Your Boomer Mortgage: Insurance Offers You Don't Need

On a recent episode of Financial Impact Factor Radio, we discussed the topic of insurance. If you have never tuned into this show, I think you will find it interesting and topical. We have a wide range of guests and often discuss the very questions that concern Baby Boomers, their children and their parents. Because being a Boomer is more than just being a certain age. All of our shows on Financial Impact Factor Radio can be found here.

As a Boomer, I am always intrigued by the offers that begin showing up in my inbox/mailbox. Although they don't on the surface seem to be age related, one can't help but read between the lines. Are they talking to me? Are they worried about whether I will make it to the end? That "end" involves satisfying the largest debt any of us will ever own: our mortgage.

Last week I received a letter in the mail from the bank that holds my mortgage that would make most mortgage holders think twice. It was the offer of life insurance. My bank might think there are good reasons for offering this product that is different that many of the other types of insurance offered with these types of loans. For instance, PMI is private mortgage insurance the bank makes you buy if you are putting less than 20% down on a mortgage. The sole beneficiary in this instance is the lender, who knows that if you are going to default, this riskier loan covers their interest in the transaction. Known as PMI, its cost has begun to weigh on borrowers who find their loans underwater. Once you pass 78% mark because the value of your house compared to the amount of your initial downpayment, you can cancel the policy.

There is also mortgage insurance which for some borrowers seems like a good option as well. Essentially the lure of this product is to pay-off the mortgage in the event of your death. The insurer doesn’t pay you directly instead writing a check directly to the mortgage company or lender.

The letter I received offered a term policy that would last until I turned 80 years old, which is about 26 years from now. Like all insurance policies it plays on your fears and comes at a time when the typical term policy is about to expire if you bought insurance in your thirties, which is typically the time when most folks consider coverage. But it isn’t cheap. In fact, this sort of policy has a seven year flat rate, just a few medical questions without an exam and of course the tug-on-your-heart-strings assurance that your loved ones will be taken care of.

So today I thought we’d talk about late in life insurance coverage and whether we should consider it.

Listen to Financial Impact Factor Radio with your hosts:
Paul Petillo of Target2025.com/BlueCollarDollar.com and Dave Kittredge and Dave Ng of FinancialFootprint.com

Is Real Estate Part of Your Retirement Portfolio?

We have been told to diversify our portfolios. We have been told, and Boomers will know exactly what I am speaking of, to re-balance the risk in our portfolios as we age. We should go from a more risk prone investment to one that is more stable, even fixed as we head towards and eventually retire.

That's good advice and there are a number of ways to do exactly that. But one you may not have considered involves investing in real estate through the use of REIT or real estate investment trust.

As Will Rogers once said: "Don't wait to buy land, they aren't making any more of it.” But we have developed it making the ground far more valuable and those who own what’s on it, in some instances richer because of it. Over the last couple of days we have focused on your immediate real estate. While your home is not an investment per se, it is often considered one. Owning a hundred homes, or a shopping center or an office tower is an investment. The roof over your head, not so much an investment as a stewardship. You pay for it, you fix it up, you might even spend your entire life in it but at some point, you pass it on to the next owners. And you care for it in that manner, improving it so it is saleable to those next in line.

On this edition of the Financial Impact Factor Radio with Paul Petillo, Dave Kittredge and Dave Ng, we have someone who has focused his career on real estate as an investment: Brad Thomas. Mr. Thomas researches and writes on a variety of real estate based fixed- income alternatives including both publicly-traded and non-traded REITs or real estate investment trusts. He has a broad background in capitalization and sustainable net lease investing. Mr. Thomas currently writes weekly articles for Seeking Alpha and Forbes where he maintains “real time” research on many of the equity REITs and retailers.

Among the topics Brad explained included the risk of owning these investments, how they are structured and the dividends they offer, how to analyze their worth and most importantly, how these investments react to various economic forces. REITs have been around for over five decades and are a widely suggested part of a diversified portfolio.


This is a must listen show for not only the curious investor but those looking to better understand the subject of REIT investments.

Listen to Financial Impact Factor Radio with your hosts:
Paul Petillo of Target2025.com/BlueCollarDollar.com and Dave Kittredge and Dave Ng of FinancialFootprint.com

The show is broadcast daily, online at 6amPST/9amEST.

The Boomer Rollover Conundrum

Boomers will be retiring en masse in the coming years. And with that retirement comes options. For the first time their lives, they will be outside the comfortable boundaries of their employer's retirement plans and on their own. The choices are many and often confusing. That is why I thought it would be informative to discuss over the last couple of days, an option you may have considered.

Today on the Financial Impact Factor Radio with Paul Petillo, Dave Kittredge and Dave Ng we continue the discussion we began yesterday about self-directed IRAs. While having control over your retirement is important, how much risk is too much and who can handle the increased potential of loss or gain.

To listen to yesterday's show, click here.

Here are some outtakes from this conversation:

Yesterday we discussed a different corner of the retirement investment world when we talked about self-directed IRA. I suggested that “If there is one thing we all seem to be seeking and at the same time, remains as elusive it is control. Our investments often seem to want us to master its fate, as if simply involving yourself is enough.” T.S.Eliot seemed to agree although we all know he wasn’t talking about your retirement plans when he wrote: "Only those who will risk going too far can possibly find out how far it is possible to go."

