Hope springs eternal, especially in March. Like many firms, ours runs an informal NCAA basketball tournament pool for our employees. It is fun. This time of year, the NCAA Basketball Tournaments thrill fans and create so much interest that it is estimated one in four Americans fills out a bracket to predict who will win it all. As a financial advisor, I can not help but see connections between college basketball’s March Madness and investing. While there are similarities between investing and filling out a bracket, the stakes are vastly different and require different approaches. Filling a Bra ..read more

Last week, the investing world lost a giant – Daniel Kahneman. A psychologist at Princeton University and winner of the Nobel Prize in economics, Kahneman may well have had more influence on investing than anyone else who was not a professional investor. Jason Zweig wrote a lovely tribute to Kahneman in his WSJ column. Check it out.   The Psychologist Who Turned the Investing World on Its Head by Jason Zweig, March 2024   Daniel Kahneman gave people an understanding of what drives financial decisions. He did it, in part, by relishing his own mistakes.   Daniel Kahneman&nb ..read more

The era of Artificial Intelligence is here, and boy are people freaking out. AI is the application of mathematics and software code to teach computers how to understand, synthesize, and generate knowledge in ways similar to how people do it. AI is a computer program like any other – it runs, takes input, processes, and generates output… It is owned by people and controlled by people, like any other technology. AI isn’t killer software and robots that will spring to life and decide to murder the human race or otherwise ruin everything, like you see in the movies. – Marc Andreessen Several fac ..read more

The term FIRE (also seen as FI/RE) stands for Financial Independence / Retire Early. It is a term that was coined in the 1992 book, Your Money or Your Life. Recently, the FIRE movement has experienced a comeback as the internet has enabled financial resources to be more readily available. Here at Rebalance, we prioritize financial education and literacy to help empower individuals to reach their financial goals. And, as a member of the FIRE movement myself, I enjoy working with clients and clients’ children to help them work toward these goals. While FIRE consists of many different components ..read more

Read this Barron’s article to learn why the 4% withdrawal rule for retirees is still relevant amidst changing markets. Discover strategies like adjusting withdrawal rates, optimizing asset allocation, and utilizing Roth conversions to make the most of your retirement savings. Does the 4% Withdrawal Rule for Retirees Still Make Sense? By Elizabeth O’Brien, February 9, 2024 The 4% rule, a mathematically derived annual withdrawal rate that retirees can use to avoid running out of money, is the Barbour jacket of retirement planning. It’s a classic strategy that provides protection in changin ..read more

Discover an approach to retirement savings that balances convenience with individual choice, offering insights into strategies for boosting retirement preparedness. In this Wall Street Journal article, Shlomo Benartzi’s proposal of automated account setup sheds light on a nuanced solution to increase retirement savings rates. A Simple Way to Get Workers to Save More for Retirement by Shlomo Benartzi, February 3, 2024   Automated retirement-savings accounts—where companies enroll employees and have them start saving at a default rate unless they opt out—have been a huge success. But t ..read more

Uncover the hidden disparities in money-market funds’ returns and the impact of selecting the right fund amidst changing market conditions and fee structures, as explored by Derek Horstmeyer in this Wall Street Journal article. All Money-Market Funds Have the Same Yield, Right? Not Even Close by Derek Horstmeyer, February 2, 2024   Money-market mutual funds were ignored by many investors over the past decade or so as their yields hovered near zero. That has changed since the Federal Reserve began to raise its benchmark interest rate in 2022—but there has been wide variance between ..read more

In this Wall Street Journal article, delve into the emotional journey of retirees confronting mortality and the necessity of a backup retirement plan. Two Retirees Consider Their Nightmare: What Will We Do if One of Us Dies First? by Stephen Kreider Yoder, February 1, 2024 Steve We came 6 inches from death, maybe 4, just west of Leoti, Kan., in September on our tandem bicycle. Ever since, we’ve been asking: Should we each have a Plan B, a backup road map for retirement with the other suddenly gone? Our brush with mortality came on a sunny morning as a tailwind pushed us along a thinly traf ..read more

As tax season is currently in full swing, many individuals are looking for ways to lower their tax bill or increase their refund before the filing deadline of April 15, 2024. For some married couples, one excellent strategy for reducing taxes and boosting retirement savings is with spousal IRA contributions. What is a spousal IRA contribution? A spousal IRA contribution, very simply put, is a way for a working spouse to contribute to an Individual Retirement Account (IRA) on behalf of a non-working or low-earning spouse. Often, people may think that the working spouse is the one who must own t ..read more

One should take financial advice as seriously as they take medical advice, as Rebalance Managing Director Mitch Tuchman outlines in this recent column. by Mitch Tuchman, January 31, 2024 If the number of digits on your retirement account balance surprises you, that might be a sign you need to get help with your financial decisions. The average American household in their 50s now has $1 million in net worth, reports USA Today. Having written the grabby headline they wanted, the story follows up with the slightly deflating truth: The median for Americans between the ages of 50 and 59 i ..read more