Hashtag #BrokeRetirees: Majority are Falling Short with Their Retirement Funds … but Who’s to Blame?

Hashtag #BrokeRetirees: Majority are Falling Short with Their Retirement Funds … but Who’s to Blame?

To put this in today’s social media language, the trending hashtag in the field of retirement planning is #BrokeRetirees, referencing the fact that the vast majority of folks – I mean, the overwhelming majority – are at risk of failing miserably at their attempts to have a secure income during their retirement years.

In their latest Retirement Confidence Survey, the Employee Benefit Research Institute asked a very simple question:“Overall, how confident are you that you (and your spouse) will have enough money to live comfortably throughout your retirement years?”

Here are the results: 

• Only 18 percent of working Americans are very confident that they will have enough money to live comfortably throughout their retirement years. 
• Among folks who are already retired, the number is 28 percent.

Compared to 2013 (when the numbers were 13 percent and 18 percent, respectively), these numbers seem “a bit better,” but I personally think they are still horrible. Think about it this way: 72 percent of retirees are seriously missing the mark after all those years of working, saving, and investing for this very purpose. That’s seven out of 10 folks! The other thing I’d like to point out is that ten years ago, roughly 41 percent of retirees and 25 percent of workers were very confident about their financial sustenance in retirement. Clearly, things seem to be moving in the wrong direction, don’t they?

The natural follow-up question then becomes: What is causing this deplorable situation? Of course, the answer depends on whom you’re talking to. Though, the financial press time and time again seems to point the proverbial finger at the hard-working retirement investor for, you know, not saving nearly enough money, selecting the wrong funds, and failing to rebalance their portfolios appropriately, among others.

But are these really the main culprits? I beg to differ, because while those may account for some instances of retirement insolvency, the crux of the issue, in my opinion, is that the vast majority of financial advice to which folks are being exposed is, quite frankly, nothing more than utter myth. Obviously, that’s up for debate, but I wonder why practically no one seems to question the financial advice side of the equation? There is a right way to do things and a wrong way to do them. Throwing more money at the wrong process won’t make the process work – it will just guarantee that you’ll be wasting money on a process that doesn’t work.

If we’re really serious about ending this rather terrible trend, isn’t it time we looked at all angles?

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If you need to talk with an experienced financial professional with dozens of real-world clients who are experiencing successful retirements, please call 877.656.9111 or visit LaserFG.com.

It Doesn't Always Have to Be About Money

Life is full and rich. Our goal at Laser Financial Group is to allow you to make the most of all of it, including the cultural pieces that don’t really have any direct connection to your retirement plan or investment portfolio. For anyone older than their early 20s, the events of September 11, 2001 are likely seared into our memories forever. We know where we were when we heard, and perhaps have loved ones who were directly affected. And it was a time when all other worries – the behavior of the stock market included – were pushed to the side for a time while our country came together to grieve and heal. Those familiar with New York City may agree that it seems to be a friendlier place ever since.

This week marks the public opening of the long-anticipated 9/11 Memorial Museum, located at the World Trade Center site in lower Manhattan. Tickets for the museum’s opening day are sold out, and it is recommended that you purchase your tickets in advance. Museum tickets include admission to the 9.11 Memorial.

For those looking to conserve a few dollars, admission to the Museum is free for all visitors on Tuesday evenings from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m., with the last entry at 7 p.m.  However, visitors must still obtain tickets. Same day tickets are available at the ticket windows starting at 4 p.m. A limited number of reserved tickets are available online two weeks in advance of each Tuesday evening. U.S. Military, FDNY, NYPD and PAPD discounts are also available.

If you have plans to visit New York City during your upcoming summer holiday, perhaps a visit to the 9/11 Museum is in order. For further info and to reserve your tickets, visit the 9/11 Musuem website.

_____________ If you need to talk with an experienced financial professional with dozens of real-world clients who are experiencing successful retirements, please call 877.656.9111 or visit LaserFG.com.

Don't Learn this Lesson the Way Sally Did - the HARD Way!

Don't learn this lesson the way Sally did - the HARD way!

