Hosts: , Gary Abely CFP®, AIF® and Joe Bert, CFP®, AIF®
Well hello everybody, welcome to another addition with On the Money with the Certified Financial Group here on News 965, WDBO. We are here with Joe Bert and Gary Abely from the Certified Financial Group. Guys, how are you this morning?
Good morning.
Terrific.
Keeping a little cool out as <Inaudible>
Oh, beautiful morning.
It is nice, a little smoke in the air, but <Inaudible>
Oh yeah.
I wondered where is that fire, does anybody know?
I don’t know, could be anywhere.
Did you smell it when you came up <Inaudible> this morning?
I did not, I did not.
I didn’t either, so it must be down somewhere —
South?
I don’t know <Inaudible>
Or east?
Or downtown <Inaudible>
If anybody knows where the fire is, let us know.
Yeah.
There you go.
They’ll text it, <Inaudible> all know.
Hopefully it’ll be out very, very soon before that <Inaudible>. But Joe, what can the audience call you about today?
Well Gary and I are here this morning to talk about anything that’s on your mind regarding your personal finances. As we oftentimes say, we go through life trying some of this, trying some of that, and wake up one day at age 55, look across the breakfast table to Loretta. And say Loretta, you know the kids are gone and here we are, we’ve got retirement staring us in the face, what have we done? And then Loretta will say well went to this seminar a couple of years ago. We bought that annuity, and that’s not working out just like we thought it was, and you’ve got your 401k and your IRA. And we’ve got some Social Security going to come in. Do you think <Inaudible> we’ll take those vacations like we want to do, and do all of that stuff? And all of those things that run through your mind as you’re trying to plan for what we call those golden years, are things that Gary and I and the other certified financial planners at CFG do. Helping out clients plan for retirement. So it’s what you need to do now so you don’t look back 5 or 10 years from now and say gee, I wish I would have known. Or gee, I’m sorry I did this or that. So we’re here to clean up the mind fog that you might have regarding your personal finances. Questions that you might have about stocks and bonds and mutual funds, real estate, long-term healthcare, IRAs, annuities, life insurance, reverse mortgages, all of that and more, we are here to take your call. So if you have any questions about any of those topics or anything else I might not have mentioned, the good news for you is to pick up the phone and dial these magic numbers.
844-220-0965. 844-220-0965. Or you could text your question to 21232. Gary Abbely from the Certified Financial Group is here as well. Gary, how are you?
I am doing terrific.
Gary, do you have any workshops coming up?
We do indeed. We have one coming up Tuesday, June 6th, from 6:00pm to 8:00pm. And that — well we used to call that Will You Outlive Your Money, which is just what Joe was talking about. But T. Rowe Price said hey, that’s our name. So we’ve renamed it When Can You Retire, Know Your Numbers. So the purpose of date workshop is to actually calculate during the workshop based on your spending what you will need before you say see you later to your boss. So we don’t want you to quit before we know that you’re going to be okay. We want you to have at least a 90% probability of not outliving your money.
But as they’re going through this process with you, it’s confidentially. You’re not going to ask <Inaudible>
Oh absolutely, right right right <Inaudible>
And everybody is going to have their own opportunity <Inaudible> workshop.
Right. And then we go through — we actually go through an example that will help everybody take that example home and then calculate it on their own. The next workshop we have is July 11th and that is on healthcare options in retirement. And there’s a little confusion in the media right now on Plan F, which is kind of the Cadillac on Medicare supplements, so we’ll help clean that up so people aren’t worried about that. But we talk about not only your Medicare options and other healthcare options, Medicaid, but we also talk long-term care which is something that a lot of folks will put off until their mid-50s, mid-60s. And we recommend you consider well before that time. That market is just getting tougher and tougher.
Let’s circle back to the Medicare supplement because I find in meeting with clients that haven’t had to deal with this for themselves or with their parents, they’re somewhat confused when they get into those — that age 65, they say I’m going to have Medicare, what does that do for me? Which is Part A, Part B, Part C, Part D, you just mentioned Part F. They’ve got more —
Actually, Plan F.
