-Robo-Advisor-Ultimate-Automatic-Management/dp/1537111957

Another way the wealthy avoid paying their fair share

Trump caught inflating value of his woods: tax avoidance of $21 million. Did you obtain a tax break when you bought your home simply by claiming you would not build in your back yard? No of course you didn’t. The wealthy use these kinds of tricks and politicians don’t fight it. Usually because the wealthy help the pols get what they want too and nobody goes to jail. First, you have your company buy the property. Then you hire an appraiser who makes a report that IF a new owner were to develop the land, it would be worth double current values. The appraiser who also does deals with you makes up “unsupported assertions and misleading conclusions that boost the value of [your] charitable gift — and [your] tax break.” Another example is the private museum of Peter Brant in CT. Operated by a nonprofit charitable foundation created and controlled by Mr. Brant, this cozy museum with old bicycles is tax-exempt. Wealthy collectors save $ millions in federal taxes by donating art and money to museums and foundations. But for Mr. Brant’s center and a growing number of private tax-exempt exhibition spaces like it is that their founders can deduct the full market value of any art, cash and stocks they donate, even when the museums are just a quick stroll from their living rooms. The museum is not open to the public however. So you could set up a museum of your old baseball cards in your shed but the lawyer set up will cost you. Or you could just use your legal tax shelter which costs nothing to establish.

Start now: https://www.amazon.com/Trump-Tax-Shelter-Avoid-taxes/dp/1985448300

Why is compounding the key to your investing success?

Warren Buffett credits compounding as key to his success in accumulating over $80 billions. “My wealth has come from a combination of living in America, some lucky genes, and compound interest.” Without compounding Buffett’s securities could not propel his assets to that level. We can only achieve our long-term goals by using compounding. Compound interest of 1% at a bank provides $125,762 after investing $250 a month for 35 years. Since inflation runs about 3%, we are losing money! Only compounding securities’ dividends/interests can we accumulate $1,243,368 in 35 years. Since we don’t have Buffett’s genes, buying a low-cost stock index fund is our best and easiest way to take advantage of compounding.

Use Buffett’s strategy: https://www.amazon.com/MasterClass-Buffetts-SIMPLE-Strategy/dp/1983485268

Is “professional” money management right for you?

Investors are questioning whether the promises of the large Wall Street firms are really fulfilled. You may remember when Yale Endowment’s use of ‘alternatives’ was the answer to every investor’s dream of “beating” market returns. Well, guess what? It was a myth. Studies have concluded: “…we find no evidence that the average endowment is able to deliver alpha (market beating returns) relative to public stock/bond benchmarks.” Another study found, “little positive evidence supports the conclusion that private equity as an asset class is able to deliver alpha.” But ultimately, they concluded, “We do not resolve the question of whether private equity and hedge funds deliver alpha.” As to other sources of alpha they flatly stated, “We find no evidence that manager selection, market timing, and tactical asset allocation generate alpha.” Even without taxes, “Non-profit endowments badly underperform market benchmarks, with median annual returns 4.46 percentage points below a 60-40 mix of U.S. equity and Treasury bond indexes, and statistically significant alphas of -1.10% per year.” In English, that means “professional” money management is not worth the $ thousands we are paying over our investing lifetime. The fees are subtracted from our account whether there is a gain or loss.

Compare Vanguard’s low-cost lineup: https://www.amazon.com/Vanguards-Top-Ten-mutual-funds/dp/150073909X

Is it ever time to buy a new car?

What is the difference between a new car and a slightly used version? You must consider that the luxury cars have dependability problems so they lose over 40% value in the first to third year of ownership. Manufacturers use owners for a FREE testers—some of us must return these expensive babies over and over to work out the kinks. If you don’t want to be their guinea pig, look to the used market to save on value. For example: BMW 7. Average new price, $109,231. One-year depreciation, 43.4 percent. Average year-old price, $61,784. Audi A6: Average new price $63,931, One-year depreciation, 41 percent. Average year-old price, $26,199. Jaguar XE: Average new price, $50,371. One-year depreciation, 40.9 percent. Average year-old price, $29,786. Compare Honda Civic hatchback: Average new price, $25,390. One-year depreciation, 11.9 percent. Expected average year-old price, $22,686. If you are still not convinced, price the Porsche SUV (contradiction in terms?) at $127,800 for the Cayenne Turbo. The used 2020 SUV is a ‘bargain’ at $106,000.

Buy right insurance for it: https://www.amazon.com/Vehicle-Insurance-Beware-Double-Coverage/dp/1480027634

Most of us have no idea how much money we need

An overwhelming majority of us are heading into retirement without any idea of how much money we will need. New survey: 71% of adults within 20 years of retirement have not run a projection on how long their savings will last based on their life expectancy. Moreover, 53% of that group said they expect to retire with less than $100,000 in savings. But averages don’t mean a lot. We now have tools to help us get a better idea of our retirement spending levels without paying a planner to make a big printout. We can estimate how our savings/investments will grow over time and then how long they will last. Combine that with the Social Security benefits estimate using current earnings (https://www.ssa.gov/OACT/quickcalc/) and we will have a rough guess of our retirement income. If we do it now we still have time to fix it.

https://www.amazon.com/You-Can-Afford-Retirement-FEE-FREE/dp/1517738253

You could save $3,000 a year on financials

Our financial industry Insiders show you the "tricks of the trade" so you save up to $3,000 every year on banking, mortgage, education, mutual funds, securities, annuity, insurance-life, health, disability, long term care, vehicle, homeowner's, lawsuit--vehicle purchase, estate legacy, wealth transfer, retirement spending . . . almost any service. You buy the best financial services and avoid high fees and commissions. Your savings builds your Wealth Reserve over time. You buy where we Insiders buy! Our Insider's Guides help you find the savings so you can build your Wealth Reserve to protect your lifestyle, now, and into the 21st Century. Your Unbiased Advisor: "Give a man a fish; you have fed him for today. Teach a man to fish; and you have fed him for a lifetime." Our Insiders show you how to SAVE $3,000 every year by buying your financial services DIRECTLY--using Insider's Guides for each financial product/service.

https://www.amazon.com/Insiders-Guides-Discount-Financial-Services/dp/143480593X

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