Jim Hitt of AmericanIRA.com to discuss the IRA that you control. There is a lot left to be discussed it seems and little clarification is needed in advance. Jim is a third party administrator or TPA. We have had a few professionals who ply their trade as a go-between, somewhat detached from the other two parties but necessary in the legal and tax compliant execution of a retirement plan. Sometimes we need to be reminded that all retirement investments, 401(k)s, 403(b)s, IRAs in all their incarnations are essentially parts of the tax code. And I’d be willing to wager that when taxes are mentioned, there is a certain fear, perhaps caution that moves to the forefront. Self-directed IRAs are no different.

On numerous occasions, we have, in advance of a guest appearing on the show prepped the listening audience, discussed what we knew about the next day’s topic and did so in almost every instance, without the guest’s knowledge. Today, we’re going to look back.

Most of us have had out retirement plans nestled safely – and I’ll describe what I mean by safely in a moment – inside a 401(k). The way these plans are constructed give us a sense that someone else is watching over us. They choose the investments. They made the match. They suggested that they had a fiduciary responsibility to us. I asked Jim if he had just such a responsibility and he simply replied: no.

So we began the discussion there as I asked Dave and Dave if they would like to tell us what fiduciary responsibility is?

Now we all know that risk is something we need and knowing how much of a risk you can take is key in the way you execute your goals. But this is no easy task when it comes to this type of IRA. "Trust your own instinct, “ as Billy Wilder once said: “Your mistakes might as well be your own, instead of someone else's."

As Baby Boomers begin this massive wave of retirement, many are for the first time going to get their life’s retirement account to control. I was caught by one thing Mr. Hitt suggested as to the people who come to him: they come in good times and bad.

The risk of self-directing your IRA is there. Jim discussed using this money for real estate investment purposes, business opportunities and other investments such as gold, commodities, etc. And it all boils down to coordination.

Listen to Financial Impact Factor Radio with your hosts: Paul Petillo of Target2025.com/BlueCollarDollar.com and Dave Kittredge and Dave Ng of FinancialFootprint.com

The show is broadcast daily, online at 6amPST/9amEST.

Paul Petillo is the managing editor of BlueCollarDollar.com/Target2025.com and a fellow Boomer.

Retirement for Boomers: The Fitting Room Method

Sometimes, the message for Boomers is mixed in with a variety of other, often unrelated topics. But if you are like me, they exist in a subsurface thought, an attempt by my subconscious to always be searching for some clue, some answer, some key to this puzzle. 

Last night on the Daily Show with Jon Stewart, Charles Barkley, basketball star turned sportscaster offered his thoughts on retirement. Granted, professional athletes are hardly the poster boys and girls of those seeking to retire. They have made huge sums of money in a relatively short amount of time and retirement usually means a second, perhaps third career managing that money, be it a car dealership or real estate investments or sportscaster.

So they aren't usually who writers such as me profile as "retirees". And he wasn't directly speaking to Boomers. But he did make one comment that was noteworthy: "I was bored out of mind by the third month of retirement". (I'm paraphrasing of course but it was as close to the quote as I intend to get.) We spend so much of our time and mental effort focusing on the goal of retiring at whatever age we pick, that we seldom realize that for many of us, a whole lifetime may await us when we retire.

I know what you are already thinking: yes, you might live for an additional twenty or thirty years after retiring but they are hardly years of increasing quality. And as one well-to-do acquaintance recently suggested: "rich people never retire". So when I suggest that whole lifetime awaits you in retirement, the suggestion either falls on deaf ears or scares you more than you want to admit.

In reality, you will live at least an additional ten years after whatever date you pick to retire. While 75 or 80 doesn't seem to be that old, at least in the conversations I have overheard, it is. You are not the person you once were and the mechanized hum of that inner world of you is not humming along the way it did when you were forty. In fact, when you were forty you barely heard it. At sixty, your insides send you regular messages. At eighty, I imagine its a cacophony of sounds.

So have you asked yourself what retirement will really be like, beyond the dreams you may have harbored for most of your life? Have you equated what your body has told you about those dreams in some sort of altered wish? 

Probably not. What you may have thought would have been the ideal place to retire, the ideal lifestyle to live, may no longer be what you are capable of doing.

So you should try it on for size. First, the dream place. Warm climates attract your tired bones with thoughts of heat and sun and outdoor activities you may have enjoyed for week long vacations while you were working. Resort living is not the same as permanent residency. Many warmer, resort like climates offer an enticing postcard view of how you might end your days. But proximity to good medical care - even if you think you are healthy - should be a consideration.

Hawaii, for example is warm and tropical and part of the US. Medical care there is good. But the cost of living on the islands, and that includes medical, food and utilities, is almost twice the cost of living based on the whole of the contiguous US. Accumulate a month's worth of vacation and spend it in your dream locale before you retire. Many resort locations have rentals that are more residential and less beachfront. Families often seek these places out in the hopes of saving a few bucks. Compared to what it might cost to live there full-time, you will get a fairly accurate picture of the day-today expenses.

I have been an advocate for second careers for as long as I can remember. So try your second career out now. You may like where you live. It is close to friends and family, places you are familiar with and activities you enjoy. So take a month off and stay at home. Mr. Barkley said that by month three he was going crazy. And he had a good sum of money put away to indulge in whatever whim passed his way. You won't have that luxury - you'll be on a fixed income. A month should be enough on the average income to understand what you can do and what you can't afford to do. It will also give you the chance to work at career two.

Which brings me to the last part of my try it on for size. Your income will be fixed. Although in reality, it will be diminishing, which is fixed with minuses. Inflation, taxes and insurance will play a much more major role when it comes to your income. Yes it might be the same amount each month but each passing month will take a little piece of it. Try this concept on for size.

You could do a lot of positive things for yourself in 2012. But pretending to be retired, if only for a month, will give you some clear understanding of what retirement, at least the early years of it, will be like. Doing it while you are working gives you time to alter the course and embrace a new life while still living in your old one.