Most reasonable people would agree that when it comes to saving and investing for your

retirement, the decisions you make regarding your choice of investment vehicles should be driven by your overall final expected output. No one is likely to invest their hard-earned money into anything unless they are convinced, one way or the other, that it will bring them the highest benefit. Only a complete idiot would settle for even the second best in this situation, right?

In most of the cases I have seen and continue to witness every day in my practice, most well-meaning folks still end up, for lack of a better term, getting burned by ideas that sounded great in theory but turned out to be their worst nightmares in reality. And that, my friend, is exactly the genesis of many of today’s retirement horror stories, as far as I’m concerned.

Take the story of a lady I consulted with couple weeks ago. Like millions of Americans, the tax guy/financial advisor with whom she’s been affiliated with for more than 20 years told Sally that the absolute best way to cut her tax bill both during her working years and also during retirement was to fund a traditional IRA. The so-called strategy here was that her contributions were tax-deductible, and all of her investment gains would also be tax-deferred until she began taking withdrawals in retirement, so this would cut her taxes. Obviously Sally’s advisor, and so many others just like him, was under the assumption that since her retirement income would be lower, compared to her working years, her taxes will fall, too.

Here’s the thing to keep in mind about retirement theories: they may sound terrific – and may even have worked just fine for someone you know – but following the same approach may end up costing you dearly. In Sally’s case, after just her very first full year of retirement, her tax bill is, in her own words, “going through the roof.”  In fact that was the very reason that she was taking with us: she was trying to figure out what was happening and how she could keep more of her money.

Long story short, although overall her income had decreased by about 20 percent in retirement, her taxable income – which is the key word when it comes to paying taxes – has actually gone up! How’s that possible? It’s very simple, and it happens more often than you can imagine. Sally’s tax deductions are much lower today because she’s no longer putting money into her traditional IRA, and she paid off her mortgage a couple years back. The other thing you may find interesting is that even with a 20 percent drop in her income, Sally is still in the exact same marginal tax bracket. The worst part is that her effective tax rate has rather gone up!   

This is not an isolated incident with Sally. As I discuss extensively in two of my books, 5 Mistakes Your Financial Advisor Is Making and Is Your 401K a Trap?, millions of folks find themselves in this exact predicament every day. But it doesn’t have to be so, because although we cannot predict future tax rates, a truly savvy financial advisor should be able to look at your tax profile and decipher how a given investment vehicle will impact you, which clearly wasn’t done or was done incorrectly in Sally’s case.

The great ending is that we were able to craft a plan to help Sally strategically rearrange her income and significantly cut her tax bill going forward so that she can keep more of her money, just like she intended all along.

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Want to talk with an experienced financial professional with dozens of real-world clients who are experiencing successful retirements? Want to learn how you can KEEP more of your retirement money, even if the market crashes? Call 877.656.9111 or visit LaserFG.com to talk with a retirement professional with a proven track record TODAY!

Is Now a Good Time to Be in the Stock Market?

Is Now a Good Time to Be in the Stock Market?

Undoubtedly, this is among the most frequent questions I hear in almost every setting I find myself, once someone discovers my line of work – especially following an economic downturn.

And it’s an understandable question – because you no doubt want to make sure that you don’t lose a penny of your hard-earned savings. Besides, many talking heads in the financial press are notorious for giving directions about how and when to jump into the market. In fact, a lot of so-called financial advisors bank their careers on “specializing” (notice the quotation marks) in telling you just when to strike, don’t they?

You can probably guess my view on this subject, so let me cut to the chase. Trying to figure out when is a good time – and by implication, when is not a good time – to invest in the stock market is a terrible waste of time and one of the most dangerous concepts on which you could ever base you future financial security.   

Here’s why: 

No one knows exactly where the markets are headed in the foreseeable future. Not even the savviest investment advisor or market watcher. Not a single soul!  

Over the course of history, many “financial scientists” who have claimed to have some secret formula that allows them to make those kinds of determinations have, time and again, ended up doing just the complete opposite – and losing fortunes in the process.

Usually, folks who invest around this question tend to get into the market when things are on the up and up, hoping (the key word here is hoping) to get out just before things start to go south. But is that what usually happens? Of course, not. They seldom manage to get out of the market until it has already dipped.

