BHC's Consumer Insights
Listed below are the current and past issues of Consumer
Insights. These reports are written with your clients in mind. They
address topics of general interest, give solutions to problems faced by
you & your clients, and are written for easy understanding
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January 2010 What will you do if you run out of money during retirement? What are the consequences if your surviving spouse doesn’t have enough money? These serious questions are reality for many retirees. Nonetheless, the fear of running out of money has not kept many retirees from speculating with their retirement money. Much of this “speculative mentality” is driven by constant advertising bombardments telling retirees the best places to keep their money ...
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December 2009 No other savings vehicle is as misunderstood, under appreciated and maligned as fixed annuities. Most people who can benefit from annuities have been bombarded by misinformation, biased opinions and outright lies. The truth is: fixed annuities are safe because they are guaranteed by insurance companies, a great place to keep retirement money because they pay tax-deferred competitive returns, and all of your money is working 100% of the time. Like all investments, fixed annuities are ...
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November 2009 Many retirees live on income from their portfolio of stocks, bonds, mutual funds and other market-related securities. On October 09, 2007, the market [as measured by the DJIA] peaked at 14164.53 and then started a dramatic decline until March 09, 2009, when a trough of 6547.05 was reached. This 53.8% shrinkage played havoc with retirees’ portfolios and forced many back to work or ...
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October 2009 The Great Recession has probably thrown your investments in reverse, and you’re hoping to soon “get back to break even”. Not only may this be wishful thinking, it is probably bad strategy – because this is the exact strategy that got you to the bottom in the first place. What’s more, your investments – and the market – may not cooperate by coming back. If your portfolio was...
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September 2009 You get a call from your broker or someone else that wants you to invest money. You’re told that you can expect a double-digit return and there is no risk. No doubt the “sales pitch” will be more subtle but the proposition is the same: above-market return with low or no risk. The one immutable law of investing is: Risk and Reward always travel together. This means that ...
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August 2009 As you are painfully aware, the before-tax money you’ve put away for retirement, and which has been growing tax deferred, has a co-owner: Uncle Sam. The tax laws say you must start withdrawing and paying taxes on this money when you reach age 70½. If you fail to take the Required Minimum Distribution (“RMD”) there is a penalty tax of 50% on the amount you should have ...
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July 2009 Reverse Mortgages are currently the hottest part of the real estate market, especially for retirees. It is an option you need to know about. Here are the requirements: you must be at least age 62 and own a home in which you have equity. Let’s immediately dispel the common misconceptions about ...
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June 2009 Most of us measure our retirement money by how “tall” it is rather than how “long” it is. It’s not how much money you’ve got that’s important, but how long it will last. Because of uncertainties like inflation, taxes, investment losses, emergencies and more, retirees don’t know how long they might live; thus, it is hard to determine how long the “tall money” will last. This is why ...
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May 2009 Issue 4: There has been a lot in the press recently about the solvency of Social Security and how it could go broke by 2016. As has been previously mentioned in this Retirement Blog, seniors and late boomers are concerned about their future Social Security benefits and want answers. The following will shed some light on the matter ...
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May 2009 Issue 3: Outliving their money is the greatest fear of most retirees. Because of massive market losses since 2007, high and rising medical costs and more taxes & inflation as fallout from the unprecedented federal deficit spending, retiree fear is at an all-time high. But for the stronger gender, females, it is especially alarming, because ...
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May 2009 Issue 2: Many Americans of yesteryear relied on employers to provide a defined benefit pension at retirement. They were guaranteed a lifetime income whose amount was based upon how long they worked for the employer and their ending salary. For example, a defined benefit pension plan might pay a retired worker 2% of their last year’s salary for every ...
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May 2009 Issue 1: When leaving an employer at retirement, changing jobs, down-sizing or starting your own business, leave behind only what belongs to your ex-employer. That means not forgetting your retirement plan money! About forty percent of departing employees, ages 60 to 65, leave their retirement money behind in former employers’ plans. They cite several reasons ...
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April 2009 : The greatest fear of most retirees is the risk of longevity: outliving their money. The meltdown of retirement accounts, rising medical costs, uncertain entitlement programs and higher taxes have added to the risk. Facing 30 years of retirement living on past savings and Social Security benefits is a scary reality. What can be done? ...
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March 2009: We've spent our adult life working for retirement. We've scrimped, cut corners, saved and managed our savings so we can enjoy a secure retirement. Mostly, we've avoided bad investment choices. The dot.com bust in 2000-02 and the market meltdown of 2007-09 were big setbacks, but we've survived. We've made it this far with
...
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February 2009: If you have money invested in the market, chances are very high that you have a loss. In talking to savers and investors like you, I'm amazed that they all tell me the same thing: "As soon as my investments get back to where they were, I'm getting out of the market". Let's give some thought to this exit strategy
...
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