Paul Petillo is the managing editor of BlueCollarDollar.com/Target2025.com and a fellow Boomer

Happy New Year's Boomers: Your Retirement Resolutions

To be a Boomer means many things. Even as our bodies age and our eyes lose some of their focus, one thing we can all see clearly, is our retirement. Are we really looking though?

Jimi Hendrix once wrote: "I used to live in a room full of mirrors; all I could see was me. I take my spirit and I crash my mirrors, now the whole world is here for me to see." When it comes to the reflection staring back at us, our retirement, like those images, are a search for imperfection. We don't look at ourselves to admire how good we look; we look for flaws. We don't imagine a future; we see the relics of past decisions.

If you consider yourself a Baby Boomer, the reflection in the mirror is an image that polarizes: we are comfortable in the what the future holds or we are worried. There is good reasons for this feeling of either hope or dispair, with no real middle ground. This group has seen the demise of the defined benefit plan (pensions) and the introduction of the defined contribution plan (401(k)). You have seen the greatest bull market in investing history and witnessed two major crashes that have rattled your confidence in the decade following. You are the first generation to realize that your future is in your hands and you were not ready for the responsibility.

If you are younger than a Boomer, you are the first  generation to have never seen any other opportunity to finance your future than with a 401(k). And you have come to realize that this is not the plan it was intended to be. 401(k) plans were not designed to be the one and only vehicle for retirement. We were sold a notion that this was the end-all-to-be-all plan that would afford us a better retirement than our parents only to find out that it hinged on two extremely volatile concepts: your ability to consistently earn money and your level of contribution. Your 401(k) became your anchor and your wings.

I imagine that many of you will look back on the highlights of 2011 and find yourself in either one or two camps: you were able to hold onto your job, pay your bills and put some money away for retirement or you will be looking back at a year of indecision, regret and the promise to do better in 2012. You may be celebrating simply getting through it or wishing it never happened. To that, I offer some simple resolutions to embrace in 2012.

One: Revisit your idea of retirement. You can promise to save more money for your future, increasing your contribution to your plan or perhaps, in the absence of a plan, begin one of your own using IRAs. But you do this without really looking at that future. Retirement will not be the same of any two of us. For some it will be a life of struggle, an ongoing effort to make ends meet when they may never  met while they were working. For some it will be the realization that the balance between the now and the future relies on a level of personal sacrifice we were smart enough to embrace while we were working. For others, it will simply be a resignation of sorts, a belief that it will never happen.

Retirement is three things: A time when we find new opportunities outside the confines of what we called a career, a place of unimaginable risk and/or a chance to take a breather. It is not a place of no work and all play. It is not a time spent waiting for the end to come. It is not what we imagine because, if we looked closely at that image we see flaws. So we don't look as closely at those who are retired, examine how they live and ask if this is what they had planned. In revisiting the idea of retirement, your concept of that future, consider looking closer. If you don't like what you see, resolve to change it. But don't look away.

Two: Don't reflect on what you've done. You made mistakes; we all have. Some of us took too much risk, some not enough. Some contributed as much to their retirement as their budgets allowed, others did not. Some of us made poor mortgage or credit decisions, others did not. No matter what you did or didn't do, looking back will not improve the look forward.

Looking forward doesn't mean turning your back on on any of those events. It means focusing all of your energy on fixing them. This is a twofold effort, the first being getting the budget you may not have in line with your paycheck and focusing on paying down your mortgage (keep in mind that even if your home is underwater - meaning your mortgage is greater than the value of the house itself - the interest you pay on than loan is eating away at your future invest-able or save-able dollars). Does this mean you should not put money away in a 401(k) plan and redirect every dollar to the day-to-day? Not at all. Keep in mind that a 5% contribution will, in almost every instance, not impact your take home pay.

Three: Don't over think the process. From every corner of the financial world you will hear: rebalance your 401(k). If you chose a minimum of four index funds spread across four sectors, or four ETFs that do the same thing, rebalancing is a waste of time. You diversify so you can capture ups in one market and downside moves in another and your contribution doesn't allow you to buy more when one market moves up and allows you to buy more when it goes down.

We want to think we are in control when in fact, the only thing you actually control is how much money you want to put in. Markets will do what they do best: move. It might be up one day and down the next. It doesn't really matter. What matters is that you do something and in 2012, it should be significantly more than you are doing now.

Four: Stop being selfless. One of the hurdles we are told, for women investors specifically, is their inability to put themselves before their family. This is a cause for concern of course but not  a disaster in the making. Take a good long and hard look at your family and ask yourself: could I spend my retirement years living with any of them? Do they want you to?

Five: Embrace the truth. Now there will be an increased amount of pressure from every financial professional to get advice on your investments. This educational effort will evolve in the next several years from long, drawn out seminars on how your 401(k) works to short, ADD friendly videos that last several minutes and offer key points on what to do. The truth still relies on your ability to put more money away. Five percent will net you 25% of your current take home in retirement. A ten percent contribution over the average working career will pay you about 50% of what you earn today in retirement. Fifteen percent contributed to a 401(k) plan with average (modest) historical returns will allow you to live on 75% of your current income. Can you handle that truth?

Six: Stop worrying about it. According to HealthGuidance.org, you are killing yourself with worry. Michael Thomas writes: "Worrying leads to stress and stress has been linked with a number of health problems. People who suffer from high levels of stress are much more prone to cardiovascular disease, gastrointestinal issues, weight problems and there has even been a link made between stress levels and certain cancers." Instead resolve to do more saving than you have ever done, spend less than you did last year and embrace the reality of what fixed income is. Retirement is fixed income. Resolve to live like that now.