Becoming a successful investor doesn’t rise to the level of rocket science. That I can tell you for a fact. But it has a lot do with good old common sense and knowing exactly how much risk you can and cannot live with. If you do otherwise, you’ll most likely end up stressed a great deal of the time, and maybe even a broke retiree. But it doesn’t have to be this way! Call us today and find out how you can avoid this path to financial ruin! 877.656.9111

And to my colleagues in the financial profession still playing the game of assigning good and bad times to jump into the stock market, do you seriously believe you have the ability to do that?  Isn’t the better idea that you quit playing with people’s future livelihoods?

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Want to talk with an experienced financial professional with dozens of real-world clients who are experiencing successful retirements? Want to learn how you can KEEP more of your retirement money, even if the market crashes? Call 877.656.9111 or visit LaserFG.com to talk with a retirement professional with a proven track record TODAY!

What You (and Your Financial Advisor) Don’t Know about Collecting Social Security Could Literally Ruin Your Retirement

What You (and Your Financial Advisor) Don’t Know about Collecting Social Security Could Literally Ruin Your Retirement

The story usually goes something like this: You work hard all your life and contribute to Social Security with the expectation that, come retirement, you’ll hang up your work cloths and your monthly payments will begin supplementing your retirement lifestyle. That sounds right for the most part, except that the way you opt to collect your benefits could mean leaving thousands – if not hundreds of thousands – of dollars on the table.

If you are counting on receiving any kind of help from Social Security Administration employees, you are out of luck, because they are specifically prohibited from providing any form of financial advice. This means they can’t offer a shred of help when it comes to selecting the option that will give you and/or your family the maximum lifetime income. That may be hard to swallow, but it’s the reality.

Personally, I think what’s even worse is that an overwhelming number of so-called financial advisors don’t know enough to help their clients with strategies that could help boost their social security retirement income. That may sound like a strong statement, but how else would you account for the countless folks I meet, day in and day out, who are working with financial advisors, yet have no clue that they have better choices in terms of how they collect their Social Security?

Here’s a classic situation to support my point. Allison submitted this request through the “Ask Your Question” feature on our website. Before I go any further, let me take a moment to thank Allison and her parents for allowing me to share their story.

Allison’s Question:

I’m contacting you because my coworker believes that you may be able to help my parents come up with a better solution regarding their Social Security benefits. 

My dad, who’s now 66, took early Social Security retirement at 62.  My mom just turned 66, her full Social Security retirement age, but wants to wait until she’s 70 so that she can collect her highest benefit. However, she could use some extra income right now. Their financial advisor is suggesting that she start collecting now, since her work income will not reduce her benefits like it did for my dad. I’d really appreciate any assistance you can offer.

My Response to Allison’s Inquiry

First of all, thank you for contacting us about your parents’ situation.

I believe your mom is going to be pleased to hear about what is called Claim Now; Claim More Later, which is one of the little-known strategies for collecting Social Security that I cover in my complimentary special report “Secure YourFuture.” Because your mom has reached her full Social Security retirement age, she can immediately begin collecting benefits – here’s the key phrase – as your dad’s spouse.

This will allow her to receive half of your dad’s unreduced benefit amount, in spite of the fact that he began collecting his benefits early, at age 62. The other, even more powerful thing here is that your mom’s spousal benefit checks will not affect her own work record benefits. Therefore, she will continue to earn delayed retirement credits, just as she desires, until she’s age 70, at which time she will be able to switch over from collecting as a spouse to taking her own much higher benefits.

In  a nutshell, your mom can collect spousal benefits right now while her own benefit keeps growing. And by the way, her employment income will not cause any reduction in her benefits because she’s attained her full retirement age.

Allison’s mom would likely have missed out on collecting the spousal benefit to which she is entitled if she’d take her so-called financial advisor’s suggestion to start collecting her own benefits right now. Of course, it all ended well for her. But that’s because she found us! I wonder how many hard-working Americans out there are unknowingly walking away from Social Security money for which they qualify.

Does your financial advisor have the right knowledge and experience?

Download your very own copy of my complimentary Social Security strategy report. You can also contact us for suggestions about how you can get the most out of your retirement savings.

