Annuities get a bad wrap. Most of that bad wrap is justifiably earned. Annuity providers often reward the “salesperson” (yes, many times, that is what they are) with a big commission check. As such, they are incentivized to encourage (scare you into) putting as much of your money as possible into annuities. As a result of those sales antics, many advisors that take the other side of the annuity argument… Read More
Ashby Talks Retirement
Over the past few weeks, I chatted with a couple of my advisor friends that I thought I would share with everyone. Not surprisingly, we spent the majority of time talking about retirement planning. On Monday, I spent the afternoon with Justin Castelli, CEO of RLS Wealth Management. Prior to shooting the video, we talked about all types of things about our industry and profession. We are both passionate about… Read More
Reflections on 2018 and What’s To Come in 2019
I wavered on whether to write a post like this or not. But after realizing so much wisdom from reading similar posts from other people that I respect, I feel that if it benefits just one person then it would be worth it. If you’re here strictly for financial content, I won’t be offended if you skip this one. As we closed out 2018, I took the week of Christmas… Read More
Comparative Disappointment
A friend of mine has a client that inquired with disappointment that his account was down 2.5% when the S&P was up 0.5%. He wanted to know why his portfolio was performing so poorly by comparison to the S&P. At the time of this inquiry, the S&P was up 0.5%, Small Cap was down 5% and International was down about 15%. This has been a pretty typical refrain for many… Read More
Something To Think About
If you really think about it, the only two points in life that we truly don’t care about money is when we have a total lack of wisdom as a child and at our point of maximum wisdom late in life. We spend the rest of our lives chasing it only to return to our childlike state by realizing it doesn’t matter a whole lot. That may seem odd for… Read More
One Bad Decision Is All It Takes
There is a saying in professional golf that, “You can’t win a tournament on Thursday, but you sure can lose it.” For the golf uninitiated, every professional golf tournament starts on Thursday and concludes on Sunday. So, a good round on Thursday can put you in position to win with three rounds to go, but a terrible round on Thursday is likely to result in missing the cut and any… Read More
“Optimal” Retirement Planning Strategies
I read articles regularly that discuss optimal portfolio withdrawal strategies. I think these articles are great but are probably best kept in the academic world. In other words, they should not be given to clients. I have a friend that was forwarded one of these articles by an advisor as the basis for their retirement planning decisions and asked for my thoughts. Don’t get me wrong, it’s great that this advisor… Read More
A Case For Long-Term Optimism – Words Matter
The words we use are important. When you hear the term “stock market,” what immediately comes to mind? Recently, I completed an informal survey asking that very question of various non-financial industry connections and the number one response was “risky.” I think part of the reason people view investing as risky has something to do with the term we use when referring to the assets we are purchasing — stocks…. Read More
“Best Interest” is not Black & White
Back in March, the CFP Board voted to require every CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNERTM professional that provides financial planning to be held to the duty of care of a fiduciary starting October 1, 2019. I greatly applaud this move! For folks not in our industry, if an advisor is a fiduciary, then that advisor is legally and ethically required to put your best interest before their own. Up to this point, the… Read More
Why Saving In Your 60’s Is So Important – It’s Not the Reason You Think
When I speak to folks that are in their final stretch leading up to retirement, one topic that often comes up is how much they should be saving. While the simplest answer is “as much as possible”, I wanted to provide some additional perspective on why saving as much as possible in the homestretch to retirement is so important. It’s not the reason you think. Let’s say that you just… Read More
