WE WANT OUR STOCKS to behave like bonds, and our bonds to behave like cash investments. That leads to all kinds of portfolio contortions—some of them damaging to our investment results. Remember, risk is the price we pay to earn higher returns. Many folks want those higher returns, but they’re anxious to avoid risk. Chalk it up to loss aversion: We get far more pain from losses than pleasure from gains. Result? Think about stock-market strategies like purchasing equity-indexed annuities a...| HumbleDollar
I WAS RANDOMLY scrolling on social media and saw this post:“Can you just open an LLC and write things off?”That’s a real question someone asked, and I’ve seen this question asked many times.There are a lot of misconceptions around LLCs, their purpose, and how LLC changes your tax structure. With TikTok, there are “tax experts” sharing terrible advice, so let me clarify how it could be useful.First, what is an LLC?An LLC is a Limited Liability Company. It’s a business structure a...| HumbleDollar
If this post is appearing, it means I’ve succumbed to cancer or one of its side effects. Please don’t feel sad for me. I’ve had a life filled with love, great experiences and wonderful career opportunities. Despite my demise at a relatively young age, I consider myself beyond fortunate. I’m hoping that, under the tree in front of our little Philadelphia rowhome, my wife Elaine will place a stone tablet inscribed with my name, and the year I was born and died.| HumbleDollar
HUMBLEDOLLAR FOUNDER and longtime Wall Street Journal columnist Jonathan Clements passed away earlier this week. He was 62. I reached out to several of Jonathan’s close friends and colleagues to ask for their remembrances. Taken together, they paint a picture of someone who was as beloved by his peers as he was by his readers. As Jason Zweig put it, “I have just lost a friend, and so have you.” Christine Benz,| HumbleDollar
My challenge to you: List your top financial mistakes. Not sure you want to invite the ridicule of others? To make everybody a little more comfortable, I’ll go first. Here are my top six: When I started investing in the late 1980s and early 1990s, I bought individual stocks and actively managed mutual funds. Admittedly, I went this route because it allowed this cash-strapped investor to get started in the financial markets with a few hundred dollars,| HumbleDollar
ON SUNDAY MORNING, May 19, I was enjoying croissants and coffee with Elaine at the kitchen table, while watching the neighborhood sparrows, finches, cardinals and squirrels have their way with the bird feeder. All was right in our little world, except I was a little wobbly when walking—the result, I suspected, of balance issues caused by an ear infection. It was going to be a busy week, and I figured that it would be smart to get some antibiotics inside me,| HumbleDollar
TODAY’S FINANCIAL lesson: We can manage risk—but terrible stuff can still happen. This thought, of course, was prompted by my recent cancer diagnosis. But the notion is also all too relevant to money management. But let’s start with health matters. In 1995, I began training for my first marathon, which I ran in May 1996 in Pittsburgh and finished in just under three hours. Ever since, I’ve been a bit of an exercise nut.| HumbleDollar
WHO HAS TIME TO die? I never realized death would be so busy. I thought I had my financial affairs in good order. But in the two months since my cancer diagnosis, I’ve made countless financial tweaks, mostly with a view to making things easier after my death for my wife Elaine and my two children. Here are just some of the steps I’ve taken: I took my two checking accounts—my personal account and the business account for HumbleDollar—and made Elaine the joint account holder with rights...| HumbleDollar
I’VE ALWAYS ASSUMED my financial life wasn’t so different from that of others—and that made writing personal-finance articles a whole lot easier. I, too, wanted to own a home, buy the right insurance, pay for the kids’ college, and amass enough for a long and comfortable retirement. On top of that, I wasn’t some financial minority—a highly paid executive, or a successful business owner, or the recipient of a hefty inheritance. Instead, I was like most everybody else,| HumbleDollar
WHEN WE RETIRE, we win back control over our daily life. Gone is the boss, the expectation that we’ll be at work at a certain hour, the worry about what the next office email will bring. We have a degree of freedom that, in many cases, we last knew when we were students contemplating a long summer vacation. But even as we gain that freedom, there’s also much that we lose. If we’re to be happy retirees,| HumbleDollar
