Do You Have Enough To Retire? The 60 Second Calculation
Do you have enough to retire? Believe it or not, as financial planners, we can often answer that question in LESS THAN 60 SECONDS just by asking a handful of questions. In this video, I’m going to walk you through the 60-second calculation.
About Michael……...
Hi, I’m Michael Ruger. I’m the managing partner of Greenbush Financial Group and the creator of the nationally recognized Money Smart Board blog . I created the blog because there are a lot of events in life that require important financial decisions. The goal is to help our readers avoid big financial missteps, discover financial solutions that they were not aware of, and to optimize their financial future.
When you sell a stock, mutual fund, investment property, or a business, if you have made money on that investment, the IRS is kindly waiting for a piece of that gain in the form of capital gains tax. Capital gains are taxed differently than the ordinary income that you received via your paycheck or pass-through income from your business. Unlike ordinary
One of the most challenging aspects of starting a new business is finding the capital that is needed to support your expenses as you begin to build up a revenue stream since it’s not always easy to ask friends and family for money to invest in a startup business. Luckily, for new entrepreneurs, there are some little-known ways on how you can use
Parents always want their children to succeed financially so they do everything they can to set them up for a good future. One of the options for parents is to set up a Roth IRA and we have a lot of parents that ask us if they are allowed to establish one on behalf of their son or daughter. You can, as long as they have earned income. This can be a
If you were planning on moving this year to take a new position with a new company or even a new position within your current employer, the moving process just got a little more expensive. Not only is it expensive, but it can put you under an intense amount of stress as there will be lots of things that you need to have in place before packing up and
There is a little known change that was included in tax reform that will potentially have a big impact on business owners. The new tax laws that went into effect on January 1, 2018 placed stricter limits on the ability to deduct expenses associated with entertainment and business meals. Many of the entertainment expenses that businesses
Now that small business owners have the 20% deduction available for their pass-through income in 2018, as a business owner, you will need to begin to position your business to take full advantage of the new tax deduction. However, the Qualified Business Income ("QBI") deduction has taxable income thresholds. Once the owner's personal taxable
Tax reform will change the way rental income is taxed to landlords beginning in 2018. Under current law, rental income is classified as "passive income" and that income simply passes through to the owner's personal tax return and they pay ordinary income tax on it. Beginning in 2018, rental income will be eligible to receive the same preferential tax
While one of the most significant changes incorporated in the new legislation was reducing the corporate tax rate from the current 35% rate to a 21% rate in 2018, the tax bill also contains a big tax break for small business owners. Unlike large corporations that are taxed at a flat rate, most small businesses, are "pass-through" entities, meaning that the
The conference version of the tax bill was released on Friday. The House and the Senate will be voting to approve the updated tax bill this week with what seems to be wide spread support from the Republican party which is all they need to sign the bill into law before Christmas. Most of the changes will not take effect until 2018 with new tax rates for
Buying a company is an exciting experience. However, many companies during a merger or acquisition fail to address the issues surrounding the seller’s retirement plan which can come back to haunt the buyer in a big way. I completely understand why this happens. Purchase price, valuations, tax issues, terms, holdbacks, and new employment
When you turn 70 1/2, you will have the option to process Qualified Charitable Distributions (QCD) which are distirbution from your pre-tax IRA directly to a chiartable organizaiton. Even though the SECURE Act in 2019 changed the RMD start age from 70 1/2 to age 72, your are still eligible to make these QCDs beginning the calendar year that you
The Republicans are in a tough situation. There is a tremendous amount of pressure on them to get tax reform done by the end of the year. This type of pressure can have ugly side effects. It’s similar to the Hail Mary play at the end of a football game. Everyone, including the quarterback, has their eyes fixed on the end zone but nobody realizes that no
A Single(k) plan is an employer sponsored retirement plan for owner only entities, meaning you have no full-time employees. These owner only entities get the benefits of having a full fledge 401(k) plan without the large administrative costs associated with traditional 401(k) plans.
It’s here. On June 9, 2017, the long awaited Fiduciary Rule for 401(k) plans will arrive. What secrets does your 401(k) advisor have?
This question comes up a lot when a parent makes a cash gift to a child or when a grandparent gifts to a grandchild. When you make a cash gift to someone else, who pays the tax on that gift? The short answer is “typically no one does”. Each individual has a federal “lifetime gift tax exclusion” of $5,400,000 which means that I would have to give
Many of our clients own individual stocks that they either bought a long time ago or inherited from a family member. If they do not need to liquidate the stock in retirement to supplement their income, the question comes up “should I just gift the stock to my kids while I’m still alive or should I just let them inherit it after I pass away?” The right answer is
In the world of executive compensation, there are a number of ways that a company can reward key employees. Although most companies are familiar with traditional deferred compensation plans, one of the lesser known options which is growing in popularity is called a “phantom stock plan”. Especially in small to mid-size companies.
As an owner of a small business myself, I’ve had a front row seat to the painful rise of health insurance premiums for our employees over the past decade. Like most of our clients, we evaluate our plan once a year and determine whether or not we should make a change. Everyone knows the game. After running on this hamster wheel for the
When you think of Research and Development (R&D) many people envision a chemistry lab or a high tech robotics company. It’s because of this thinking that millions of dollars of available tax credits for R&D go unused every year. R&D exists in virtually every industry and business owners need to start thinking about R&D in a different light because
As financial planners we are seeing more and more individuals, especially in the software development and technology space, hired by companies as “1099 employees”. “1099 employees” is an ironic statement because if a company is paying you via a 1099 technically you are not an “employee” you are a self-employed sub-contractor. It’s like having
Spousal IRA’s are one of the top tax tricks used by financial planners to help married couples reduce their tax bill. Here is how it works: