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Self Storage Discussion forum is your venue to discuss Self Storage , Car Storage , RV Storage , Boat Storage , Yacht Storage, Furniture Storage and Wine Storage.
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Life Insurance-Your retirement planning isn’t just about you.
Who Needs Life Insurance?
Life Insurance - Who needs it?
Many people are concerned with building wealth amoung their 401k and other investments. However, while these are somewhat exciting and enjoyable topics, there is another planning tool that is much more important. That tool is the never fun subject of Life Insurance.Most Americans need life insurance. To figure out if you need life insurance, you need to think through the worst-case scenario. If you died tomorrow, how would your loved ones fare financially?
Would they have the money to pay for your final expenses (e.g., funeral costs, medical bills, taxes, debts, lawyers’ fees, etc.)? Would they be able to meet ongoing living expenses like the rent or mortgage, food, clothing, transportation costs, healthcare, etc? What about long-range financial goals? Without your contribution to the household, would your surviving spouse be able to save enough money to put the kids through college or retire comfortably?
The truth is, it’s always a struggle when you lose someone you love. But your emotional struggles don’t need to be compounded by financial difficulties. Life insurance helps make sure that the people you care about will be provided for financially, even if you’re not there to care for them yourself.
To help you understand how life insurance might apply to your particular situation, we’ve outlined a number of different scenarios below.
You’re Married
Life Insurance - You’re MarriedWhen you’re married, you share everything with your significant other, including your financial obligations. Many people mistakenly believe that they don’t need to think about life insurance until they have children. Not true. What it one of you were to die tomorrow? Even with the surviving spouse’s income, would that person be able to pay off debts like credit-card balances and car loans, let alone cover the monthly rent and utility bills. If you’re planning to have children, you’ll want to buy life insurance right away and not wait until the mom-to-be is pregnant. Some companies won’t issue a policy to a woman during her pregnancy. Since health complications sometimes arise, they’ll want to wait until after the baby is born to issue the policy. Buying insurance before a baby is on the way helps avoid this potential problem.
You’re Married With Kids
Life Insurance - You’re Married with Kids Most families depend on two incomes to make ends meet. If you died suddenly, could your family maintain their standard of living on your spouse’s income alone? Probably not. Life insurance makes sure that your plans for the future don’t die when you do.
You’re a Single Parent
Life Insurance - Single Parent As a single parent, you’re the caregiver, breadwinner, cook, chauffeur, and so much more. Yet nearly four in ten single parents have no life insurance whatsoever, and many with coverage say they need more than they have. With so much responsibility resting on your shoulders, you need to make doubly sure that you have enough life insurance to safeguard your children’s financial future.
You’re a Stay-At-Home Parent
Life Insurance - You’re a Stay-At-Home ParentJust because you don’t earn a salary doesn’t mean you don’t make a financial contribution to your family. Childcare, transportation, cleaning, cooking and other household activities are all important tasks, the replacement value of which is often severely underestimated. Surveys have estimated the value of these services at over $40,000 per year. Could your spouse afford to pay someone for these services? With life insurance, your family can afford to make the choice that best preserves their quality of life.
You Have Grown Children
Life Insurance - You Have Grown Children As the years go by, you may feel your need for life insurance has passed. But just because the kids are through college and the mortgage is paid off doesn’t necessarily mean that Social Security and your savings will take care of whatever lies ahead. If you died today, your spouse will still be faced with daily living expenses. What if your spouse outlives you by 10, or even 30 years, which is certainly possible today. Would your financial plan, without life insurance, enable your spouse to maintain the lifestyle you worked so hard to achieve? And would you be able to pass on something to your children or grandchildren?
You’re Retired
Life Insurance - You’re Retired Did you know that depending on the size of your estate, your heirs could be hit with a large estate tax payment after you die (45% of your estate). The proceeds of a life insurance policy are payable immediately, allowing heirs to take care of estate taxes, funeral costs, and other debts without having to hastily liquidate other assets, often at a fraction of their true value. And life insurance proceeds are generally income tax free and can be arranged to avoid probate. Finally, if your insurance program is properly structured, the proceeds from your life insurance policy won’t add to your estate tax liability.