Or Plan F, that’s right.
Like it is confusing.
It is Plan F, not Part F. You go down to Plan Z, probably.
<Inaudible> the Part F.
Yeah, what’s that all about?
Well, so Part A and B cover about 80% of your hospitalization and your doctor visits. And of course we know that if you have a 20% exposure, that is way too much. So the industry has come up with things called supplements that help pay that 20%.
So A and B is provided by the government.
Well, yes and no.
Okay.
Part A is you’ve been paying for it all your life, and Part B you have to pay for once you hit 65.
Right, but yet they’re government programs.
They are government programs.
And Part A covers —
That’s going to cover your hospitalization.
So go in the hospital, pay the hospital bill, but not the doctor.
That’s right.
And then Part B covers that.
They cover the doctor business, outpatient surgery, and <Inaudible>
But it doesn’t cover it all.
Doesn’t cover it all.
That’s why you need —
A supplement.
Which is a plan <Inaudible>
Plan F, that goes Plan A, B, C, D, then you have Plan F and N, you have Select Plan F, and you know. So it gets confusing. But the Cadillac plan out there is Plan F. That covers virtually all of your medical expenses. Now, to confuse folks a little bit more, that does not cover prescriptions. So that’s where Part D kicks in, and that’s going to cost you <Inaudible> it is. And to purchase that though, it comes again at the premium. You’ll pay anywhere on the low side $15, probably all the way up to $80 a month. So it can get expensive.
So the easiest way to remember that is when you say Part-something, that’s the government plan. When it’s plan-something, that’s an insurance company plan that you use to supplement the government plan.
<Inaudible> Is there a better way to say it? Oh okay, alright.
Well, we have Part C of Medicare which is really you’re getting out of the original Medicare which is A and B, and your care is then provided by an outside insurance company. So those are also called Medicare advantage plans. So I don’t really think of those as a government plan, even though the government is involved, the government might say to somebody living in Orange County we’ll pay you $9,000 and you take care of Joe Burt’s care from now on. And if you pay out less than $9,000, well you make some money. But if Joe costs you more than $9,000, well I’m sorry, that’s your loss. And so the insurance company obviously is going to manage your care. So they’re looking to have a closed network — some of them. Some of them have open networks where you can go in and out of network. But you’re going to pay money when you go to doctors and hospitals, you’re going to have exposure that would otherwise be covered by paying a monthly premium for the supplement. And that exposure can be high, it can be 7,000 in network, maybe 15,000, 20,000 out of network.
So the good news is you will cover all of that and more at your workshop <Inaudible> that’s going to be on Tuesday, July the 11th at our office in Altemont Springs from 6:00 to 8:00. You’re going to provide some light refreshments.
Yes.
And we have a nice classroom there, we can get about 25 or 30 people in comfortably. And you’ve got some big screen television there and all kinds of audio visual stuff, you’ll be razzling and dazzling them.
There you go.
So if you want some more information about that, go to our website, that’s financialgroup.com, financialgroup.com. Click on workshops, you can make a reservation. Right there in addition to the one that Gary is doing the week before on June the 6th, also a Tuesday — no it’s not, I’m sorry. The month <?> before. June the 6th, and that’s the What You Need To Do Now To Prepare For Retirement, get an idea of your number.
Okay, we got a call. Perfect. Well I was going to say if you have a question for Gary, 844-220-0965. That’s 844-220-0965. Let’s get to our first caller today, Chris in Orlando. Chris, go ahead. You’re on with the Certified Financial Group here on WDBO.
Good morning, Chris.
Hey, good morning, guys.
Good morning.
The one thing — I’m 30 years of age and my main concern was basically for the future because I know that whole saying <?>, Social Security is going to be out of the picture by the time I get of age, but right now I’m working on my Series Six and some of the things I’ve learned is about annuities and Roths. And I was wondering — your intake is — at a person of my age, what should be the best direction to try to secure some type of — I know I should have worked to start it on like 10 years or 20 years ago. But at this point, at this moment, is a Roth and an annuity a good idea, or?
