I was not totally surprised to read this over the weekend at The Daily Upside. The article is a worthwhile 3 minute read, but if you don’t have time (and who does these days??), here’s the premise. Pensions The first important point for all of us to understand is that pensions have gone the way […]
Hello Gen X. Please Contribute to Your 401k. Let’s Talk About Why. Read More »
It’s almost 2026. Can you believe it??? At around this time every year, most investors start reading articles about how it’s time for a year-end check-up. It seems like a lot of work so many investors just move on and stick with the program. And honestly, this isn’t the worst reaction. With investing, often laziness
Your Year-End Planning Checklist Read More »
In my personal finance classes, and even in my posts, I can feel people’s eyes starting to glaze over when I start to talk about budgets. They’re no fun. Most of us don’t want to be an accountant. And accountants are paid for what they do, why would we want to do accounting-stuff in our
Hate Budgets, Try This. Read More »
Congratulations! You have a new job. At some point early on at our new company, we’re invited to a new hire orientation session where one of the key topics is benefits. One of the best benefits that is often not given enough focus in these sessions is the 401k plan. Today we’ll go through the
How Do I Participate in My Company’s 401k? Read More »
I worked in the investment field for over 30 years but never spent much time with bonds. So to me, bonds are a bit of a mystery. I’m looking to buy a nice simple corporate bond. Check this out. I understand the maturity date, ratings, coupon and lots of other stuff, but I’ve got no
Bonds Are Complicated But They Need Love Too Read More »
My wife and I are financially independent. We live in an average home, in an average town, and we take an occasional vacation. Last winter we spent a week in Key Largo. The prior year, we spent 3 days in the Red Roof Inn (near) Newport, RI off of a highway with a striking view
The Importance of Financial Independence Read More »
I wrote a little about dividends here and here. The first post is about why dividend stocks have a place in your portfolio and how a company handles dividends. This is great, but what if I own a mutual fund. Does that pay dividends? Maybe, let’s take a look. Mutual Fund A mutual fund is
How Do Mutual Fund Dividends Work? Read More »
Investing can be hard. There is a lot of misinformation, or worse yet, partially correct information out there, that can hurt us if we’re not thorough in our research. Many of us invest in index funds. These are a great way to diversify, but it is important for us to understand what they are and
Stock Indexes And Index Funds, How Do They Work? Read More »
In an earlier post on Mutual Funds and ETFs, we talked about mutual funds and ETFs, how they work, the fees they charge and how we get our money out after investing. Mutual Funds and ETFs are baskets of securities, but it is important for investors to know a little bit about how they manage
I Bought a Mutual Fund. What Do I Own? Read More »
A lot of my posts encourage investing in low-cost S&P 500 Funds and ETFs. My premise is that we need to invest in equities in order to build wealth. Look at the post on compounding as an example. At one point we compare the portfolio gains of 2 folks – Al and Peg – assuming
So How Do I Know The S&P 500 Will Go Up? Read More »