The Cautious Investor

Many people who manage to save enough for retirement find it agonizing to start spending that money when the day finally comes. As a result, they needlessly deny themselves the simple pleasures and occasional splurges that can make the difference between a dream retirement and a dreary one. More Americans face the opposite dilemma, of…

Our industry sometimes focuses too narrowly on rate of return. It makes sense when you consider that a percentage is the best way to compare how your investments are doing against the broader market, other investment strategies being deployed, or your friends at the water cooler. But we should remind ourselves that we don’t spend…

As Certified Financial Planners we are committed to encouraging savings for a rainy day, whether that is an emergency fund or for retirement. A new report released by the Economic Policy Institute last month further brought into focus the current financial preparedness of the median American family.*  Most statistics seem to quote averages which is…

The irony of it all is that you’ve done the hard part already! Maybe you’ve sacrificed a little from every paycheck to save for retirement and now you’re practically here. If you are like many Americans approaching retirement or recently retired, you too may be finding the decisions you must make on how to spend…

It seems everyone has an opinion about what is coming next which makes it difficult to tune out the noise and “predictions” of market pundits. But if there is one thing we have learned from the media, it is that no one seems to have a clue what is coming next. There is never a…

It’s hard to believe the impact a mere 140 characters can have on financial markets. As demonstrated by now President Donald Trump, tweet-shaming packs a powerful punch. In the early morning hours of December 6, Trump tweeted that Boeing’s new Air Force One fleet project, at a cost of $4 billion, was “out of control.”…

My spouse is the first one to remind me why finance and accounting professionals, of which I’ve been both, take the fun out of everything.  Whether it’s keeping the books in balance or households and divisions under budget, we’ve been known to tend to say no to some of the fun decisions that our peers…

A fiduciary is obligated to give you advice that is in your best interest. Yeah….I know…..who wants advice that is not in their best interest? Sometimes in our lives we don’t want what’s in our best interest, but when you walk into the office of a Certified Financial Planner® you should not expect anything less…

The book that sits in the glovebox of your car has the obligatory ‘Ongoing Maintenance’ section, highlighting how often you should be changing your oil, flushing your transmission fluid and a slew of other tune-up services.  However, no one probably gave you an ongoing maintenance guide to your financial life once your account balances started…

It may be possible to do more damage to your financial future as a tinkering and impatient investor than by staying the course. The temptation to make tweaks to investments and move money around, especially when markets are particularly volatile, may be hard to resist. In our experience, periods of volatility are exactly when being…