Well Chris, I don’t know about starting at age 10. <Inaudible> that’s pretty good, if you can start then. So Joe, what do you think about an annuity for somebody 30? I don’t particularly like it.
No, and they’re oftentimes promoted by these free lunch and dinner seminars and they will tell you all of this wonderful stuff that their annuities will do. There’s a place for annuities, but oftentimes they’re not the ones that are offered through these seminars. What you want to do — and you said you’re studying for your Series Six?
Yes, sir.
Okay, for those who are listeners that might not be familiar with that, that’s a securities exam through the Financial Industry Regulatory Association for someone who’s studying offer mutual funds to the general public. So you’re getting some good information there. And what you ought to be looking at is when you talk about retirement, what you ought to be using is some form of retirement plan. Are you employed now?
Yes.
Go ahead.
I have a 401k in place already.
Okay, so that’s what you want, that’s what your number one target ought to be. Maximizing your contribution to your 401k, Chris. At your age, you can put $18,000 a year into a 401k on a pre-tax basis. Okay?
Yeah so Roth, would you at least consider a Roth better than a 401k?
Well, so most 401k — I don’t know about most, but probably about half wouldn’t you say, Joe, 401ks offer both a Roth version and a regular version. And my rule of thumb and a lot of financial planners differ on this. But if you’re in a 10% or 15% bracket, consider a Roth. You are giving up a current deduction, but that current deduction is not providing you a lot of benefit. But clearly if you’re in the 25% bracket or higher, it’s my opinion that you should put away money on a pre-tax basis that actually allows you to put away more money, right? If you’re putting away $10,000 into your 401k, it’s only costing you 7,500. But again, if you were in a 10% bracket, you’re just getting started, it might be nice to have early in life some money accumulating toward a Roth bucket of money. And it’s a little complicated, we go into this in the workshops. But it does permit you later on to have a tax-free bucket of money to live on in addition to taxable — the 401k or the regular IRA bucket so that you can manage your tax brackets later on in retirement and possibly avoid having taxes on your Social Security if you have a large enough bucket on your Roth side. Now Joe, you have some thoughts on that, too.
Well, I agree with you 100% that if you’re in a low tax bracket. Particularly, somebody that’s young because you could use the Roth as kind of an emergency fund as well. Because <Inaudible> withdraw your principal from it and not pay taxes on it. And if you don’t withdraw it, it’ll continue to grow for you on a tax-free basis. So using a Roth — but the question is okay are you going to use a pre-tax or an after-tax. Pre-tax is you’re going to use a 401k or traditional IRA. After-tax, you’ll use a Roth. But then really the question is where you invest it.
Right.
So here you are at age 30. The good news for you, you have a great asset. You know what that asset is, Chris?
Time.
Time.
Yep, you got it baby.
Tim is a great asset. It’s a great healer. So what you want to do is be as aggressive as you can possibly be, go fully invested in the market and don’t look at it for 25 years. I guarantee you, you’ll do far better than somebody that’s trying to put it in a CD today because they don’t want to lose any money.
That’s right. And most annuities are going to earn somewhere in the — in today’s timeframe if you’re looking at fixed annuity or fixed indexed annuities you’ll probably get somewhere between 3% to 5% at best. And we know even if you look at the worst 20-year period or actually even the worst 15-year period from 1992 to 2012, we had a return of — for the S&P 500 index of a positive 4.5%. And that is if you had the worst timing, meaning you suffered a loss in the 49% decline and the Dotcom bust. And you suffered a 57% decline in the financial recession. So if you have the worst possible timing, the worst 15-year period during that 20-year timeframe, actually still provided you with a little bit better positive <Inaudible> percent return.
Right.
Which is probably better than what most of the annuities would be paying today.
