If you think money managers are overpaid, imagine how much they’d charge if they actually beat the market.
WHEN IT COMES to retirement planning, many Americans focus primarily on their portfolio’s size. That’s understandable. But there are other issues you should also think about, so you get your retirement on the right track and keep it there. Here are 11 steps to a better retirement:
Housing. As you get older, you become less mobile. Climbing stairs and getting up from a chair become more difficult. Keep this in mind when thinking about what house you’ll live in during retirement.
“JOURNALISM is printing what someone else does not want printed. Everything else is public relations.” It’s a quote that should be framed on the wall of every newsroom.
Of course, every journalist knows this. We call PR—public relations—the dark side. But most of us journalists stray into it far more often than we like to admit.
As a reporter, I cut my teeth at a group of regional newspapers in a prosperous part of England in 1989.
MY ELDERLY mother’s credit card was recently compromised. This required her to move all her automatic payments to a new credit card.
That, in turn, prompted her to reevaluate these various charges. Her cable bill, for instance, had gone up more than 15% over the past two years. My mother complained that, while she gets many channels, she only watches broadcast TV. She dropped the cable package.
As she added the autopay information to her new credit card,
IN DECEMBER 1954, 23-year-old John Neff hitchhiked from Ohio to New York in search of work. A Navy veteran, Neff had recently graduated college near the top of his class, with a degree in finance. His hope: to land a job as a stockbroker. But despite these qualifications, Neff was turned down. Why? According to a biographer, the brokerage firm felt “his voice didn’t carry enough authority.”
It didn’t take long for Neff to recover from this setback.
DECIDING WHETHER to buy bonds or pay down the mortgage used to be a tricky decision. Not anymore: Paying extra on your home loan will almost always be the right choice.
This takes some explaining—because it involves wrapping your head around the standard vs. itemized deduction, investment taxes, and a mortgage’s shifting mix of principal and interest.
First, let’s dispense with the obvious objection: Yes, if you’re inclined to buy stocks rather than pay down the mortgage,
MUCH CRITICISM is leveled against millennials, often defined as those born between 1981 and 1996. The criticism is frequently directed at their money and career decisions, including their purportedly foolish spending, excessive borrowing, job-hopping, self-absorption and sense of entitlement.
The perception is so pervasive that even millennials buy into this view of themselves.
But I wouldn’t be too quick to criticize millennials or compare them unfavorably to older generations. Each generation confronts its own unique challenges and difficulties,
FOR PURCHASES under $10, 49% of U.S. adults typically use cash, 35% use a debit card and just 16% use a credit card, according to a CreditCards.com survey.
NO. 1: THE GOAL isn’t to beat the market, prove we’re clever or grow absurdly rich. Rather, the goal is to have enough to lead the life we want. We should favor the path most likely to get us there.
NO. 108: OUR HUNTER-gatherer instincts tell us to consume right away—and not save for the future. What to do? We might automate our regular savings. We should visualize our goals, so they seem more alluring than today’s spending. We might share our financial ambitions with others, so fear of their disapproval prods us to act.
REFINANCE to take advantage of today’s low mortgage rates. That can be a smart move if, within a few years, you can recoup the refinancing’s cost through lower monthly payments. Want to get a handle on how much you’re truly saving? If you have, say, 19 years left on your loan, find out the monthly payment on a 19-year mortgage at today’s lower rates.
BETA AND ALPHA. Beta measures an investment’s volatility relative to a benchmark index. If the investment has a positive alpha, it means it outperformed the index on a risk-adjusted basis, with that risk measured by beta. For instance, a mutual fund could trail the market averages, but still have a positive alpha if its performance wasn’t especially volatile.
WHEN IT COMES to retirement planning, many Americans focus primarily on their portfolio’s size. That’s understandable. But there are other issues you should also think about, so you get your retirement on the right track and keep it there. Here are 11 steps to a better retirement:
Housing. As you get older, you become less mobile. Climbing stairs and getting up from a chair become more difficult. Keep this in mind when thinking about what house you’ll live in during retirement.
“JOURNALISM is printing what someone else does not want printed. Everything else is public relations.” It’s a quote that should be framed on the wall of every newsroom.
Of course, every journalist knows this. We call PR—public relations—the dark side. But most of us journalists stray into it far more often than we like to admit.
As a reporter, I cut my teeth at a group of regional newspapers in a prosperous part of England in 1989.
MY ELDERLY mother’s credit card was recently compromised. This required her to move all her automatic payments to a new credit card.
That, in turn, prompted her to reevaluate these various charges. Her cable bill, for instance, had gone up more than 15% over the past two years. My mother complained that, while she gets many channels, she only watches broadcast TV. She dropped the cable package.
As she added the autopay information to her new credit card,
IN DECEMBER 1954, 23-year-old John Neff hitchhiked from Ohio to New York in search of work. A Navy veteran, Neff had recently graduated college near the top of his class, with a degree in finance. His hope: to land a job as a stockbroker. But despite these qualifications, Neff was turned down. Why? According to a biographer, the brokerage firm felt “his voice didn’t carry enough authority.”
It didn’t take long for Neff to recover from this setback.
DECIDING WHETHER to buy bonds or pay down the mortgage used to be a tricky decision. Not anymore: Paying extra on your home loan will almost always be the right choice.
This takes some explaining—because it involves wrapping your head around the standard vs. itemized deduction, investment taxes, and a mortgage’s shifting mix of principal and interest.
First, let’s dispense with the obvious objection: Yes, if you’re inclined to buy stocks rather than pay down the mortgage,
MUCH CRITICISM is leveled against millennials, often defined as those born between 1981 and 1996. The criticism is frequently directed at their money and career decisions, including their purportedly foolish spending, excessive borrowing, job-hopping, self-absorption and sense of entitlement.
The perception is so pervasive that even millennials buy into this view of themselves.
But I wouldn’t be too quick to criticize millennials or compare them unfavorably to older generations. Each generation confronts its own unique challenges and difficulties,
FOR PURCHASES under $10, 49% of U.S. adults typically use cash, 35% use a debit card and just 16% use a credit card, according to a CreditCards.com survey.
NO. 1: THE GOAL isn’t to beat the market, prove we’re clever or grow absurdly rich. Rather, the goal is to have enough to lead the life we want. We should favor the path most likely to get us there.
REFINANCE to take advantage of today’s low mortgage rates. That can be a smart move if, within a few years, you can recoup the refinancing’s cost through lower monthly payments. Want to get a handle on how much you’re truly saving? If you have, say, 19 years left on your loan, find out the monthly payment on a 19-year mortgage at today’s lower rates.
NO. 108: OUR HUNTER-gatherer instincts tell us to consume right away—and not save for the future. What to do? We might automate our regular savings. We should visualize our goals, so they seem more alluring than today’s spending. We might share our financial ambitions with others, so fear of their disapproval prods us to act.
BETA AND ALPHA. Beta measures an investment’s volatility relative to a benchmark index. If the investment has a positive alpha, it means it outperformed the index on a risk-adjusted basis, with that risk measured by beta. For instance, a mutual fund could trail the market averages, but still have a positive alpha if its performance wasn’t especially volatile.