Longevity Annuities For Retirement

How Much Money Do You Have In The Market?

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How much money do you currently have in the market? All of it? 50% 80%? Did you make a conscious decision to have that particular percentage exposed to market risk? How did you decide stocks, mutual funds, ETFs, bonds, annuities, or maybe a professionally managed wealth management account? Or… Did it just sort of happen?

Why would I be asking this question? I say it all the time, markets go up, and the markets go down. So how much of your life savings/retirement is exposed to market risk is a very important consideration. That is why I strongly encourage everyone to think of their money in terms of red money, and green money.

Now, those terms might sound a little childish or funny, but I believe they help us understand a very important concept. Let me explain. Red money is money that we are willing to expose to market risk, and we are willing to do this in hopes of a higher return. We accept the possibility of losses even significant losses in hopes of greater gains. Red money is exposed to upside, and downside market risk. Now green money is about safety and security. With green money, we are not willing to accept the risk of losses. So we’ are willing to accept a lower return in exchange. Green money does not have downside market risk. So if red money is exposed to upside, and downside, and green money has only upside, which one is better?

That is probably the wrong question to be asking, because neither one is inherently good or bad. It all depends. The very important questions we should be asking ourselves are these, what percentage of my money should be in red money? And what percentage of my money should be in green money?

Now, if you are at or near retirement, you should ask yourself if any of your money should be in red money? Can you afford to lose any of your retirement funds? Would you rather take two steps forward and three steps back or just take one step at a time and never take a step back?

Hear the rest of my thoughts and listen to the Smart Money podcast below.

If you believe you could better navigate retirement with the help of a team that has 40+ years of experience with financial and retirement planning in the Indianapolis area I would like to invite you to schedule a complimentary meeting to see how we can help.

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3 Mid-Year Financial Planning Tips

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Our very own Casey Marx was interviewed by Indianapolis Fox 59 News giving out his best 3 mid-year financial planning tips. Here is a summary of the interview.

  1. Mid-year is a great time to look at your spending habit for the year. You can start by analyzing your budget, look at your expenses and make sure that you’re saving more than you’re spending. The pandemic last year highlighted the need for that.
  2.  Estate planning is key because you never know what will happen. That includes having a financial power of attorney a will with a named executor regardless of age, making sure they are updated with the correct information. If you don’t, your estate goes through the courts or if you’re in the hospital, the hospital is going to determine who that person is. It’s a very difficult thing to figure out on the fly. Take care of this now.
  3. Risk capacity. Your risk tolerance changes as you get older. Maybe you don’t have money from a job coming in or another change in your life. When the utility of your money changes, you need to make sure that you are balancing the risk. It’s great if your equity positions have done well, but you want professional help to determine whether or not your investment portfolio is overweighted into any one asset class; otherwise, you could lose a lot of money all at once.

Looking for professional help managing your financial life. We created the RetireShield® financial planning approach. It covers your 401k, IRA, individual investments, tax planning, estate planning and more.

We encourage you to sign up for our complimentary financial plan review. You can meet with our team in person or via the computer. Schedule a time right now online that is convenient for you.

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It’a Just a 2% Fee, Right?

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There are things you can control in other things you can’t and you need to control and and hold on to with every fiber of your being the things you can control because there’s so much you can inflation cost of goods geopolitical conflict Wall Street greed how long you live All these things you can’t control so it kills me on a daily basis clients come in and they show me their statements and then I analyze just the risk and and it’s just completely inappropriate and then the fees they’re paying.

For example a 2% fee on a deposit of $500,000 over a 15-year period reduces that investment by $487,000 over that 15-year period assuming that your advisor is a superhero and gets you 7% return annually and you never go backwards That’s insane so $500,000 would turn into $1,082,000 whereas if you didn’t have that 2% fee you would have $1,511,000 which for those keeping score at home is about the amount of your initial investment so people here are 2% fee or 1% fee or 50 basis point fee and they think that’s no big deal It’s a huge deal because it destroys the miracle of compounding interest.