Yes. And, what you want to do as — do that through your 401k because you’d be able to what we call dollar cost average.
Right.
Which means that you’re adding to the account on a regular basis and the best thing for you is hope that the market goes down for the next 15, 20 years.
Well actually yes, I was going to say for the next 34 <?> years even until you retire. Really, the idea of dollar cost averaging is getting — and just as it sounds, an averaging of your prices throughout retirement and obviously the best thing would to be able to buy more shares at lower prices. So bear markets, especially for people in their 20s and 30s are terrific ways of accumulating more and more shares. So don’t be afraid of them, actually we also try to say if we’re in a bear market, see if you can put some more money away because you’re buying low.
Does that help you, Chris?
That helped me a lot, thank you.
Okay, good luck to you, man.
<Inaudible> Alright, good luck with the exam.
Just like that Chris, it’s that simple. 844-220-0965. 844-220-0965. if you have a question for Joe Burt or Gary Abbely from the Certified Financial Group, we are planning tomorrow, today. Now it’s time to get the three big things you need to know.
And welcome back to the On the Money here on News 965 WDBO. We are taking your phone calls at 844-220-0965 with the Certified Financial Group. Joe Burt, Gary Abbely here in the studio taking your phone calls and your texts as well, 21232 is the number to get that. 21232. But again, if you have anything to do with getting to that golden finish, as I like to call retirement, 844-220-0965. One of the great resources Certified Financial Group provides is what’s called This Week’s Must-Read. And this week’s must-read, what you should know before collecting Social Security.
Well the important things are is that if you start collecting at 62 and you’re still working full-time, chances are you’re not going to get the benefit that you thought you were going to get because of the offset. Where you get back $1 for every $2 that you earn over about $17,000 today. And then of course if you wait until your full retirement age, you’ll get the full benefit available to you. But if you wait to age 70 —
Excuse me while I choke to death, here.
You get about an 8% bump-up each year.
Yeah, an 8% guaranteed increase per year, and that’s a big deal depending on your situation, your health situation, your spouse’s situation. It might makes sense to do that. So those are the things that we look at when we do financial planning for our clients. Do that analysis because the difference can mean several tens of thousands if not hundred thousand dollars of different in terms of in terms of ultimate benefit that you and your spouse might be able to attain.
Well that’s right. And you know you think the market is at an all-time high, maybe this is a good time use some of that retirement account to live on and let those Social Security benefits grow and grow and grow.
Exactly. In fact, we did a little case study and presented that again this week, Gary, about looking at where you are in retirement and what accounts to draw from. And then depending on what your tax bracket is, you may want to start drawing from your retirement accounts when you’re in a 0% tax bracket. And maybe convert that to Roth.
Well that’s right. So we had met with somebody who was early 60s and we looked at his tax situation and realized well if we defer Social Security and we start using some of his after-tax money, basically money in a brokerage account to live on, that he would really be paying no taxes. And this particular person was single and we could — with the standard deduction and personal exemptions, he could convert roughly 40,000 a year into a Roth IRA with very, very little taxes. So sometimes it’s not a good idea to pay no taxes. We want people to use that — the 0% bracket and the 10% bracket at a minimum and have a process where you convert your regular IRA to a Roth IRA, especially if we know your <Inaudible> is going to be a 25% or 28% or higher bracket later on in life.
Or the other opportunity is take some capital gains.
Well that’s right. If you’re in the 0%, the 10%, or the 15% tax bracket, and let’s say you bought Apple at 100 and it’s 150, you could turn around and sell Apple. Would secure that $50 gain and not pay any income taxes on it as long as it’s long-term, as long as you’re in the 15% bracket or lower, obviously check with your tax preparer first. But that’s a great way to step up your basis in a stock.
Yep. Well before we get to the latest news, weather, and traffic, what’s the number to reach the Certified Financial Group during the week?
407-869-9800.
Elizabeth and Ed, hang on the line. You’re going to be first up when we come back from the latest news, weather, and traffic right here on News 965 WDBO.
