Registered Investment Advisor
Breaking down the deal with Required Minimum Distributions. After you turn 72 years old, you will need to take a minimum amount out of your traditional IRA accounts each year. This also applies to your 401k or 403b accounts if you are no longer working for the businesses sponsoring those plans. The minimum required amount […]
Are you committed to starting a budget? Budgeting is like dieting. Most of us aren’t good at it. Our brains are wired for instant gratification, not delayed consumption. Making people think about such things can be an uncomfortable part of being a financial planner. I must confess that budgeting does NOT come easily to me. […]
Is getting out of debt your goal for 2021? At the start of the new year, resolutions are on people’s minds right now. As I type this it’s snowing so it seemed like a good day to write about my favorite strategy for eliminating debt – the Snowball Strategy. After all, if you have credit […]
It’s that time of year: Prediction Season! Along with new year’s resolutions, it’s time for economists and money managers to make market predictions. Some will be gloom and doom, constructing elaborate arguments about how the market is greatly overvalued and about to crash. Others will be optimistic, explaining why there’s still opportunity in the markets […]
Life Planning is a personal approach to financial planning that starts with a conversation about your life goals and dreams. We often don’t give ourselves the time and space to really think about what we want for our lives now, in the near future, and in retirement As humans, we tend to have tunnel vision […]
It’s December and 2020 is drawing to a close. How has the 2020 market been doing? It’s been a year of extremes. As I write this, the stock market is making fresh highs, with the S&P 500 stock index up 14.5% for the year, despite a harrowing journey. The economy was thrown into a recession […]
Here at Shotwell Rutter Baer, we have a genuine bright spot to brag about in 2020. We launched a Financial Planning internship program this year and were lucky enough to hire Joel. He is currently a senior in Michigan State’s International Business program. Last week, Nick and I sat down and interviewed Joel for our […]
Don’t wonder if your financial advisor is trustworthy and on the level. Do some research. Trust but verify. Bernie Madoff was arrested in December 2008 when his sons revealed that his giant asset management firm was a Ponzi scheme. He had stolen an estimated $64 BILLION dollars in client assets. While most bad behavior in […]
Frequently when we meet people who handle their own investments, they like to talk about individual stocks. I can understand why. Individual stocks have a story that you can wrap your head around, such as Pfizer creating a vaccine for Corona Virus, to borrow from current headlines. Or Tesla bringing the auto industry forward into […]
When should you refinance your mortgage? Low-interest rates may not be good for your savings account, but it could save you thousands of dollars on your mortgage loan. How do you tell if now’s the right time for you to refinance your existing mortgage? You may think that this would be a cut and dry […]
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