Paul Petillo is the Managing Editor of BlueCollarDollar.com/Target2025.com and a fellow Boomer.

In 2012: What Boomers Can Expect

"Time is free, but it's priceless. You can't own it, but you can use it. You can't keep it, but you can spend it. Once you've lost it you can never get it back." Harvey MacKay

One of the key elements in any financial transaction is time. If you want to retire, you must consider the amount of time. If you want to borrow, how long you have to pay it back can be translated into dollars and cents. Investing; timing they suggest can't be down but is important nonetheless.

If you are twenty, time is on your side. If you are thirty, there is time left. If you are forty, time is of the essence. If you are fifty, time is running out. If you are sixty, where has the time gone. And older than that, time is no longer on your side. It accompanies us through life like some dark passenger. It reflect back on us from the mirror. And when we look at our retirement plan, it stares at us without guilt or shame. Time is the truth.

When I first began writing these predictions, and I've been churning out these year end ditties for over a decade, many were laced with optimism, some with an urging that we learn the lesson and move forward armed with knowledge of past mistakes, and still others were exercises in reality. In 2012, we have some opportunities and some problems awaiting us, left on the table as we symbolically turn the calendar wiping out 2011. But it won't leave quietly.

So I have a few thoughts about what you can do - resolutions of sorts but not the drastic sort we make and break almost within hours of promising ourselves at midnight.

Increase your contribution I start with this obvious chant for two reasons: you aren't making a large enough contribution and two, I would be remiss in not telling you this right from the start. And I'm not just speaking to those with a 401(k).

There are the millions of you who are forced to (and because of that are not likely to) finance your own retirement through an individual retirement account. We lament at the worker who literally only has to sign up at his workplace and doesn't. And far too often, we say little about the person who has to sign-up (after finding a fund), commit with a fortitude that is somewhat lacking and to contribute some of their paycheck via direct deposit every week or month. That effort, it seems is a much more involved hurdle.

In 2012, the investment world will be little changed. It will roil and confuse and gyrate and possibly even nose dive - just as it has for decades. It will react to news - if not from Europe form China or even the presidential elections (which ironically tend to be excellent years to invest). This will have you second-guessing your investments. But this will only apply if you have no idea how much risk you can take.

Pay attention to diversification You may not be capable of rebalancing, the act of making sure that your investments are directed evenly across many investments. This is much harder than it seems. As long as you are involved - and that is YOU in capitals - the struggle to keep balance will not get any easier.

For the vast majority of us, mutual funds will be the investment vehicle of choice. These investments will see more movement towards fee reductions. Which is a good thing. Fees will and always have been a subtraction of gains. This makes an excellent argument for indexing.

Choosing six index funds across the following cross-sections of the markets will not solve the problem of rebalancing (some will do better than others) but it will provide diversification. Index the largest companies (an S&P 500 fund), a mid-cap fund (the next 400 companies in size), small-caps (the next 2000), an international fund (an index of the largest countries (those with established banking systems even if they are currently troubled and will continue to be so in 2012), an emerging market fund (after international funds, the most risky) and a bond index (one that covers as much fixed income as possible).

Some of you will wonder if exchange traded funds (ETF) wouldn't be just as good if not better than simple indexing. In 2012, ETFs will continue to drill down ever deeper into sectors of the markets that add risk along with the illusion of an index. ETFs will become more actively managed in 2012 offering you more risk at a lower cost. Cheap doesn't mean better. 2012 will be year of the ETF. If you are unsure what these investments are, consider this conversation I had with David Abner of Financial Impact Factor Radio recently to help explain what these investments are and how they work.

Focus on your financial well-being This refers to your credit score. It continues to impact your financial future and will become increasingly harder to ignore. A new credit rating service agency will add to the difficulty in 2012 and not only will the current scoring impact costs such as insurance, it will seek to trace the breadcrumbs of your financial life more thoroughly that the big three do.

There is little likelihood that the job market will increase as many of our returning troops will flood the marketplace, taking numerous jobs from your kids just out of college. Which means another year with your kids at home. The only answer to this problem is to continue to tighten down your budgets in 2012. As I mentioned earlier: "If you are forty, time is of the essence. If you are fifty, time is running out. If you are sixty, where has the time gone."

And you must do this understanding that inflation - not the reported number but the real number in your grocery bill - will still chip away at your wealth. This means you will move in two opposite directs in 2012: saving and investing more for your fleeting future (at least 6% but 10% would be best) and spending less in the present (easy of you don't use credit).

And the housing market will improve for those who have repaired any damaged credit or who have saved enough of a down payment to buy a house. people are still buying and selling. These people have found that while the market is not accessible to all, it is for those that have done right by their personal finances.

Do all of that this may not seem like a new year - but it will be a better year!

The Boomer Conundrum: To Hire a Financial Planner

On the surface, financial planning has remained the same. You are looking for a path to retirement that will provide you with a secure future, a worry-free post-work life. And financial planners offer you their service as a guide on that journey. But choosing the right one seems to have become more difficult as the industry has converted itself into what they think is more user friendly. How do you chose? 

There was time in the not-too-distant past when financial planners were catering to only the elite investor, one who is already versed in the concept of spending money to keep money. These richer clients understood that making money was the easy part; keeping it on the other hand was tougher. The sort of planners these folks hired were asset-based. This means that if you had wealth, for a percentage of those assets, they would invest to keep it.

