Divorce

This article identifies 10 real-world considerations in tax efficient distribution planning from the perspectives of an academic (Wade Pfau, PhD), a practitioner (Joe Elsasser, CFP), and a CPA (Steven Jarvis).

Can the Magnificent Seven retain its crown? Or will some subset of the 493 other S&P 500 stocks and their neglected sectors take the throne in 2024?

Homebuyers have suffered some severe whiplash in recent months. After all, when mortgage rates hit 8% in late October, it was reasonable to think the housing market would stay on ice throughout the winter.

What is a financial therapist, and how do you know when you need one?

Being left solely responsible for wealth through divorce or widowhood later in life comes with its own set of responsibilities, opportunities, and challenges. As with so many financial life events, it is often the emotional challenges that are the hardest.

Recently, a newly divorced woman in her 50s asked me if I knew of any good books for middle-aged, single woman of wealth.

This article explores how promoting individual strengths and skills, advocating for enhanced diversity and inclusion, fostering a collegial environment, encouraging diversification, and attracting a broader range of clients helps RIAs stand out in a competitive industry.

You hear a lot these days how unaffordable housing has become in the US. One way to think about affordability is to look at home prices relative to household incomes.

Whether you're just starting out or already have a content marketing strategy in place, this guide will provide actionable steps to help you launch your content strategy or enhance your existing practices.

Here are four steps financial advisors can take to improve financial literacy for women.

Evidence on actual spending behavior suggests that real spending falls with age. If that’s true, people need to save less for retirement than we think.

Artificial intelligence tools have demonstrated the capability to shake up nearly any industry. That includes financial advising.

We live in an age of goody-goody business. Companies wear their compassion on their sleeves in the form of ever more elaborate rainbow flags and inclusivity statements.

Any financial advisor can turn their content into a powerful SEO engine without engaging an expensive consultant.

China can match the US in artificial intelligence thanks to the expertise of companies from Alibaba to Baidu, joining a global tech transformation that will dwarf the mobile revolution, according to industry pioneer Kai-Fu Lee.

Yep, you read that right. I’m about to teach you how to get new clients for less than $10 a month.

Relative to the accumulation phase, strategies that mitigate the unique risks faced by retirees in decumulation are less understood and researched. By identifying and illustrating those risks, planners can better prepare clients for retirement.

Allan Roth’s recent article, The 4% Rule Just Became a Whole Lot Easier, promises too much, makes inaccurate comparisons and blurs the notion of risk.

Here are three signals people use to let you know when they are feeling pushed.

If you aren’t willing to niche, at least decide whether you are trying to help your clients thrive or survive. Then build a message around one of those themes. Are you selling them life rafts (survive) or sailboats (thrive)?

How will you leverage networking’s holiday season grand finale without being perceived as the friend who is desperate for business?

Here are some suggestions to consider when remarrying.

It took 16 months to pay off my husband’s student loans after we got married.

The search for information and direction about financial assistance and special-needs planning can be especially frustrating for caregivers.

When you choose a client niche, you may find that the focus is too narrow or too broad. Here’s how you can remedy the situation.

Millennials are self-centered and allergic to commitment. They switch jobs every six months and will never buy homes. And don’t get them started on marriage and kids.

We have a team of advisors who are the kings and queens of gossip.

In the current unstable economic environment, producing safe, reliable income over the course of an unknown retirement is a daunting goal for any financial professional. As a result, many Americans sub-optimize their retirement experience.

Demography isn’t destiny. If population size was history’s major determinant, China might have conquered Europe in the 15th century, and Britain certainly would not have conquered India in the 18th.

When starting with a niche, you may find it difficult to produce topics for your content marketing. To get ideas, take notes about what your prospects are talking about. This article covers specific points to create an effective content strategy.

Marriage in the US also unlocks an under-discussed retirement option: the spousal IRA.