Welcome back, and this is On the Money with the Certified Financial Group here on News 965 WDBO. It’s ask the experts weekend, we are here to take your phone calls at 844-220-0965. 844-220-0965 with Joe Burt, Gary Abbely. Joe, for anybody that joined us during the latest news, weather, and traffic, what can they call you about?
We’re here to answer those questions that you might have on your mind regarding your personal finances. Whether <Inaudible> do now so you don’t look back 5 or 10 years from now and say gee, I wish I had known about that. Or gee, I’m sorry I did that. That’s we do as certified financial planners. We charge a fee for our services. We act as fiduciaries for our clients, which is a distinction between a broker and a fiduciary, there is a distinction. You can go to our website and learn all about that. That’s financialgroup.com. When we work with our clients, we do it on a fee basis. We’re not here to sell you something, what we do is sell advice. On Saturday morning , we do it for free. So if you have any questions regarding your personal finances, we’re here to take your calls. And the good news for you, there’s still a couple of lines open, and that number:
844-220-0965. 844-220-0965. We also have the text machine up and running as well, 21232. Elizabeth down at Yeehaw <?> Junction has a question for the Certified Financial Group. Elizabeth, go ahead. You’re on WDBO.
Good morning Elizabeth.
Hi.
Thanks for calling.
Good morning.
How can we help you?
Can you hear me okay?
Yep.
We can hear you fine.
Okay, terrific. So I’m driving to West Palm Beach from Wesley Chapel, Florida. And I have a question, I also sell advice and in one aspect I get paid as an employee. And in one aspect, I get paid as a independent contractor. I have several different banks and I was told by a financial advisor to truncate the amount of bank accounts I have. I separate my businesses by bank accounts, is that not advisable?
Well Elizabeth, I believe you should have separate accounts so you Can keep your business affairs separate from personal affairs. If you’re ever audited, it’s a lot easier than having to explain oh, this one’s personal, this one’s business. I would definitely keep those separated.
I think I understand —
Separate the accounts.
I think I understood you to say that you have an accountant — several accounts for the independent contractor business. Let’s say you have five clients that you work with, you have an account set up for each one of them. Is that what you —
No no, what I do is I sell advice about <Inaudible> services and I have a bank account for that.
Okay.
I also am a business development coach for actually a radio station. So, I have a separate bank account for that. And then I have another independent business — concierge business, and I keep a separate account for that. So, I’m buying to buy down my debt to raise my credit, so my initial question was whether or not I should be concerned — if I’m single with no dependents, should I be really concerned about buying my debt down for any other reason than just getting my credit score up?
Well, I guess I would ask — I don’t want you to tell us what your credit score is — but if your credit score is adequate where it’s at, then I don’t know that I would be paying down low interest debt. I would continue to put away money for your retirement. But if you had in the teens credit card debt, then I think I would be focused on that.
The credit card debt is in the 20s. It’s greater than 25,000.
Oh, okay.
So, my credit score — I’m sorry, go ahead.
We’re talking about interest rate on the credit card.
Oh yes, they are in the teens because I had an accidental foreclosure that was just a complete debacle with Wells Fargo, but that was literally — my mortgage was on auto-pay for the last 12 years. It went out of auto-pay because if you don’t have enough funds they go out three times and then take it out of auto payment. And I never knew it was taken out of auto-payment until I got a notification that my house was under foreclosure. I paid $6,000 in the bank. I had no idea because —
Elizabeth, I think I would just focus on the debt right now. If you’re in the teens, that would be the best thing to focus on and get the debt situation, debt equity situation improved and then I would focus on retirement.
Alright, Elizabeth, thanks so much for the phone call. It’s 844-220-0965. If you would like Elizabeth’s line. Let’s go to Ed in St. Cloud. Ed, you’re on with the Certified Financial Group on WDBO.
Good morning, Ed.
Good morning, how are you?
Great, how can we help you?