They had an interest, albeit conflicted, in keeping your money in motion. Not only would they get a portion of your returns, they might also receive pay from the very products they were suggesting you use. Beyond these conflicts, which have obvious pluses and minuses, their interest was in the growth of your portfolio. They did attempt to cultivate a long-term relationship and the way they constructed their business with ease of access to conversations. And they knew that if they did a good job, they wouldn't hear from you until you stumbled across some idea on your own. They might at the point weigh the option against their own self-interest: less money to manage because, for instance you thought a life insurance policy was a good idea for your estate, would be less of a percentage of the total wealth under management.

Until, of course, things go awry. When the markets nose-dived in 2008, not only did economists and financial students miss the event, but so did financial planners. This exposed to some of these wealthy clients the fallibility of their skills. Paying as much as 2% of the net worth of their portfolios and at the same time, losing value the same as someone who didn't pay anyone for advice, brought the industry to rethink their approach.

Enter the flat-fee financial planner. This seemed like the logical choice for those with not a lot of money but the same needs as those who had much more: they wanted to keep it. The question is, without the incentive to make more based on the strength of the portfolio, it seemed as if this was simply window-dressing planning - they charged a flat fee for people who didn't need a lot of ongoing advice and they didn't offer more than was needed.

Storefront financial planners popped up everywhere. They would take your plan, reconstruct it and channel you into other products, some you might not need. They might suggest refinancing (and they could help). They might restructure your life insurance needs (and they could help). They might steer you towards an annuity (and they could help there as well).

And once that was done and you seemed set, they made money on the commissions these product brought in and did so under the guise that it was all in your best interest. Sometimes it was. The problem was that this yearly or twice yearly visit could cost upwards of $1,000. This might be a good investment for those who are in relatively stable shape. But for many who sought this sort of advice, the money might have been better spent elsewhere.

The next phase of advice giving came as a result of the downturn. While many people lost a great deal of investable net worth, some had un-investable assets. the may have had muh of their net worth tied up in their business for instance, an asset but not one that would be considered liquid. These assets, while seemingly under management would be considered when any advice was given. The concept of protection although came at a cost that sometimes is twice that of the fee-based planner.

The advent of the hourly based financial planner seemed to be a good solution. Much like the service provided by lawyers, the concept of the clock-running seemed to be a good idea for some people. They paid for what they received. The relationship was even more important here than in many of the other types of planning scenarios: planners were paid by the hour so they kept that meter running. Call with a question: and the meter clocked the time. Stop by with a concern: and the meter clocked the visit even as they chatted up your personal life.

Removing the asset-based incentive will keep your financial planner working longer on your plan with results that aren't often eventful. None of this suggests that this group isn't without merit. Far too many people equate the time they spend making money as more fruitful than time spent keeping it. They could, in almost every instance, find the same solutions on their own. Ironically, they could save money by investing some of their own time.

Evan Esar, American humorist who once quipped: "The mint makes it first; it's up to you to make it last." Keep in mind, credentials play a role. Start with the certified financial planner designation and move towards the references. Even if someone you know recommends a planner, do your own background check. Ironically, once you satisfied your inner skeptic, calculate the amount of hours you did and the amount of hours after-the-fact that you questioned your decision.

On today's Financial Impact Factor Radio with Paul Petillo, Dave Kittredge and Dave Ng we discuss the role financial planners can play in your retirement planning. Even as the industry surrounding advice has shifted to a more consumer friendly format, it has become more difficult to chose the right financial planner for the task.

Listen to internet radio with

Paul Petillo of Target2025.com/BlueCollarDollar.com

and Dave Kittredge and Dave Ng

of FinancialFootprint.com

on

The Financial Impact Factor

at Blog Talk Radio

Retirement Planning: The Statistical Boomer

I understand that it is difficult to sum up all of the issues facing our quest for retirement, from our biases to having to participate in a market that seems almost impossible to embrace. So for the sake of this discussion: Here's the problem facing Baby Boomers. 

Paul Barnes wrote in 1987 that the reason ratios (percentages are used ) is a mathematical one "and is basically used to facilitate comparison by adjusting for size".  What he quickly pointed out was that their use is "only good if the ratios possess the appropriate statistical properties for handling and summarizing the data". It is why, when the information culled from a recent Wells Fargo survey expressed as a percentage, that 25% of the adult population would need to work into their eighties, a postponement of retirement that has become newsworthy of late. The survey even suggested that they accepted the fact.

Now we have always been barraged with percentages: 10% off this, we are the 99%ers that, the markets down such-and-such a percentage for month, the quarter, the year. Whatever it is, it blurs some distinct realities by ignoring, as Mr. Barnes suggested, some important data. And we don't need to go far beyond our own observations to find the underlying reasons why some people (25% evidently) are not retiring historically.

Let's start with the unemployment rate. Expressed as a percentage, perhaps because of the space needed to write such a large number over and over, it is hovering at 8.6%, give or take a re-estimate or revision. And quickly you will be told that to add in the disparaged worker, the underemployed person or even the fully employed person who is getting less and the percentage of people who will not be able to retire based on the typical timeline of a thirty year or even forty year career this number becomes almost impossible to calculate. Estimates push the real unemployment rate to around 14%. If you are older and long past the benefit-of-time growing your savings and a stat in this group, the trouble with these numbers can be even more devastating.

Let's from there move towards the participation rate in 401(k) plans. Or better, how about we look at the number of 401(k) plans there are, which is less than 50% of the workplaces. And that is only for those who don't have access to a 401(k). those percentages get worse when you consider that more than half of this group doesn't do a single thing to prepare for retirement.

