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The US economy passed a major milestone this summer: the longest bull market in history. Starting with the bottom of the market in March of 2009 through August of 2018, the Dow Jones Industrial Average is up 290%, the S&P 500 is up 320%, and the Nasdaq is up 520%. 2018 has also seen more job growth, strong consumer sales and housing numbers, and Apple and Amazon hitting trillion-dollar valuations.
As much as we caution investors against making knee-jerk reactions to the news, your investments and your long-term planning don’t exist in a vacuum either. That’s why when I attend conferences like the Barron’s Top Independent Advisors Summit or the Schwab Impact Conference, I like to come back with a report that I think will be beneficial to my clients and listeners. It’s just another way that we at Keen Wealth try to give the folks we work with a comprehensive financial-planning experience.
Over the years we have evolved a unique specialization working with Kansas City’s thriving engineering community. And that surprises many folks in our industry! Whenever I discuss that we work with many engineers at financial conferences, our colleagues from around the country think we’re crazy. We hear things like, "They are too detailed," or, "They are too smart," or, “Their standards are way too high.”
I suspect that a month or two from now, your inbox and social media feeds will be full of year-end tax-planning checklists and advice articles. But one of our mantras at Keen Wealth is, “get out ahead of issues as early as we can.” So on today’s show, we help our listeners get a jump on year-end tax planning. If you put off addressing these important items, you’re not just wasting time. You could be losing money.
Most of the clients that we work with at Keen Wealth are prudent, reasonable and disciplined with respect to their retirement resources. Every so often we will come across a soon-to-be retiree who thinks that when they gain access to their retirement nest egg, they can just stop working and crack open their accounts like they’ve just won the lottery. This occurs more often with folks who haven’t had to commit to a lifetime of saving, investing, and planning, but instead may have earned a lump sum on their pension, earned corporate profit sharing, or came into an inheritance. In s
Return on Life is the idea that money is simply a tool to help you live the life you want, instead of the goal itself. With ROL as a focus, you don’t give up the best of life or the best parts of yourself just to get more money. The money is there to serve you, not vice versa. Instead of focusing on someone else’s definition of success, you write your own.