The Financial Alliance for Racial Equity (FARE) and the CFP Board Center for Planning collaborated on one such scholarship, Financial Alliance for Racial Equity CFP^® Certification Diversity Scholarship, which was created to financially assist seven Black and African American candidates on their journey to becoming a certified CFP^® professional.

What started out as re-entering the workforce opportunistically soon became a necessity.

I’m having a hard time training one of our newer advisors on how to be a good listener.

There is no Hall of Fame for single parents. There should be. The challenges of being a single parent are monumental.

I would be very concerned if my financial planner didn’t have their own planner. Research shows that financial planning results in increased emotional and financial wellbeing, even for clients who are planners themselves. Use our Premium membership to add your logo to this article and send it to your clients and prospects.

I’ve supported many clients through times of loss and transition such as divorces, deaths of parents or spouses, business failures, and natural disasters. Following are some of the things I’ve learned.

How can you put the “know, like, trust” element of relationship marketing to work for your business at scale?

How are advisors coping with the new Department of Labor (DOL) rollover rules? Here are a dozen observations.

The parallels between the 2020s and the 1970s grow more numerous by the day. The economy faces the threat of stagflation. Fuel prices are surging, and shortages loom. Politicians are flailing. The international environment is deteriorating. The Supreme Court is revisiting the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling.

We’ll tackle IRMAA in this article. I’ll provide you with information to teach you how you might be able to get rid of IRMAA.

Here’s how to customize your calendaring system so that you weed out unqualified prospects and spend your time talking to qualified ones.

After spending many years in the planning profession, I’ve found that advisors place superfluous importance on speaking intelligently and comprehensively.

Does being busy equate with being productive?

There is no greater threat to your financial wellbeing than divorce. Unless you are very wealthy or extremely poor, both former spouses will see a decline in their lifestyle

For an ambitious, career-ladder climber, what sort of person makes the best mate? The human heart is not known for being coldly calculating, but pretend, for a moment, that it could be. What personality traits should be preferred?

Laurence Kotlikoff is a world-class economist who can convince you to pay off your mortgage and make you snort out your nose laughing at the same time; Money Magic is his compendium of life hacks aimed at leaving the reader wealthier and happier.

I’ve seen a lot of celebrity and CEO couples who have been married for a long time go through a divorce. The usual norm is that marital assets are subject to division. But where do financial investments fit into this equation?

The majority of the wealth in the U.S. is controlled by baby boomers. However, two rising trends in this dominant demographic are creating complications, not only for boomers and their advisors, but also for the children of boomers who constitute an increasingly vital current and future client group.

This is the time when you are preparing an end-of-year/holiday letter for your clients. Unfortunately, fewer than 1% of them are going to derive any meaning from it. Use this template to create a holiday letter with some pizzazz.

Here is my interview with Eric Negron, an advisor, about how he uses the Asset-Map software.

In case there was any uncertainty about the moral hazard created by the Federal Reserve’s decision to buy junk-bond exchange-traded funds, a group of former senior leaders at BlackRock Inc., JPMorgan Asset Management and HSBC is leaving no room for doubt.

The analytic framework for providing retirement income planning advice must use marginal tax rates and not tax brackets.

A client engaged us about three months ago. But based on the time we’ve worked together, I do not enjoy or like him.

He continues to participate in sessions (mostly held in the early afternoon) and he seems at best distracted, at worst under the influence.

Warren Buffett is getting out from the middle of a potentially contentious split.

I’m making a bold claim: Data should be the top driver of your marketing strategy.

The entrepreneurial culture and meritocracy of the wealth management is what makes this profession unique. But have you ever wondered what we could learn from other industries?

Every aspect of a marriage should be built on mutual trust, love, and respect. But as an attorney, I’ve counseled countless victims of financial abuse who have experienced none of these qualities.

Fear of rejection ranks high, but there’s more than one way to get referrals.

A woman to whom I was referred because she is facing a nasty divorce turns out to be a close acquaintance of mine.

Increased marital stress is highlighting the financial challenges divorce brings, especially to women.