MYTH: Tax Planning is Necessary Only if You're Rich

Myth: Tax Planning is Necessary Only if You're Rich

Perhaps you, too, consider tax planning as something only “rich” retirees need to worry about – and although you’re working on it, you are not there just yet. Or maybe you think that because your retirement income will be lower than what you’re earning today, your tax bill will automatically decrease.

I must admit that, on the surface, that reasoning seems pretty logical. However, in reality these are complete myths when it comes to the way things work under the U.S. Tax Code. Really!

In fact, as tax season shifts into high gear, all you'll have to do is to pay close attention and you’ll notice that the bulk of retirees who feel clobbered by taxes do not consider themselves to be “rich” – although that’s admittedly a very loose term. Take social security benefits, for instance. Your checks begin to be taxable when your total taxable retirement income from all sources (including exempt municipal bonds) plus one-half of your social security benefits exceeds just $25,000 if you’re single or $32,000 if you’re married. You wouldn’t consider these to be thresholds that only the “rich” would be wise to plan around, would you?   

Yes, it’s true that our tax system is progressive in nature. But as I systematically lay out in my book 5 Mistakes Your Financial Advisor Is Making,  it’s equally true that your tax bill depends on your taxable income, not merely your gross or total income. As a result, even with a significant drop in your gross income, you could end up effectively paying more in taxes during retirement, as you generally tend to lose most of your significant deductions: mortgage interest (because your house is usually paid off or nearly so), dependent children (they are likely independent adults by the time you retire), and deductible contributions to retirement accounts (you’re drawing income, instead of contributing).  

On the other hand, the Tax Code also identifies some sources of retirement income as non-taxable. What you must understand about non-taxable income is that its size is irrelevant when it comes to your income tax bill. As a result, if Mary draws $250,000/year in non-taxable income, she’ll not owe even a penny of tax. All things being equal, Sarah, who draws just $30,000 in taxable income, will end up paying more in income tax. So we can say that when it comes to taxes, the term “rich” is directly related to taxable or non-taxable income.

Now it's time for some good news: Even if you are already retired, there are things you may be able to do to shift your income from the taxable column into the non-taxable column today – and also protect your income from possible future tax hikes. You can begin by scheduling a complementary, no-obligation appointment to talk with a Laser Financial Group wealth advisor about your options. 

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Want to talk with an experienced financial professional with dozens of real-world clients who are experiencing successful retirements? Want to learn how you can KEEP more of your retirement money, even if the market crashes? Call 877.656.9111 or visit LaserFG.com to talk with a retirement professional with a proven track record TODAY!

The Most Important Requirement to a Successful Retirement Is NOT What Most People Are Made to Believe

The Most Important Requirement to a Successful Retirement Is NOT What Most People Are Made to Believe

In my opinion, this is the million dollar question when it comes to retirement planning: What is THE ONE THING that must be present and without which your chances of succeeding in your retirement planning are slim to none? As a front-row eyewitness to the retirements of hundreds of folks for nearly two decades, I can tell you that it’s not simply saving a lot of money. 

Most people would agree, if not require, that a practitioner have actual real-life, hands-on expertise in a given field before we’d even consider hiring him or her. It makes perfect sense to want to ensure that a surgeon has already successfully operated on a few folks with your specific condition before agreeing to lie on their table. In fact, I wouldn’t even let someone remove my wisdom tooth unless they had a proven track record of doing just that.

Of course, that’s just common sense, right? So are you applying that same standard to one of the most critical aspects of your life – your retirement planning? Does your advisor have a proven track record that is backed by real-life success stories from folks just like you?

For some strange reason, it seems like many people unfortunately treat their retirement planning as though it were a routine procedure. Something for which they can afford to hire a less-skilled professional than they require in other equally import areas of their lives.

In reality, your ability to retire successfully requires more than just socking money away. And certainly more than radio or TV personalities who haven’t actually hit the trenches and cannot point to real-life results in their work.

Of course, you might get lucky. But would you hire an inexperienced surgeon, for example, and count on luck to be on your side?

Good food for thought!

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Want to talk with an experienced financial professional with dozens of real-world clients who are experiencing successful retirements? Want to learn how you can KEEP more of your retirement money, even if the market crashes? Call 877.656.9111 or visit LaserFG.com to talk with a retirement professional with a proven track record TODAY!