And what about the folks that do have a 401(k)? Participation rates are up in some surveys, down in others. Chances are, if you were just hired, you were auto-enrolled in your company's plan. Recent numbers suggest that 90% of those newly hired chose to not opt out. While that is a headline number, the 10% who chose not to participate is more worrisome and adds to the quarter who will not have enough for retirement - although they may not be old enough to embrace the full consequence of that decision. But even auto-enrollment has its problems as two-thirds of those who are automatically enrolled don't do anything to adjust the default investment the plan picked.

Pamela Hess, director of retirement research at Hewitt Associates suggests that "Most employees who are automatically enrolled tend to stick with the employer-provided default contribution rate, so simply getting them into the 401(k) plan at a minimal contribution rate isn't going to help them meet their long-term retirement needs." That minimal contribution rate is often 3% and not close to adequate. In fact, in the larger picture, less that sixty percent of those who are in a plan contribute more than 5% of their pre-tax pay.

Ms. Hess believes that  "Companies should strongly consider increasing the default contribution rate and coupling automatic enrollment with contribution escalation, which automatically increases employee contributions to the 401(k) plan and helps get them to a better savings rate over time." Auto-escalation has helped, a method of putting some or all of the employee's raises into the plan but unless the worker understands the implications of failing to do so, they often don't opt for this benefit.

I have pointed out before that the recovery will need jobs that people want to stay in long enough to benefit from the company match. As much lip service as these plans offer when they match the contribution, vesting is still an issue. Some workers may be deciding to not stay long enough to get the matched contribution, a period that usually last five years and decide to not bother. And many who slashed their contributions have not returned to offering them, pushing participation down in their plans even for those who are fully vested. If these businesses have restored the match, they have often cut benefits elsewhere making the choice of contributing more a financial one with a harsh reality.

So when a survey crosses the retirement radar suggesting that 25% of us are planning to work into our eighties, the number misses some key data. Workers who suggest that a retirement number - a dollar amount base on any number of formulae - is what will determine their time of retirement, the estimates they embrace may be outsized. 

These folks fret over the stock market and construct a worse-case scenario for what might happen if the gains they had hoped for fail to materialize.

And then they turn around and overestimate their comfort zone, attempting to replicate exactly what they have now. Here is where they become discouraged. Previous generations of retirees had something we never had: modest outlooks. Skip back just three generations and the elderly were likely to move in with children in retirement.

When the numbers tell only part of the truth, as if shining a narrow beam of light and describing what it illuminates is all that matters to the discussion, we need to refocus and see what we've been missing. Retiring can still happen when it should - which is when you want and not when your retirement account statement says so based on some target. So embracing a time, which 20% of the surveyed did, is a much more realistic parameter. 

The only question left is how can you do it?

Two answers are worth repeating: you need to become a little more austere in your fifties and save more, much more. The reality of the harsh regime will stiffen your resolve for when work is not what you want to do. It is practice with a safety net. the second is readjusting your expectations and plan for those realities. The investment you make to mentally prepare yourself for this less-than-what-you-had-previously-planned retirement is still a plan and will work. And if its any comfort, the data shows that too many don't even have that!

Paul Petillo is the Managing Editor and Founder of BlueCollarDollar.com/Target2025.com and a fellow Boomer.

Are You Thinking Estate Planning?

Boomers aren't considering their estate plans the way they should. Perhaps the costs seem high. Perhaps the language too difficult. Perhaps we don't want to come face-to-face with our own mortalities. But talking about estate planning isn't just for the older ones among us. On the Financial Impact Factor Radio we hosted Deborah L. Jacobs, author of "Estate Planning Smarts".

This was an important show for those of us who may not have taken the important first step and made a will. And you'll find out that this is actually the next step in a good estate plan! Tune in to find out what the first step was. Deborah, a columnist and estate planning expert at Forbes discussed how to approach this topic with your parents, your spouse, your family and your lawyer.

 In the second half of the show, Dave Kittredge and Dave Ng of FinancialFootprint.com and my cohosts discussed the upward challenge of re-educating yourself for a new career, even if you graduated 30 years ago. College doesn't come cheap and when Boomers focus their attention on getting trained for a changing work environment, everyone benefits.

 

Listen to internet radio with

Paul Petillo of Target2025.com/BlueCollarDollar.com

and Dave Kittredge and Dave Ng

of FinancialFootprint.com

on

The Financial Impact Factor

at Blog Talk Radio

An Important Show about Long-Term Care Insurance

On Monday's Financial Impact Factor Radio we had a guest of interest to all Boomers. Jesse Slome of American Association for Long-Term Care Insurance joined us to teach us about LTCI. This is a multi-faceted topic that has long-range implication for the near retiree and their retirement planning strategies as well as someone who is already retired. Jesse was nice enough to stop by and explain many of the nuances of this product and offer some helpful tips on what to look for when buying long-term care insurance, where to purchase it and when.

Listen to internet radiowith

Paul Petillo of Target2025.com/BlueCollarDollar.com

and Dave Kittredge and Dave Ng

of FinancialFootprint.com

on

The Financial Impact Factor

at Blog Talk Radio

Don't be Tempted to Borrow from Your 401(k)

Under the current laws governing tax-deferred retirement plans such as a 401(k), withdrawing money has consequences. I have mentioned many of them here over the years, not the least of which is the early withdrawal penalty, the payment of taxes on those tax deferred investments and of course the loss of retirement money. Yet, those penalties haven’t stopped many of the people who have found it difficult to make their monthly budget work.

Of course, I am assuming a monthly budget. Without some anchor in reality, not having a budgetcan lead to rash decisions withut considering the far-reaching impact. Without a monthly budget, you will have no idea what could be cut to maintain some level of financial stability when times get rough. It is also safe to assume that if you do not have some sort of monthly accounting of your finances, you probably don’t have an emergency account. Both of these would have served the households with troubled income streams.

