Should You Pay Off a
Mortgage Before Retiring?
Selling your home if
you are going to move or downsize provides money to repay your home loan
without having to deplete savings. No reason to pay off mortgage. Some keep
their home for seasonal rental and use. Rents pay mortgage. Paying down high-interest
loans/credit cards are a better use of your cash. Retirement may leave you cash
poor. Some folks earn more toward their retirement income goal than they would
save by paying off a low-cost mortgage. Cash from an emergency fund takes
priority over paying down a low-interest mortgage. Mortgage interest may help
you lower your current income tax bill. Each family must run through the
solutions to learn the best strategy before and after retirement. Once you pay
off a mortgage, if you need cash you can always use a HELOC to tap home equity
for cash. Some cost
nothing to acquire. Another alternative is a reverse mortgage. But consider
the costs.
https://www.amazon.com/Reset-Your-Retirement-Income-retirement/dp/1512304344
Is auto-home ‘bundling’ right for you?
Sounds good but most folks find it is not right for them. Why? Bundle benefits go to the insurer not to you. Buying both auto and home insurance from the same company assumes one insurer can provide the best deals for you. That just doesn’t happen. Insurers price their products differently depending on their financial needs. You can save $ thousands over time by taking advantage of their shifting marketing strategies and also changes in your needs. For instance, insurers in CA and WA have had to raise rates as more fires got worse in recent years. If you have the same insurer in AZ your rates have also gone up. On the other hand, driving and commuting have been reduced so your rates are now found in the ‘leisure’ category. If your credit score has improved, your rate could be lower but only if you shop your vehicles to other carriers. Insurance agents don’t have an incentive to call you when your rates could be lower. Or they don’t know that you now have a minor on your policy or that you now have a dangerous dog. You can’t know you could be paying less for 10-20 years unless you compare rates often. Each insurer has their own set of discounts so you may qualify for more with a new insurer.
Drop the extras: https://www.amazon.com/Industry-Insiders-Guides-Buying-Insurance/dp/1466435712
Is your family member a scam target?
Certain folks are more likely to be scammed than others.
Consider how the
results of this study may impact your family members. The scam target is
not likely to ask questions of an offer or product or agent. Researchers
propose that mental frames governing compliance, opportunity, intelligence, and
order may have affected the way that interviewees interpreted what scammers
told them. Individuals were more likely to lose money if they believed that:
- Authority
should not be challenged.
- Financial
opportunities are a zero-sum game with clear winners and losers.
- The
world is organized in a way that rewards good people.
- Asking
too many questions can make a person seem ignorant.
Study participants explained how scammers reached out with promises of easy money or lucrative investments. Others described receiving phone calls from fraudsters posing as IRS agents and demanding payment of back taxes. Some scammers pose as eager lovers who promise to pay you back. Natural disaster victims are especially vulnerable to scammers since desperation makes us perfect prey.
Educate your family: https://www.amazon.com/Money-Scams-2014-insurance-financial/dp/1505437962
Is prepaying your funeral right for you?
Covid deaths—now over 700,000 and counting—have some folks thinking about the future. What is new is paying for your departure in advance to a lay-a-way company with no track record. Funeral homes have had their own ‘pre-need’ accounts for centuries. Of course your prepaid account may not last long enough: there are business failures. However, like buying life insurance for final expenses, paying for a funeral on a lay-a-way basis is not the best solution for this expense. Some plans offer a price ‘guarantee’ but how do you know they will provide the expected services. Some new ones offer affordable monthly payments in advance. Some claim they will hold the money in a bank and move the money to a funeral anywhere in their system. A better way is to designate some of your legacy for your final appearance. Since you don’t know about costs in advance, you may want to leave a note with your will explaining what kind of show you want and how much to spend. You need to designate a trusted executor to follow thru on your plan. My plan is cremation by the medical school when they are done with me. God knows what is on my tombstone. Relatives may want to give a toast at the final dinner.
Your plan or their plan: https://www.amazon.com/Your-Plan-Live-Age-100/dp/1548180793
Why is the boring target-date fund right for you?
Tests and surveys have consistently shown that steady contributions—the same amount each month—to these low-cost index funds provides the best chance of reaching the maximum accumulations over time. This boring investment strategy beats any advisor or computer-run strategy because the market swings are unpredictable. Most investors and their advisors think they can do better than the market index funds. Hubris was identified early in human history as being the cause of one’s downfall. Morningstar, the investing analyst, ran some extra simulations and DCA (dollar cost average) does possibly account for some of the gap in returns, but a perfectly-steady DCA investor still outperformed the real-world investor in 6 out of 7 fund categories. DCA can’t be helped if you are simply investing what you can, when you can, but there is still extra trading in and out that appears to only make things worse. Market timing, the effect of using ANY investing strategy, has no benefits for you except maybe in the short term. Warren Buffett advocates this “dumb” way of investing because it succeeds.
Go with Buffett: https://www.amazon.com/Warren-Buffett-Your-Investment-Advisor/dp/1518690963
?**********ACCOUNTABILITY**************?
