What are your options for insuring yourself prior to age 65? If you retire before age 65, you must be prepared to address two insurance issues.One, finding health coverage in the period before you can sign up for Medicare. Two, finding a way to pay for that coverage. You know it will probably be expensive, but do you realize just how expensive? A single retiree may pay as much as $500-1,000 per month for private health insurance. For a couple, the monthly premiums can surpass $2,000. These are ballpark figures; fortunately, seniors without pre-existing health conditions can locate some less expensive plans offering short-term coverage, albeit with high deductibles.1,2 If you find yourself in
Start your “second act” with inadequate assets, and your vision of the future may be revised. How much have you saved for retirement?Are you on pace to amass a retirement fund of $1 million by age 65? More than a few retirement counselors urge pre-retirees to strive for that goal. If you have $1 million in invested assets when you retire, you can withdraw 4% a year from your retirement funds and receive $40,000 in annual income to go along with Social Security benefits (in ballpark terms, about $30,000 per year for someone retiring from a long career). If your investment portfolio is properly diversified, you may be able to do this for 25-30 years without delving into assets elsewhere.1 Perh
Things you can do for your future as the year unfolds. What financial, business, or life priorities do you need to address for 2019? Now is a good time to think about the investing, saving, or budgeting methods you could employ toward specific objectives, from building your retirement fund to lowering your taxes. You have plenty of options. Here are a few that might prove convenient. Can you contribute more to your retirement plans this year?In 2019, the yearly contribution limit for a Roth or traditional IRA rises to $6,000 ($7,000 for those making “catch-up” contributions). Your modified adjusted gross income (MAGI) may affect how much you can put into a Roth IRA: singles and heads of hous
Future financial needs may be underestimated. If you were born during 1965-80, you belong to “Generation X.” Ten or twenty years ago, you may have thought of retirement as an event in the lives of your parents or grandparents; within the next 10-15 years, you will probably be thinking about how your own retirement will unfold.1 According to the most recent annual retirement survey from the Transamerica Center for Retirement Studies, the average Gen Xer has saved only about $72,000 for retirement. Hypothetically, how much would that $72,000 grow in a tax-deferred account returning 6% over 15 years, assuming ongoing monthly contributions of $500? According to the compound interest calculator a