Great.
I heard one of your answers and a previous caller had mentioned that you could put $18,000 in your 401k tax free and that sparked a question for me. I currently feed 10% of my income into a 401k, which is about $12,000 a year, and I also feed an IRA, the max, which is, I think, 5,000 a year. Am I better off to stop feeding that IRA, which is post-tax money, and —
Yeah, Ed, I do think you are better off contributing the maximum to your 401k at that income level. You are in most likely the 25%, 28% bracket. So, I would be putting more than the 12,000 that you’re putting away into the 401k. The max, just so that our viewers know, is 5,500 for an IRA. It’s 6,500 though if you’re old like me.
Over the age of 50.
Over the age of 50. So, but because you’re doing your contribution on an after tax basis to your IRA, you really should max your 401k out. And then —
So, just leave that IRA alone or do I roll that over —
No, just leave it alone.
Leave it where it is.
Leave it where it is and just let it keep growing.
Is that person going to be interested in managing that if I’m not feeding it anymore?
Well, it depends. It depends on who you’re working with.
We can’t speak for how they would treat that account.
Right.
But there’s no — there’s not necessarily a financial advantage to having it combined. A lot of people think it will grow faster if I combine all my accounts into one account. It will grow faster.
Right, yeah.
Which is not correct.
Correct.
Okay.
Alright Ed. Well, thank you very much.
Thanks for your call, Ed.
Yeah, appreciate it. If you want Ed’s line, it’s 844-220-0965. That’s 844-220-0965. Katie in Lake Mary. Katie, you’re on with the Certified Financial Group on WDBO.
Hi Katie.
Good morning. I appreciate your time.
Sure.
Real quick question. Good or bad, I’ll be 65 in December. I am gainfully employed. I am a social worker, I have no intention of retiring at this point of my life. I’m wondering about Medicare. Is there advantage to waiting until I decide to stop working? Should I sign up for it now? I know there’s Medicare A and B and if I wait on the B it will cost me more down the road. I don’t know what to do.
Well Katie, I assume that you are covered by your employer’s group health plan.
Correct.
Okay, so I would suggest to you because the Part B is expensive and there’s no reason for you to spend 125 a month when you don’t need to. So, a lot of people feel that once they’re 65 they need to sign up for Part B so that they don’t face some penalty later. But the rule is this; you have a guaranteed issue right to purchase any Medicare supplement sold if you’re coming — I don’t care if you’re working to age 75. If you’re coming directly off of a group health plan and you haven’t had a lapse of coverage. And that’s an important distinction because one of the things that I ask in the workshop is Obamacare, the Affordable Care Act, got rid of pre-existing conditions, true or false. And of course most people will say true, and it’s true for everybody 64 and under, but a lot of people don’t realize when you’re on Medicare you are subject to pre-existing conditions if you don’t buy a supplement when you’re first eligible. Meaning, if you buy the part C plan, the Medicare advantage plan, and you later say ah, this isn’t working out for me, I don’t maybe like the network that I have, I think I’ll buy a supplement next year. You get to the next year and you realize oops, I’ve got some medical questions I have to answer. It’s not a guarantee that I can get back into original medicare.
Oh.
So it’s important to buy what you want. If you can afford the Cadillac, buy that initially. Later on, if you can’t afford the Cadillac, you can go downstream in quality, if you will, but you can’t necessarily go upstream. You can’t always go from an Advantage plan to a supplement. There is —
Understood.
Yeah, but in your case there’s no advantage for you really to sign up for part B Medicare. I would wait until you stop working.
Okay.
Doesn’t the — something in the back of my mind though, Gary, and you’re the expert in this, so that’s why I’m asking you. The plan that she’s in has to be a qualified plan.
It has to be creditable coverage.
Creditable coverage.
And I’m assuming that you’re working for the government, Katie?
Yes.
Yeah, so it’s going to be creditable coverage. Now, what Joe was referring to, and this is a good point, let’s say that you were offered a couple different plans at your office and one of those was a high deductible plan. Also known as a health savings account compatible medical plan.
