Have you heard advertisements about creating lifetime income for a secure retirement? I’m always skeptical about annuities because they are so confusing, even for those of us that pay attention. Turns out, the term “lifetime income” is a marketing phrase meant to demystify annuities by highlighting their main benefit. Unfortunately, a new marketing campaign doesn’t…
To be more transparent about my overall investment strategy, I’ve redesigned my Portfolio page and will be explaining the changes in today’s blog post. It now includes the details of our retirement asset allocations, my dividend growth stock portfolio, the forward 12-month investment income (F12MII) chart, and a new financial independence progress chart. I did…
I recently completed a six-figure transfer of retirement assets from Vanguard to Fidelity. The transfer is part of an account consolidation effort I put in motion last year to simplify our finances. The need to consolidate accounts became apparent when we started working on our family estate plan. We’re coming close to finally completing our…
Should you max out 401(k) in 2024? The short answer is yes. This article explains why, and the limits for maxing out your 401(k) and IRAs in 2024. The department head at my job invited me into his office for a 30-minute chat when I first started. We spent the time getting to know each other and…
What’s the difference between investing vs. gambling? The simple answer is math, but there’s more to it than that. In my mid-teens, I went to Atlantic City with my family for an evening on the boardwalk. I was deeply interested in money for someone my age, so gambling intrigued me. You must be over the…
In the almost five years of sharing my investments on this blog, I’ve never shown exactly how I track dividend income. This article lays out the steps (with screenshots) I take each month to import dividend data into my tracking spreadsheet, estimate forward dividend income, and easily capture dividend increases. My forward 12-month investment income…
A New York-based company called Construction Robotics has designed and built a bricklaying robot called SAM (Semi-Automated Mason) that can place up to 3,000 bricks during an 8-hour day. That’s about three times the number of bricks that the fastest human bricklayers can set. The machine requires at least two humans to load materials and finish…
One of the best benefits of my new job is the employer-sponsored retirement plan. The plan was confusing at first, even for me who lives and breathes this stuff. But they made it complicated to maximize the tax advantages. It’s so good, the plan is even better than most of the 401(k)s of the big…
A few readers recently expressed a lack of confidence in their investing. They are uncomfortable with where their money is and unsure how to make changes. I sensed some fear because of the recent downturn, maybe for good reason. So today’s post is about how to invest money more confidently by increasing your financial security…
After choosing a domain name and starting my blog back in September of 2013, the software behind the scenes called WordPress asked me to declare a tagline. Unprepared, the first three words that came to mind were Invest. Retire. Travel. Those three words accurately presented the message I wanted to convey to my readers so I went…
This article is about learning to protect yourself from a future job loss by creating sustainable income streams that will continue to pay you even if you’re not working. If you’re unemployed today, use this article to frame your strategy once the income is back. Of all the financial advice I read and practice, the one…