Category: Financial and taxes in retirement
December 22, 2019 - The SECURE Act has been passed by the Senate and House and signed by the President. The bipartisan bill, Setting Every Community Up for Retirement Enhancement, has several key provisions that impact many of those who are currently retired as well as people planning for retirement.
Good news. The bill allows for people over 70 and one half who are still working to continue to contribute to regular IRAs - there is no longer an age restriction for making such contributions. Perhaps the most important provision is the one affecting people who will not have reached age 70 and 1/2 by December 31, 2019. The new law raises the age for taking Required Minimum Distributions (RMDs) from 70 and 1/2 to 72. These two provisions allow people who have not yet reached the age of 70 and 1/2 to achieve higher IRA and 401(k) balances for retirement if they are currently working and/or have enough non-IRA investment assets to defer taking IRA minimum distributions for an additional two years. This can provide for a higher likelihood of not outliving retirement savings. Unfortunately, if you were already 70 and 1/2 before 2020, you still have to take the RMDs required under the previous law.
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Published on December 21, 2019
Comments 30
Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
December 17, 2019 -- If you are shopping around for the best state to retire in, the good news is that there are a number of states that would really like you to choose them. These states know that the homes retirees buy and the money they spend locally represents an important and clean industry. So they have taken steps to make themselves attractive to retiring boomers.
States like North Carolina, Nevada, Florida, and Texas don’t have a problem attracting retirees. They have a good reputation and many attractive places to retire. Others, such as West Virginia and Mississippi, have a harder time bringing in retirees without incentives. In this list we will concentrate on states that have taken specific steps to increase the number of people retiring in those states. .
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Published on December 16, 2019
Comments 20
Category: Retirement Real Estate
December 12, 2019 – Two different companies, The National Association of Realtors® (NAR), and Realtor.com, have each identified markets expected to outperform in the coming years. The lists are quite different, with Realtor.com's concentrating more on smaller markets.
Both sources believe that affordability and strong local economies are key to markets with strong prospects for the future. Note that very few of these cities are on the coasts, although the overwhelming majority are in warm weather climes.
In alphabetical order, here are the top 10 the NAR expects to outperform over the next three to five years.:
Charleston, South CarolinaCharlotte, North CarolinaColorado Springs, ColoradoColumbus, OhioDallas-Fort Worth, TexasFort Collins, ColoradoLas Vegas, NevadaOgden, UtahRaleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill, North CarolinaTampa-St. Petersburg, Florida
However, don't stop with just the NAR report. Realtor.com jumped into the topic with its own list. Here are the "hottest" real estate markets they predict for 2020, along with median home prices. Note: many of these are smaller markets. The only overlap we see in the top 10 are Charleston and Colorado Springs.
1Boise, Idaho$295,0002McAllen-Edinburg-Mission, Texas$152,0003Tucson, Ariz.$230,0004Chattanooga, Tenn.$189,0005Columbia, S.C.$178,0006Rochester, N.Y.$149,0007Colorado Springs, Colo.$312,0008Winston-Salem, N.C.$169,0009Charleston-North Charleston, S.C.$270,00010Memphis, Tenn.$188,000
The NAR offered additional explanation on its choices for hottest markets:
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Published on December 12, 2019
Comments 0
Category: Social Security
December 11, 2019 -- You can always expect a lively debate on this subject: should you wait to claim Social Security, or take it as early as age 62? No matter your opinion, it is indisputable that claiming later than your Full Retirement Age (66 or later) provides an attractive 8% increase per year yield (plus COLA). Now a new study suggests that the 8% per year reward for waiting is too high, and the penalty for claiming early is too severe. Note: Shoutout to Maimi for bringing this study to our attention!
The study, "Are Social Security's Actuarial Adjustments Still Correct", comes from the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College. When Social Security started to allow beneficiaries to claim early or delay to age 70 it used actuarial adjustments designed to keep lifetime benefits constant for an individual with average life expectancy. In other words, no matter when you take your Social Security benefits, the odds are that you will receive the same amount of money.
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Published on December 10, 2019
Comments 11
Category: Financial and taxes in retirement
December 7, 2019 -- We don't know about your experience, but in ours we are starting to see signs that many of our retired friends and relatives are getting more and more frugal. Some have to cut back from necessity, but even many of our very well off friends seem to be pinching pennies, at least in some corners of their life. Folks that might fly business class to Australia on a luxury vacation, but hoard plastic bags from the supermarket to line their kitchen trash bin. Many like to save money for the sport of it. After all, who likes spending money on unimportant stuff. Snagging an inexpensive vacation, landing a great deal on a rental car, or getting a better internet deal is a lot more fun and exciting than paying top dollar!
If you search on the Internet for "live like a cheapskate" you will strike a frugality bonanza. There are authors like Jeff Yeager who have written best sellers on the subject ("The Cheapskate Next Door"). There's even a show on TLC, "Extreme Cheapskates". Not to mention all of the articles Topretirements has written on the subject over the years (see Further Reading at bottom). This article will roll up advice from all over into some of our top tips on how to live like a cheapskate, and have fun while doing it!
