Your Money – You Can’t Take it with You

Dec 11, 2019 Posted by Van Pappas In Featured Articles Tagged Money Comments 0

At age 70 ½ the government (Uncle Sam), wants you to start taking money out of your tax-deferred retirement accounts. You know, your 401K, your IRA. Any retirement account that you have put part of your income into over the years to avoid paying tax on it. Now they want you to take a RMD (Required Minimum Distribution). That’s IRS talk for, you’d better start paying taxes on that tax-deferred money. They figure, you have avoided the taxes long enough and they want their cut, before you leave this earth. So, if they force you to take money from your retirement, how do you determine how much? Well there is a calculation to come up with the minimum distribution amount. Most people have multiple accounts from changing jobs and not rolling over old accounts to consolidate. You start by taking the total account value on December 31st of the previous year of all retirement accounts (except ROTH IRAs); and you ...

Do You Want To REALLY get FREE College Money?

The debates are on and every presidential candidate is promising thousands and thousands of dollars of FREE college money. Wouldn’t that be nice? Now that the kids are back in school and the football season is in full swing, most families don’t realize that applying for free financial aid is literally right around the corner for the school year in 2020. The problem is that most people don’t understand how the college aid process actually works and often sell themselves short of getting free money that could help offset the growing cost of college. Here are seven mistakes that could crush your ability to get free money for 2020. Filling out the FAFSA form AFTER October 1st– If you are interested in getting the most possible money from the Free Application For Student Aid, then you must fill out the forms by October 1st. Some of the financial awards are issued on a first come first serve basis, so when ...

Should I Loan Money To Friends and Family

Every quarter the Federal Reserve reports on national household debt, and every quarter we’re reminded of the trillions of dollars that Americans owe in credit cards, student loans, mortgages and more. But what about FF debt — aka loans from the Bank of Friends and Family? (source: finder.com) Getting by with a little help from your friends is nothing new, but especially with peer-to-peer lending and digital wallets making lending to people we know easier, we wondered how much do we rely on our loved ones? And how much do these loans contribute to our national debt? (source: finder.com) What Finder found is that we borrow money for much bigger expenses than to cover lunch (despite what your Venmo feed may say) — to the tune of $184 billion annually. That’s a figure that is more than student loan and credit card debt combined and deserves a closer look. (source: finder.com) How did they calculate how much we borrowed from friends and family? ...

Lending Money

Has a friend loaned money to you … or worse, asked you for a loan? How much is too much? Ted Jenkin has some tips for keeping friends. ...

Five Money Moves To Make When You Turn 50

Recently, I had the opportunity to experience something really special. Several of my college roommates were turning 50 years old, and there was a multiple person birthday gathering in Washington, D.C. that I attended. As we reminisced about the good old days in college and I watched their children run around (most of them six to eight years old), it occurred to me that my very own friends are going to be starting down the backstretch towards retirement. It’s hard to imagine that for some of them they will be 65 years old when their kids either get into college or graduate college, so does this mean they will take a different path to retirement? Either way, there are smart money moves you should be making when you turn 50. I know this first hand because the two co-founders of oXYGen Financial (Kile Lewis and myself) both turn the age of 50 this year. While we started oXYGen Financial to ...

Five Money Moves To Make When You Get The Pink Slip

The Pink Slip. It’s the dreaded official notification from your employer that they no longer need your services. You’ll often hear the corporate rumors flowing within your company about the impending layoffs, but you’ll never suspect that you might be a person on the hit list. We never imagine that we will be that person who gets called in for dismissal time. While getting a pink slip is an awful feeling, it’s also a phase in your life where you need to immediately get your financial act together. Here are my four smart money moves to make when you get laid off from work. 1. When is your last paycheck? – It’s truly amazing to me how many people don’t ask the very simple questions when they get the heave ho from their employer. You will want to ask specifically when your last day or work is and what the expectations are of you over the next 30, 60, or ...

Five Money Moves To Make During Open Enrollment

Fall signals the changing of the leaves, football Sundays, and Halloween. It is also the time of year where many of the companies begin to offer open enrollment for your benefits. With the increasing complication of benefits packages, it more important than ever that you learn how to make smart money decisions during your two weeks of open enrollment. Here are my five smart money moves to look at when your benefits season comes this fall. Don’t wait until the minute to check your options!! Pick The Right Insurance Plan- Picking the right insurance plan today might require a minor in engineering. As companies have increased choices and plans have increased their complexity, it is important you thoroughly review your options. Consider closely how much money you actually spent on health insurance this year. Did you reach your deductible? How much did you pay in out of pocket costs? Was this an unusual health year, or can you expect the ...

The Mom’s Summer Guide To Saving Money

Ice cream, ice cream, we all scream for ice cream. For moms across America, summertime can be both a blessing and curse at the same time. While it’s exciting not to worry about packing lunches and dragging the kids to the bus stop, it is also a time when you might feel like you constantly have to entertain your children. This may mean a lot more discretionary income will go out the door than you have coming in each month. We put together our smart money moves guide for 10 moves moms can make over the summer to manage your family finances. 1. Have a budget – Whether you use a spreadsheet, 50/30/20 rule or www.youneedabudget.com, it is important to set expectation for everyone around how much cash flow you have for fun and entertainment. 2. AAA membership – There are lots of great discounts especially hotels, rental cars, & amusement parks. So when you are planning your family vacation ...

Five Apps That Will Pay You To Shop

Shopping is usually an activity that makes you spend money. In fact, with the ease of debit cards and credit cards today you can rack up big bills by simply turning your computer on to one of the major shopping websites. So, I thought going into the summer it might be interesting to see what apps you could download that might actually pay YOU money to shop. Ibotta (www.ibotta.com) – Did you ever thing you could get paid to scan receipts from your phone? Before you go shopping, you complete a few simple tasks and then you begin to unlock rewards. With over 187 participating stores (and you can link loyalty accounts as well) it makes it very easy to make money with Ibotta. Really, you end up just scanning bar codes and then taking pictures of your receipts. Swagbucks (www.swagbucks.com) – With over $132,470,000 of gift cards that have been awarded to users, Swagbucks is an app that will ...

Where To Invest Under A Trump Presidency

Americans aren’t quite sure what to make of this three ring circus we are calling a Presidential election. With the nomination fairly certain to be Donald Trump on the Republican side, there has been major discussion about what a Trump President might look like for the future of our economy. Will he borrow more money? Will he balance the budget? Will he build a wall? Will he bring jobs back to America? These are amongst the many issues that have been speculated about on the media outlets across the country. Here are my smart money moves on where to invest under a Trump regime. Infrastructure- While I cannot give you specific stocks, mutual funds, or exchange traded funds (you’ll have to call me or e-mail me for that info;), I will divulge that this will be one of the best opportunities under a Trump presidency. Consider this for a moment. . . If you have a parent or grandparent that ...