Two Georgia Congressmen think that those 401(k) plans might be able to help. Their idea: Hardship Outlays to protect Mortgagee Equity (HOME) Act. Introduced last week, U.S. Senator Johnny Isakson (R-Georgia) and U.S. Representative Tom Graves (R-Georgia) want their proposal considered as a way to keep homeowners in their homes. The concept, somewhat like throwing you a lifeline of your own making and designed to rescue you from poverty in the future offers a short-term fix in the near-term. They believe that if you have been a diligent saver, adding to your 401(k) religiously over the years, you shouldn’t be punished for needing the money now as opposed to later.

Rep. Graves is convinced that the housing crisis is the reason the economy has not recovered. Calling up his decades in the real estate business, he suggests: “This bill will help Americans who risk foreclosure use their own resources to make their mortgage payment on time without being penalized by the federal government.” If his assessment of who may need this money now – 23% of those who have mortgages are underwater but not necessarily facing foreclosure – the government should step out of the way and allow these folks to withdraw that money without penalty.

They are proposing that there be a lifetime cap on these withdrawals of $50,000 or one-half of the present value of one’s 401(k) account (whichever is smaller), so long as those funds are used for that purpose within 120 days of withdrawal. This is not the first bill of its kind.

Since the Great Recession began, Congress has struggled with what to do with corner of the financial world. A similar bill was introduced in 2009 and never debated on the Senate floor.

Numerous homeowners should not be in the homes they own in the first place. They may have obtained these residences with fraudulent applications, been unable to afford those homes during what would be considered a normal buying environment and failed to restructure their loans or worse, keep with the terms of their bankruptcy decisions. Because tax-deferred retirement accounts are not considered in these proceedings, some mortgage holders may have been in a position to financially right their own ship. But because of the penalties associated with tapping those accounts, they simply chose not to.

The HOME Act will allow wealthier homeowners to save their residences without penalty, while the rest of us, those that underfunded their retirement accounts or couldn’t wait for Congress to act, have already drained those accounts, paid the penalties and taxes and tried to move on. This effort woud do little to help those currently in the foreclosure vortex or who have been spat out by the continued downturn in housing.

No matter who you are, this last ditch effort is not the way to go. Reducing future retirement payouts (compounding and time suggest that $50,000 in retirement savings would provide only about $290 a month in retirement – a projected shortfall of over $1200) would set the average wage-earner, hardship or no, back decades in support of keeping the house. Few of these folks, given the opportunity and the consequence of this decision will consider the long-range impact of that decision. And if it gets Congressional approval, it will push the real problem further down the road.

On the surface, it might seem like the right thing to do. But beneath the veneer of a tax and penalty holiday the problems this money promises far outweigh the immediate salve it may provide. There are solutions, none of them pleasant.

If you are seeing the problem on the horizon, don’t wait until the day of reckoning. Contact your lender before you run into problems. If the problem has arrived, keep in mind, as devastating as it seems, it is not the end. While temporary may well last several years, longer if you successfully pursue a bankruptcy, protecting your future, a time when this will all be an unhappy bump in life’s road will be worth the sacrifice.

True, protecting your credit is important. Just keep in mind, it wasn’t as important when you bought the house as it is to you now. This too will pass.

The bottom line: those 401(k) provisions were established decades ago when the thinking was to make it painful to withdraw your money all the while giving you the illusion that if need be, you could tap it. Now provision, recent or past will stop you if you have made up your mind. But for those who see this as an exit strategy for a bad decision, this Act will add to the problem.

I know it’s old school but it is worth repeating: get a budget (and figure worse case scenario, not current spending habits to allow a downturn picture to standout), attempt to negotiate before the problem strikes (ironically, most job losses are not a surprise) and divide this time and the future into two separate lifetimes. Borrowing – or in this case, stealing from the future is not a good short-term remedy. It is a bandaid on a gapping wound.

Paul Petillo is the managing editor of BlueCollarDollar.com/Target2025.com and a fellow Boomer.

Paul's latest book "ReBuilding Wealth in a Paycheck to Paycheck World" is available at Smashwords

This Show was for Boomers: On the radio with Steve Cooperstein

On Monday, we had Steve Cooperstein on the Financial Impact Factor Radio show with Paul Petillo, managing editor of BlueCollarDollar.com/Target2025.com and a fellow Boomer. Steve's recent book was the topic for today's show: “Implications of the Perceptions of Post Retirement Risk for the Life Insurance Industry: Inside Track Marketing Opportunity, But Requiring Focused Retooling”.

It may have been written for advisors and academics and the insurance industry, but in doing so it offers us some interesting insights into how these folks think about us: the end user. Did I mention that Steve is an actuary?

 We talked to him about annuities and Long Term Care Insurance, the impact both of these products have on all age groups, what is wrong with them and how they can be improved. We solved a great deal in the hour we had together!



   

Listen to internet radiowith

Paul Petillo of Target2025.com/BlueCollarDollar.com

and Dave Kittredge and Dave Ng

of FinancialFootprint.com

on

The Financial Impact Factor

at Blog Talk Radio

New Book for Boomers and Their Kids

I have been writing for BoomersRetirement for quite some time. And while I tend to address the concerns of this older demographic - being one myself - I don't want you to think we can do so and ignore those around us.

Yes, we need to be focused. But personal finance has become intra-personal with our kids (and their decisions) often impacting our decisions. So we owe it ourselves to make sure that we educate them in the basics. I wrote the first version of this book seven years ago and my how things have changed - even as they stayed the same. Someone once told me that if everyone had read it, we wouldn't be in as deep of a financial mess as we are in now.