First of all, a little etymology - if you are going to be a cheapskate you might as well understand where the term came from. Although there is some uncertainty about the origin of the word, the main dictionary sites think that "skate" was a late 19th century slangy term for a worn-out horse, to which cheap was added to imply mean or miserly. One Wiki source claims it refers to inexpensive strap-on roller skates; while we acknowledge those were horrible to skate on back in the day, we doubt that is the term's origin.
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Published on December 6, 2019
Comments 19
Category: Active adult communities
December 3, 2019 -- For baby boomers who love to play golf, living on a golf course seems like a dream. Drive over in your golf cart and play any time you want, no waiting. Later on in the afternoons, sit back and enjoy the beauty of a golf hole in the setting sun from your lanai. Unfortunately, golf is not as popular as it once was. That decline is interrupting the dream of golf course living.
Our friends over at www.retirehoppy.com just wrote about unpleasant experiences at their community, Trilogy at Vistancia in Peoria, Arizona. Seems like the developer has changed its mind, and now would like to sell the golf course to the Home Owners Association. Nobody there knows what is the best decision. Buy it (HOA has first right of refusal), or let the developer try to sell or develop it? Either way is fraught with problems.
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Published on December 3, 2019
Comments 18
Category: Baby Boomer Retirement Issues
November 29, 2019 -- In case you hear this comment from a millennial, Gen X, or Yer, it is NOT a compliment. It is a dismissal, as in, "OK, baby boomer, you have a lot to say, but your day is over. Kindly step aside." Younger folks tend to use this term on social media to respond to anybody over 30 who says something condescending about young people .
Perhaps we deserve it, justice served a generation later. Certainly we baby boomers are awfully proud of how we changed things back in the day - our music, rebellions, cultural shifts. Today we seem to think we know everything and have strong opinions - millennials are lazy, the younger generation doesn't know about hard work, etc. Sound familiar: Remember how we were convinced, back in the day, that our parents knew nothing and we knew it all.
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Published on November 28, 2019
Comments 25
Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
November 26, 2019 -- Are you in the camp of retirees who “hate” Florida, or are you among those that “love” it? Most folks thinking about the best place to retire in Florida seem to fall into one of those divisions; not so many have no opinion. In our view, Florida is filled with many great retirement towns, and it is diverse in more ways than you might think. This article will tell you a bit about this very large and populous state, plus give you a list of 12 Florida towns we think make for a great place to retire.
First, a few factsFlorida's 2018 estimated population was 21,300,000, the 4th most populous in the nation. Some 19% of the population is 65 and over, compared to 15% nationwide.
Geographically speaking, the State has a very unusual shape – it is both tall and wide. So tall and wide that it takes over a day to drive from Pensacola to Key West (832 miles). Florida is the 22nd largest state, has the longest coastline in the contiguous states, and the only state to have a coastline on the Atlantic and the Gulf of Mexico. It is a very flat state, which is one of the things that people tend not to like about it (Mount Dora, at 185' is one of its highest towns).
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Published on November 26, 2019
Comments 16
Category: Family and Retirement
By Ed LaFreniere of Retirementhumor.net
November 23, 2019 --
Q: My husband retired three months ago. We took a two-week trip right afterwards, and then the frustrations began. He claims he’s joking when he criticizes me if I miss a spot with the vacuum or the kitchen mop, but it’s getting annoying. He complains that I’m buying the wrong peanut butter for his lunches. He turns on the TV at 7 a.m. and sits around watching cartoons and soap operas. When I go out for the day and I ask him to do the laundry, he mixes the colors with the whites and leaves them dripping wet in the washer all day, so that they smell as if they’ve just come out of the New England Patriots locker room. I have to push him to get up and do anything. He says he’s just taking some well-earned time off after 45 years of working. How do I deal with the love of my life now that he has morphed into this freeloader?
....Frustrated in Frostproof, Florida
Dear Frustrated: Ah, the age-old problem that affects tens of millions of households eventually: A husband or a wife retires and sits around the house as if he or she owns the place! You need to take this by the horns and indoctrinate your better quarter in the new reality – the updated rules of loving togetherness!
First, though, please keep in mind that both of you should be prepared for an adjustment period – and show sympathy for each other’s psychological and emotional well-being, changing identities, and new needs for self-fulfillment and self-esteem.
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Published on November 23, 2019
Comments 4
Category: Family and Retirement
By S. W. Hubbard
November 20, 2019 -- Last year, my husband Kevin was counting the days to his retirement. He had planned the financial aspects thoroughly. On January 1 he would leave behind his demanding job as an operations executive who traveled worldwide and would spend all his days at home.
With me.
Great, right?
As a novelist and part-time English professor at a community college, I worked at home three days a week and was on campus two days during the academic year. Although Kevin has plenty of interests and hobbies, I was concerned that the aspect of work he’d miss the most was managing events and people. Once he retired, he’d have no one to manage.
Except me.
Uh-oh.
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Published on November 19, 2019
Comments 20