Risk has its place but understand what you’re doing and quite frankly my clients are smart people they’re not stupid people It’s just not their expertise and so if I go talk to an engineer about something I’m not going to be up on his furniture I’m not going to be up on the the vernacular that is exclusive to that expertise so if you starts running around in circles around me talking about what he does and this and this and how this is so great and and he’s trained to do that You know I’m at a loss I don’t know what to do

It all comes back to education for us It’s teaching people The great thing about working with something that’s positive is that you’re not afraid to lift the curtain You lift the curtain you show people and they come to the natural conclusion that what you do is best for that and that’s a it’s a good position to be sitting in.

If you want a second opinion on your existing financial plan for retirement contact us for a complimentary consultation.

Time, Money & Energy Of Financial Planning

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Time, money, energy….What is important to you? What does that pie chart look like? What’s really important to you? How do you want to balance it?

That should be defined right at the outset you know because and this change is over time too The beginning of your career you might be all about the money You might be willing to sacrifice the time. People need to sacrifice the energy but then you get to 55-60. I’ve been doing this for several years and my energy is a little bit more important to me now. My time is a little bit more important to me now. What are you doing in order to give it back to yourself because the same stuff’s not going to do it

Time, money energy This is for anybody in the business world It’s for clients getting ready to retire It’s for anybody but until you’re honest with yourself on what’s important You are like a blind man trying to find a meal It’s It’s not there and often we get told what we should be wanting by others and then we get angry at others for pursuing those things You got a choice everyday but put yourself in the position in order to achieve it and part of what we’re doing

Crown Haven is where providing people with the expertise and the tools in order to better balance their time and energy so they worry less about that money and spend more time enjoying their lives. Contact us to learn how we can maximize all your variables for retirement.

Casey Marx 2020 Financial Advisor Of The Year

Casey Marx Receives 2020 Financial Advisor of the Year Award

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Indiana’s own Casey Marx just received the 2020 Financial Advisor Of The Yea Year Award from Aegis Financial. We see him working with clients in the Indianapolis area every day and know exactly the difference he makes in their retirement planning through their 401k accounts, IRAs. annuities, life insurance, estate planning and more.

We invite you to see why the program Casey created to RetireSHIELD® to systematically protect individuals and institutions assets against any and all market risk allow for growth to outpace inflation and create income that they will never outlive. Contact us now to set up a complimentary consultation with the 2020 Financial Advisor Of The Year.

Casey Marx, based throughout Indiana, has been awarded the prestigious Advisor of the Year. The plaque is engraved with a quote from Nelson Mandela, “Everyone can rise above their circumstance and achieve success if they are dedicated to and passionate about what they do.” Aegis Financial presented the award at its National Sales Symposium in Denver.

A trailblazer, Casey has been recognized by Forbes Magazine as one of America’s Financial Leaders, is continually recognized as a standing member of the National Ethics Association, and is a sought-after speaker in the retirement income planning field for his unique perspective on retirement income planning solutions for baby boomers and those approaching or in retirement.

As host of Indiana’s #1 retirement income planning shows Smart Money with Casey Marx, Casey finds great joy assisting Hoosiers to guarantee their retirement dollars for a future in which they can genuinely rely upon. His firm, Crown Haven, was just rated the #1 Independent Wealth Advisory Practice in Indiana.

Casey believes in continuing his education so that he can transfer that knowledge as a benefit to his clients—he recently completed a course at Yale entitled “The Global Financial Crisis” lectured by former US Secretary of Treasury Timothy Geithner.

To accompany his other distinguished honors, Casey has earned the Retirement Income Certified Professional designation at The American College, unanimously the #1 designation in the field.

“I’m proud to educate my clients in a field where education is viewed as taboo. I desperately want my clients to understand the things they can control—risk and fees— and how to best control them. It’s only a mere result of my thousands of hours and extensive study that I know what I know. “

Reposted from Annuity.com