You’re a Small Business Owner
Life Insurance - Small Business Owner Besides taking care of your family, life insurance can also protect your business. What would happen to your business if you, one of your fellow owners, or perhaps a key employee, died tomorrow? Life insurance can help in a number of ways. For instance, a life insurance policy can be structured to fund a “buy-sell” agreement. This would ensure that the remaining business owners have the funds to buy the company interests of a deceased owner at a previously agreed upon price. That way, the owners get the business and the family gets the money. To protect a business in case of the death of a key employee, “key person insurance,” payable to the company, provides the owners with the financial flexibility needed to either hire a replacement or work out an alternative arrangement.
www.ERollover.com has partnered up with a network of companies that should be able to provide you with the best life insurance products for your needs. Please call us at 888-243-9990, or click on the link below to get more detailed information.
Please email us at info@erollover.com to apply for insurance or to get more details
Click HERE to do a free “Life Insurance Needs Analysis”
Click HERE to run a term quote comparison
Call 888-243-9990 or email us at mike@erollover.com for an application
Please visit our site for more retirement details:
www.erollover.com
User:mikerowan: eRollover Retirement and Personal Finance Blog
10 Facts About 403b Retirement Plans You Should Know
by Cecelia Yap
403 retirement plans are tax deferred retirement plans available to employees of educational institutions and certain non-profit organizations as determined by section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code (IRC).
I’ve 10 facts here on 403b which you should know.
Fact 1: The Workings Of 403b Plans
You set aside money for retirement on a pre tax basis through a salary reduction agreement with your employer. You choose from among the vendors offered by your employer where you want to invest the money. The money grows tax free until you withdraw it at retirement.
Fact 2: Who Can Contribute To A 403b
If you’re an employee of tax-exempt organizations established under section 501(c)(3) of the IRC, you’re eligible to participate and start contributing.
Teachers, school administrators, school personnel, nurses, doctors, professors, researchers, librarians and ministers are contributors to the plan.
Fact 3: Why Contribute to a 403(b)
Your employer provides you with a pension upon your retirement. However, the pension plan may not provide an amount equal to your salary. A 403(b) plan can provide a healthy supplement to your pension.
Fact 4: How Much You Can contribute Annually
For 2008, you can contribute the smaller of:
* The elective deferral limit of $15,500
or
* Up to 100% of including compensation
or
* If you’ve employer matches or other employer contributions, limits are $46,000 or 100% of compensation (whichever is lower). You’re still limited to the employee elective deferral limit ($15,500 for 2008). Hence, your employer can add another $30,500 to your account
* If you’re 50 or older at any time during 2008, you can contribute an additional $5,000
Fact 5: Lower Taxes
You make 403b contributions on a pre-tax basis which can greatly reduce your tax bill. The tax savings grow bigger as your contributions increase.
Fact 6: More Tax Savings
All dividends, interests and capital gains earned in a 403b account are on a tax-deferred basis. This means your earnings will grow tax-free until time you withdraw them.
Fact 7: Part Time Employees Eligible To Contribute to 403b Retirement Plans
Your employer must extend the 403b plan to all the employees.
However, certain employees may be excluded, such as:
* Employees who contribute $200 or less annually
* Employees who are participants in an eligible deferred compensation plan (457 or 401k) or participants in another TSA (tax sheltered annuity)
* Non-resident aliens
* Students and employees who work less than 20 hours per week
Fact 8: 403b Plan Does Not Reduce Social Security Benefits
Your contributions to a 403b reduce taxable compensation for federal (and in most instances, state) income tax purposes only. These contributions don’t reduce wages for the purpose of determining Social Security benefits.
Fact 9: Special Tax Credit For Low-Income Savers
Eligible savers will receive a tax credit of up to 50% or up to $2,000 in contributions to an IRA, 403b, 457, SIMPLE, 401k plan and other tax-favored plans. For 2008, the full credit is available to joint filers whose adjusted gross income (AGI) is less than $53,000, and for singles whose AGI is under $26,500.
Fact 10: A 403b Can Be Rolled Into An IRA
This occurs when you change job; retire; become disabled or die.
OK, you might think 403b retirement plans are more or less similar to 401k plans. But there’s a big difference there - your eligibility.
If you’re an employee in public schools and certain tax-exempt organizations (as determined by Section 501(c)(3) of the IRC), you’re eligible for 403b. The 401k, on the other hand, covers private-sector employees.