Yes, understand. Understand.
Well, those aren’t always deemed creditable coverage and so you potentially could be on that type of a plan and have a penalty when you sign up for Part D Medicare because you didn’t have creditable coverage for prescriptions for example because you had to first meet this large deductible.
Right.
So, you do want to stick with a traditional plan when you’re close to signing up for part B, so that’s a great distinction Joe, thank you.
Okay. May I ask another quick question?
Sure.
Regarding Social Security, do I wait until I retire? I’ve heard rumors from different coworkers that are in my age bracket, some of them are taking out Social Security now because they’re claiming that when they go to sign up at Social Security, Social Security is telling them it really doesn’t matter, you’re not going to really gain that much from waiting, so might as well get the “free money” now.
No, I disagree. Disagree completely. I would say, Katie, if you do not need the additional money that Social Security would currently provide, defer it. You will be gaining an 8% approximate benefit for each year you continue to work and sometimes it’s even greater. And the reason for that is when you work past your full retirement age, what Social Security does is they average your 35 highest years of earnings. And let’s say by chance you were a mom raising a family and you had a lot of zeroes in those working years, you might be able to eliminate some of the zeroes with some high working years from the ages of say 67 to 70. So, I don’t think that advice that you’re getting from your coworkers is good advice.
Okay.
The only caveat there is if your health is poor.
No, not by the grace of God. No. Nope.
Well, if you’re in reasonably good health and expect to live 15 years, 20 years into retirement, you are better off getting a guaranteed 8% increase.
Okay.
That’s right. And your friends who are still working will be paying back a good bit of that Social Security because their benefits are going to be taxable because they’re currently working.
Oh. I’ll bet they’re going to have a surprise next year.
Well, they need <Inaudible> for those who do take their Social Security, it’s really important to have some federal withholding for those benefits because they will be taxable in most cases.
Okay. I really appreciate — thanks for being there for me.
Alright.
I appreciate it.
You’re welcome, Katie. Bye, we’re here for you. Thanks for calling.
Thank you, bye.
If you’d like Katie’s line, it’s 844-220-0965. 844-220-0965. Real quick, let’s see if we can’t squeeze in Anna before we’ve got to get to the three big things you need to know. Anna go ahead. You’re on with WDBO.
Anna.
Hi, good morning.
Good morning, how are you?
Hello.
How are you?
Good. Um, my question is, my husband and I are in our 50s. We’re self-employed. We make pretty decent money right now and the only investment that we really have made at this time is property. We have bought some property. And I would like to know what else could we add to our portfolio to plan for our retirement?
Well Anna, you certainly, being self-employed, could set up a retirement plan. For example, a SIMPLE one or you could do a SIMPLE IRA, a SEP-IRA, what’s called a simplified employee pension.
Muni 401k.
Yeah, yeah. So, there’s a lot of different retirement plans you could set up to defer some of that income. And while having property — rental property that you can control and manage on your own is, in my opinion, one of the great investments, you don’t want to just have that. I mean, anything with a retirement plan should have diversification. So, you do want to have equities. You likely want to have some fixed income and possibly if you have excess money, saving the taxes I think would be a great opportunity for you. So, I would open up one of those three plans that we recommended and depending on how much you want to put away —
Have you filed your taxes yet for 2016, or are you on extension.
Unfortunately, we got an extension from our accountant.
There’s nothing wrong with that. We do it all the time. The good news for you is that you can still set up a SEP-IRA for 2016 and get some nice tax deductions. So, ask your tax preparer about what you can put into a SEP-IRA for 2016 and get a tax deduction even though the tax year is closed, it’s one of the few options that’s still available.
That’s right.
Oh, okay great. Well, thank you so much. I’ll look into that. Thank you so much.
Okay, thanks for the call.
