One of my favorite books of the year was written by Morgan Housel titled, The Psychology of Money. It may be the most accessible lesson on money that I have ever read. I judge the quality of the book based on how much I highlight it, and I highlighted this book as much as any. Below, I will share a few of my favorite quotes from just two chapters. My… Read More
Time to Review Your Risk Management Plan
This fall, I conducted reviews of client risk management plans and found some interesting things I’d like to share with you in hopes that you might review your own situation to ensure you are prepared for the “what ifs” in your life. To save you some time, here are a few issues I came across on multiple occasions: Out-of-date beneficiary designations. (Most popular.) Too little liability coverage on auto &… Read More
The Ultimate Retirement Lever
There are plenty of technical planning topics that can add value to your financial life that range from tax optimization to long-term care planning to estate planning. But if you blow up your portfolio, each one of those planning areas is exponentially worse off which is why I write so much about the simple value of staying the course through all markets. Imagine that around March 23rd of this year,… Read More
Who Would’ve Thought?
On 24 November, the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) closed above 30,000 for the first time ever. In case you’ve forgotten, on March 23rd, the DJIA closed at 18,214. This is a rebound of about 65% in a period of about eight months’ time. Let’s also not forget how loud the doomsayers had become in their war chant of “this is the end of the world as we know it.”… Read More
Using “Enough” to Find Contentment
Perhaps the greatest benefit (albeit it was unknown to me at the time) of contributing to the book, How I Invest My Money, was that I was sent a beautifully framed version of the personalized sketch Carl Richards put together for my chapter. Though this wasn’t the case for many of the contributors, it’s quite obvious where his sketch idea came from for my chapter. I said, “For me, enough… Read More
We Are the News We Consume
I am a willing consumer of the “self-improvement” section of the bookstore. After two decades of reading these books, it occurred to me why the continuous reading of these style books is helpful. It’s because we have short memories and need constant reinforcement of these ideas if they are to become a reality. As I have been writing this blog for almost three years, I believe this same benefit is… Read More
Why Bond Duration Matters to Your Portfolio
As I have written about extensively since the Fed aggressively cut interest rates, bonds are in a tough spot. Because I continue to get questions on why I feel so strongly about the precarious nature of bond investing at current, I want to share some additional information and perspective on why I feel the way that I do. I think providing a little bond investing education here will be time… Read More
Today’s Headlines Are Tomorrow’s Footnotes
I have been reading a collection of investment articles that were written back in the early 1990s. Here’s the gist of those articles. The bull market had gone on for about 10+ years to that point. The markets were coming off of a five-year span of ‘unprecedented volatility’ as was noted a few times. There were negative reports everywhere about the economy and how things were stalling out. People eagerly… Read More
Half a Life Ahead
A couple of years ago, a friend offered an observation that has stuck with me and I think much of our lives (and financial perspectives) can be traced back to this one single idea. That is “We can only see half of our life ahead of where we are.” Meaning, if you are 20, the oldest you can truly see yourself being is 30. Thinking about my own experiences and… Read More
The Sky is Falling
I want to briefly rant about something I believe retirees should be aware of that can potentially run their portfolios off course. That is the subject of the permabear pundits. Surprisingly, it’s not the general pessimism that bothers me. My problem with these folks is two-fold: Their pessimistic position never changes (hence the name permabear). The record of a permanently pessimistic viewpoint is historically absurd. I was sent one such… Read More