About the Author
Due to her strong yearning to retire early in life, Cecelia Yap has been researching on the subject of retirement. She shows you how she has prepared for her retirement here: http://retire.sitesell.com/8258171.html
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Please visit our site for more retirement details:
www.erollover.com
User:mikerowan: eRollover Retirement and Personal Finance Blog
How to choose the best Mutual Funds in your 401k
By Mike Rowan
Choosing your 401k Mutual Funds should entail more than just closing your eyes and picking a couple of funds. In today’s day and age, most 401k plans have a variety of mutual funds to select and compare. However, I know many investors who have the best of intentions, but still come up with an underperforming 401k plan quarter after quarter. So, eRollover has come up with a brief list of guidelines that should be able to serve the investor well. While 401k plans will always have restrictions and fewer choices than self directed IRA’s, this is a good place to start.
Choosing Funds
1. Choose your Asset Allocation.
In general, if you aren’t thinking of retiring too soon (within 20 years), and are relatively optimistic about the economy,you can afford to invest in an assortment of stocks.. However, if you are bearish about the market or closer to retirement, you’ll want to mix in some bond funds or cash equivilents. You might be able to deal with a 50/50 split with 10 years of the working life left, but would want to be closer to 90% fixed income investments vs. 10% growth investments by the time you retire. Many plans will also offer funds that focus on international mutual funds. Keep in mind that we do live in a global economy, so international mutual funds aren’t just an option any more
Erollover.com has a tool that will go live on our site shortly that should help individual investors to answer a few questions in order to come up with an individualized recommendation based on your risk tolerance.
2. Check past performance.
Past performance does not guarantee future performance, but it’s not a bad place to start. Obviously, you’ll want to focus on funds that are performing better than others, but there are some other things to look out for. Be sure to check how the fund performed during a bad year. How did the fund do in 2001 or 2002? You want funds that will make you money during a bull market and also save your money during a bear market. Another thing to look out for is a good fund that just had a bad year. These guys are going to be fighting extra hard this year; just make sure the bad year wasn’t do to a manager change (see #2 below).
Be wary of jumping on the band wagon of “hot funds”. Often, if a fund has a good year, a bunch of new money will roll in. There is no reason to think that the fund will be as good at running 50 billion dollars as it was at running 5 billion.
3. Check the manager.
Mutual funds have a hard time holding onto their good managers. The reason for this is simple. Say I was a manager good enough to ensure 15% returns every year running funds as large as $10 billion. There are going to be a lot of wealthy people wanting me to quit my day job and concentrate on managing just their money. It’s hard to find a reason why a good fund manager wouldn’t move into the hedge fund business where they can charge higher fees to run less money.
Manager turnover is another reason why that fund that did 20% last year might not do so again. If you’re lucky, you might find a fund with good performance who’s had the same manager over the past 5 years. Don’t shy away from “star” managers like William Danoff, who has run the Fidelity Contrafund since 1990.
4. Check the prospectus.
Somewhere inside the interface your employer provides you to manage your 401(k), there should be a way to access a more detailed view of each fund. Many plans show a Morningstar analysis for each fund. This analysis shows the funds’ distribution in cap-size, sector, and even the funds’ top ten holdings. Other key numbers to look out for are the expense ratio (what the fund charges) and the “total funds assets” (a bigger number here indicates a less flexible fund).
The Morningstar analysis offers excerpts from the fund’s prospectus which can be very useful. One interesting read is the “fund strategy”. Novice investors may glaze over reading this, but more experienced investors will be able to find funds with a philosophy similar to their own.
If you are having trouble getting this information through the application offered by your employer, check out Morningstar.com or go directly to the fund’s website to find the original prospectus.
Featured Sponsor:
Please visit our site for more retirement details:
www.erollover.com
User:mikerowan: eRollover Retirement and Personal Finance Blog
Self Directed IRA Services
Now more than ever before, the way you retire depends on you and the choices you make. The traditional retirement paradigm has shifted. As you know, the days of retiring with a pension from one company are long gone. Self directed IRA services provides which will help you truly diversify your retirement.
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Tips For Keeping Cooking Safe
Follow safe and sensible suggestions to make your experience in the kitchen a happy one for you and the kids! http://www.bingnote.com/blog/tips-for-parents-cooking-with-kids
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No one has investigated haters using hard science: until now. Through psychology, sociology and my own experiences I studied haters. I found out how to beat them and how to get exactly what you want out of Life. My findings are in How Haters Help: a FREE book for everyone to download. Go to the site and download your copy! The book is brand new and I’m looking for reviews… so let me know what you think.
Cheers!
Self-Storage
Self Storage Blog is your one stop source for all your self storage information needs. Read and learn about all self storage matters from the authorities in the self storage industry.
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