So I updated it for 2011 and published my fifth book - this time with Smashwords! And a special offer to readers of this blog, ReBuilding Wealth in a Paycheck-to-Paycheck World by Paul Petillo is available for a limited time (until 10.29.11) when you can use this coupon code to get the ebook for half price or $1.50. The code for the coupon is UJ76Q This ebook is available across all platforms including iPad and iPhone, Amazon and Sony.

So download it for yourself. Give it to your kids. Tell anyone you know how important this is.

Boomers: Do You Know Where Your Money Is?

Every second, a Boomer retires. This statistic alone should be a comforting thought. It is but not necessarily for Boomers. Billions of dollars of invested money will suddenly come under the direct control of this group and many simply don't know what to do. Yes they will want to ensure they don't run out of money. But they will have just as many opportunities to lose it all - in a scam that promises to make sure they don't run out of money.

On the Monday Financial Impact Factor Radio hosted by Paul Petillo we had Pat Huddleston, author of The Vigilant Investor: A Former SEC Enforcer Reveals How to Fraud-Proof Your Investments Mr. Huddleston is also a lawyer and CEO of Investors Watchdog LLC. As a former SEC Enforcer, he has seen more scams than you could imagine. With his new book, he takes those stories and the effect it has had on the victims and gives us the ultimate tell-all on how to spot what the people we may trust are actually doing - often right under our noses.

This is a must listen show for those on the cusp of retirement, those who have already retired and those who have elderly parents who are already retired. In other words, everyone stands to gain when they steel their hard-earned portfolios against a loss.

Listen to internet radiowith

Paul Petillo of Target2025.com/BlueCollarDollar.com

and Dave Kittredge and Dave Ng

of FinancialFootprint.com

on

The Financial Impact Factor

at Blog Talk Radio

Can the 403(b) what it should be?

Labor Day has passed and the passing of that date signals the beginning of the school year with crosswalks filled with school aged kids - so be cautious out there. But inside the building, there are teachers in the crosswalks of retirement and their caution can cost them in terms of what future they envision.

Unlike the private sector workers with the 401(k) plan, a self-directed tax deferred plan the sometimes comes with a company match, teachers have the 403(b) plan. Also tax-deferred and almost always void of any school district matches, the 403(b) does a poor job of mimicking the attributes of the 401(k). So I thought I'd take a moment and make current and potential teachers (and those in no-profit institutions) aware of some of the pitfalls that await them.

In theory, as most things are when the thought materializes for the first time, the 403(b) plan should have been just as good as the 401(k). Of course, most 401(k) plans lack many of the features that would make them more worthwhile and yet, even with those problems, the retirement grass does seem greener in those plans when compared to 403(b)s. The reasons boil down to the same problems facing 401(k) plans.

Fees are always an issue. In 401(k) plans they can come from two directions: the cost of the investments and the administration of the plan. It is no different in the 403(b). Often it is worse. The administrative costs of running these plans is an haphazard affair. Unlike corporations who might assign a person to oversee the plan's direction, choosing from different administrators as they search for the best one, school districts often do not. Because of this, 403(b) plans often have numerous administrators and no real trained inner office personal to watch over the process.

In other words, the single most important aspect of the plan is often neglected. Without prudent guidance from the person in charge of the plan at company level (or in the case of a school, the district level) the investment houses they hire often charge whatever they feel the market will bear. They mask this effort with investments they claim are designed for the group but are often not suitable for any investor.

And the choices you have can be so vast as to be daunting. In California, teachers can pick from over 3,000 investment options spread amongst six providers. It is often common wisdom that choice is good. And it is often warned that too many choices is quite the opposite. Confusion and investing make awkward bedfellows. The average 401(k) plan could serve most of its participants with as little as 20 choices, most of which will come as index funds followed by some target date offerings. Too many choices actually raises the costs of administration and stifles active participation.

And the choices they do get include annuities. This escalates the concern for fees amongst retirement plan advocates. These plan participants could be paying not only upfront sales charges of the annuities they are purchasing, deducted directly from savings. But also could be faced with higher than anticipated surrender charges. While some 401(k) plans would do well to offer some annuities to their plan participants, the 403(b) has been doing so and with little success for the participants.

Even as the government has mandated that these plan be better monitored, you the investor needs to stand-up and complain. It often works in these plans. Asking for low cost alternatives is serving to cull some of the bad plan providers from the mix.

And you the investor, once you get the low cost you seek, need to invest more often, with or without the match.

With only 10% of the school districts throwing a match their way, and expect that number to go down, not up, retirement investors need to make up the shortfall. If the typical match is 3% and you planned on investing 6%, you will need to make your investment 9% of your pre-tax income to come even. And even the best of calculations, over a thirty year career will not give you more than 50% of your current income in retirement worth that investment contribution.

If you do get a low cost plan, invest with diversity. Even as we hear stories about how the S&P 500 essentially was flat over the last decade, investing in six different index funds including that large cap fund would have given you over 8% - provided you didn't panic in 2008-2009 and held tight.

If the plan is not low-cost enough, consider investing in an IRA (which is tax deductible) or a Roth IRA (which is funded with after-tax contributions). But you must do something.

Yes it might put a crimp in your current lifestyle. And yes, it won't be easy to bring not only your retirement outlook into focus while reining in your financial house at the same time. And yes, try as it might, 403(b) plans won't ever be 401(k) plans. But no plan is worth its while if you don't use it.

Paul Petillo is the Managing Editor of Target2025.com/BlueCollarDollar.com and a fellow Boomer.