Retirement Watch Weekly
The Most Overlooked Deduction
Those who inherit IRAs often are not aware of a deduction they can take to shelter IRA distributions from income taxes. Even most tax experts do not understand “income in respect of a decedent.” Most skip over the topic in school and expect not to run into it. But with so many people owning valuable […]
Inflation-Protected Never-Ending Lifetime Income with Annuities
Retirement planning boils down to solving two problems: providing an income for life, and ensuring that income retains its purchasing power. Running out of money and watching the purchasing power of one’s income erode are two of the greatest retirement fears. Financial services companies constantly are developing products and strategies to alleviate these fears. As […]
Reverse Mortgages: How to Withdraw Cash from Your Home
American seniors can take equity out of their homes without moving. They also don’t have to make payments during their lifetimes while they live in their homes. Reverse mortgages were almost unknown when I first wrote about them more than a decade ago. Now, they are much better known but are greatly misunderstood. Only 8,200 […]
Estate Tax Changes on the Horizon
Hurricane Katrina and other factors put on the back burner permanent changes to the estate and gift tax. The plan was to have a permanent change to the estate tax enacted in fall 2005. For now, however, we continue to live with the scheduled phaseout that was enacted in 2001. Under this schedule, taxes will […]
Making the Medicare Prescription Drug Decision
The promotions for the Medicare prescription drug program are starting and will become intense for many of you over the next few months. Take your time to analyze the choices. If you are eligible for Medicare now, you are eligible for the prescription drug program. Sign ups for the plans can start Nov. 15. The […]
Pockets of Opportunity in the Stock Market
The trends that boosted our portfolios ahead of the indexes this year are likely to last another quarter or more. As more and more investors notice our returns and invest with us, it will become time to move into other investments. We aren’t at that point yet, but I’m already drawing up a short list […]
Stocks to Hold for the Long Run
We are coming up on the one year anniversary of our portfolio of 15 stocks for the next decade. For those who want to own individual stocks in addition to mutual funds, I created a portfolio of 15 companies that you should be comfortable owning for the next decade. This is not a trading portfolio, […]
Japanese Stocks Catching Fire
The doormat of international financial markets, Japan, appears to be turning around as we anticipated a couple of years ago. At Retirement Watch we have a history of following the Japanese market. Investors with long memories will recall that Japan had the world’s hottest stock market in the 1970s and 1980s. There even were fears […]