Alright Anna, thank you so much, if you would like Anna’s line it’s 844-220-0965. 844-220-0965. We are planning tomorrow —
Today —
With the Certified Financial Group here on WDBO. Hey, welcome back, it’s the final segment of On the Money here with the Certified Financial Group on WDBO’s Ask the Expert weekend. Got five minutes to the latest news, weather and traffic with Dave Wall in the News 96.5 news room. Dave’s keeping an eye on that forest fire we have in Wachiva Springs State Park, get some updates on the traffic, and how hot will it get later today. All coming up in four minutes right here on News 96.5 WDBO. But, it is the last segment, the final chance to get your question answered from Joe Burt and Gary Abley from the Certified Financial Group, 844-220-0965. 844-220-0965. The text machine is up and running as well, 21232. We did have a text question here for you guys. Let’s see. Hi, explain if buying an annuity is a good plan for a senior citizen as an investing tool.
Perhaps.
Perhaps?
It all depends on the kind of annuity. It comes in many, many different shapes and sizes, and unfortunately the ones that, as we said earlier, that are generally offered through these free lunch and dinner seminars are the ones that are loaded with things that you don’t quite understand and that you can never get out of them, and they’re very, very expensive. If you want some information on — and those are what we call fixed index annuities, they’re popular because they say you can go in the market, you’re not going to lose any. Market goes up, you gain; market goes down, you don’t lose anything. Go to our website, click on the Info To Know tab, Info to Know, and then click on the other tab called The Rest of the Story. And there’s some articles in there about these kinds of annuities. What we oftentimes find is people buy them, think they’re buying a filet and they’re really buying hamburger. They think they’re going to participate in the market, 100% goes up, I’ll lock that in, it goes down and I don’t lose anything. But, at the end of the day when it’s all said and done, you really have hamburger when you thought you were buying a filet. You’re not going to die from it, but it’s not going to get you what you thought you were going to get.
Yes, and now the flip side as an alternative to a bank account that might be paying 1% and the annuity might pay 3% to 4%, well of course that’s a better alternative provided you can handle the lack of liquidity. Because, most of these you can only take out between 7% to 10% of the balance per year without a surrender charge. And every company is different. You’ve got to read the fine print. There’s some good ones and there’s some not so good ones. So, really look carefully.
Yeah, it’s a minefield out there and these kids of programs are oftentimes sold by people that this is the only solution that they have. It’s like going to the Toyota Dealership and you really want to buy a Ford. Well, all they can sell you is a Toyota, but you really need a Ford. So, you have to be very, very careful about that.
Well, we’ve got about a minute and a half left of the show for the day. Gary, real briefly, just tell us again about your upcoming workshops. You’ve got one on June 6th and July 11th.
So, the one on June 6th is When Can You Retire: Know You Numbers. So, we help calculate just what you’re going to need before you quit your job. And we want you to be at least 90% confident that you won’t outlive your money. So, we help you with the calculations there. We have — the next one is healthcare options in retirement and when we mean healthcare, we mean not only Medicare, Medicaid. We also are talking about long-term care and what those options are in retirement as well. That’s July 11th. And shortly thereafter, July 20th, we have Social Security Boot Camp and that is hosted by Nancy Hecht and Denise Kobach.
So, once again these are all held in our office in Altamonte Springs just off of Douglas Avenue just south of 434. We hold them in our classrooms. We can accommodate about 25, 30 people comfortably. We always serve some light refreshments, give you some good information, and they are absolutely free. People say well why do you do this kind of stuff, Joe? We do it for two reasons. Number one, to give you information that will keep you from becoming a casualty in your retirement years. And secondly to introduce you to what we do as a firm. So, whether you need financial planning now or sometime in the future, perhaps you give us an opportunity to earn your business. So, if you want more information, go to our website, financialgroup.com. We want to thank all the Veterans for the service they provided.
And God bless America.
Well, happy Memorial Day, Gentlemen. Have a great, restful weekend. Back to work on Tuesday and
Dictation made on 6/1/2017 11:19 AM EDT.