Like 1776, this
period is a test
of democracy—We
rejected an "American
fascist" once
The
Path to Dictatorship: 2010-2030
Nov 2020 Wealthy
discredit election process
Jan
6 2021 Direct
assault failed: guns
& bombs ready
Trump
engaged in a "criminal
conspiracy" to stop Biden
“I
don’t f—ing care that they have weapons”
Trump was “detached
from reality”
Trump
used mafia-style intimidation on the defenseless
Parscale: “a
sitting president asking for civil war.”
Trump:
“Just
say the election was corrupt and leave the rest to me”
GOP fascism: “RINO
hunt armed; no bagging limit” J6
comm threat
Trump’s Supremes END
personal rights & state
laws except for weapons
WMDs
Fascism: GOP
to stop women leaving state for abortion
It’s
not a court. It’s a junta: Two Americas
Trump: President
is 'enemy of the state'
Jan 2025 Dictator
pardons himself
How Govt wastes our money:
NASA wasting money:
make Mars
safe for rich trips: we need desalination system
DeSantis
voting police arrest voters confirmed by state: political stunt sours Dems
New state laws could
trip up voters: 30
new voting restrictions since 2020 voter ID
GOP
says OK for Trump to keep secret docs lying around his club
FL school lessons
teach media bias ‘Dems stole election’: teach
kids not to trust media
Book Bans threaten public library funding, building use,
existence: state controls minds
SCAMS/SPINS:
Trump: Biden 'enemy
of the state': Nazis
term for everyone they didn’t like
Military
leaders affirm allegiance to Constitution NOT politician: Trump
Bible walk
Where did that extra $1 a gallon gas go? Oil
co record profits for the quarter.
Facebook
developed AI that can “hear” our brainwaves.
Alito: Supreme
sees pre-1960 Constitution as the authority to reshape our lives
TX Gov
Abbott now Dr Abbott
prescribes plan B for abortions
Christian
Nationalist stop US child deaths but not 1.4 million dying kids in
80,000
former Scouts filed abuse claims against national BSA: abusers go on
Trump: ‘Fox now Dem’ propagandist; he
made CNN offer to become his mouth
Terrorists
are actually police & military who hate America’s
new direction: list
Trumpist Bannon caught:
stole $1 million in The wall donations. The Wall
Recall: Ford recalling 200,000 large SUVs: fan
motors can catch fire.
Tips to help you spot online
fraud: everywhere and ever changing
Instagram caught
mishandling of teens’ data: millions at risk. Fine $403 million, no jail
Recall: products
with problems you might want to return
BEWARE: robotaxi
Cruise crashed making a left turn recall 80 vehicles software update
Trumpists caught
trying to change voting outcome: personal visits intimidate counters
YouTuber caught
scam followers $55 million in foreign exchange trading: promised 35%
Aventura Capital caught
overcharged clients 12b-1 and sweep
fees. Fine no jail
Erika Lynn Muller FL caught neglect,
deception forgery insurance settlements: defrock
Nicholas Spagnoletti caught distribution
of child pornography: defrocked.
Roderick Whited caught
stole $44,000 in charitable donations for a pediatric cancer
Robert Louis Cirillo CA caught
fraud on low-income Latinos: fine $3.9 million, prison
SCAM: Venmo Zelle transfer
money “accidentally”, you send your real
money back
John Woods Horizon Private Equity Oppenheimer caught
Ponzi guaranteed interest
Elon Musk caught
pyramid scheme in cryptocurrency Dogecoin $258 billion racketeering
What did Trump do with classified
docs? Sell,
Blackmail, Jan6 Gifts, toilet paper
Judge Cannon a Trump
appointee, blocked prosecutors: ‘master’
lets him delay to 2024
Jobs
Advertising executives: least
trusted professionals, just above politicians
Some employers attract employees or contract workers with plan to get
pay instantly
Workers are more productive: employers
take more of the wealth created.
Who owns your account now?
average FICO credit score 716: Check reports for new scams: only at FREE site
Sports betting goes
mainstream, addiction
experts fear: Lives and livelihoods at risk
"zero down payment" loans for first-time homebuyers with certain income requirements.
Borrowers in 7 states may be taxed
on their student loan cancellation
Miracles:
Many
coastal properties lost to the sea: 8.7%
Photo life of Queen
Elizabeth II — from childhood
to the throne
wave energy
generator had 99% uptime: 1 GW of wave energy systems by 2035
@
Light is both
a particle and a wave depending on how we look at the light.
I
don’t think that there is any such thing as a position or a velocity of a
particle.
Everything (galaxies
to stones) in universe made of subatomic
energy ‘vibrations’
A subatomic ‘particle’
is the smallest possible vibration (quantum) of a quantum field.
Mass–energy
equivalence: E=mc^2. At the smallest
level; Everything is moving!
There is no TIME at this
level because of force fields come and go in all directions.
Inside protons,
neutrons, it
is the fields of the virtual particles that creates its mass.
“Empty space is a
boiling, bubbling brew of virtual
particles that pop in and out of existence in a time scale so short that you
can’t even measure them.” Space expanding.
The electricity we use comes
from the field around the wire not from election itself.
We can apply for
Medicare online: https://blog.ssa.gov/apply-for-medicare-online
We can apply for Social
Security online: https://www.ssa.gov/benefits/retirement/
We can apply for
health care online: https://www.healthcare.gov/
IAN
973.746.2014
www.InsuranceAdvisorsNetwork.com
Alerts available
at http://dankeppel.blogspot.com/
