My Retirement Blog

My Retirement Blog

  • 2009 Roth IRA Contribution Limits

    With a new year comes a new limit for contributions, however 2009 will have the same contribution limits as 2008. This will be the first year that contribution limits will be based on inflation but 2009 will have the same limits as 2008. For 2009, the contribution limit for Roth IRAs will be $5,000 for…

  • All About Mutual Fund Loads

    I avoid mutual funds with loads at all costs. A load is just another term for a sales commission or sales fee for a mutual fund. It’s paid by the mutual fund to a broker whenever they sell shares of that mutual fund, it’s exactly like a sales commission. It’s a perfectly legitimate way for…

  • Don’t Cash Out Your 401(k)

    A recent survey from Bank of America found that 18% of respondents admitted to withdrawing money from their retirement accounts early to help pay for credit card debt, mortgage payments, and job losses. It’s a difficult time for everyone but cashing out your 401(k) should be seen as a last resort because it is so…

  • House Suspends Required Minimum Distributions for 2009

    The House of Representatives recently passed the Worker, Retiree and Employer Recovery Act (H.R. 7327) and has come through on a move that will likely make retirees smile a little in our down economy (and hugely down stock market). The act essentially lets retirees suspend requirement minimum distributions from all defined-contributions plans, including but not…

  • Social Security Strategy: Wife Claims Early, Husband Claims Late

    One way a couple can maximize their Social Security benefit is to use a strategy that takes advantage of how the benefit is calculated differently for men and women. To maximize your benefit, it pays for anyone to simply wait until their almost 70 before taking payments. If you’re not actually retired, this is pretty…

  • Will the Social Security Program Go Bankrupt?

    Until the economic crisis this year, the biggest thing on retirees’ minds was whether Social Security was going to go bankrupt. Actually, scratch that. Retirees didn’t have to worry about it, future retirees did because there were concerns that the number of people drawing from the program would outstrip the number of people contributing to…

  • Start Saving with Low Minimum Investment Mutual Funds

    I’m a big fan of Vanguard’s low cost mutual funds but they aren’t particularly friendly to the young and new investor because they often have decently sized minimum investments. Most require $3,000 to start, though their STAR Fund requires a mere $1,000, which is a lot when you consider most people are looking to save…

  • Tip’d Launches

    Tipd, financial news, a social media money site I wrote about a scant few weeks ago, has exited beta with a few new features, including one that will make most bloggers smile – straight HTML links from published stories. For bloggers, links are the currency of the internet and it’s great to see Tipd offering…

  • Unit Investment Trusts

    Unit Investment Trusts was listed as one of the places baby boomers should consider investing their savings given the current volatile equity markets. It made the list at #3 and it was an investment I had never heard of. In summary, unit investment trusts (UIT) are a type of investment company, similar to mutual funds…

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