Looking Back – Taxes – Retirement Planning – Annuities

In our last podcast of 2022, we wanted to look back at the past year and help you find some of the great resources that we provided. We’re going to use this post to wrap up the year and help recap all the great topics that we’ve covered and what you need to know going into 2023.

What are the Best Resources for Taxes?

We’ve done a lot of podcasts and we have a full list of them here for you. However, a few of the podcasts that we would like to direct your attention to are:

  • Episode 185 – An interview with Steven Jarvis, CPA about the end-of-year tax strategies for 2022. Steven’s concepts are all about all-year tax planning, what to plan for the end of the year, RMDs, Roth conversions, QCDs and so much more. These strategies apply year-to-year with just a few number changes,
  • Episode 163 – Another one with Steven Jarvis about mid-year tax strategies that you can deploy. The concepts are very similar to episode 185, but one thing we do cover in greater detail is Roth conversions.
  • Episode 184 – Tax planning should be a part of your retirement plan. In this episode, we tie together retirement and tax planning. We discuss Social Security, taxes, retirement accounts and the benefit of Roth conversions.
  • Episode 158 – In this episode, we discuss tax planning versus tax preparation. We use this episode to discuss the key differences between planning and preparation, reducing taxes on social security and more.
  • Episode 161 An episode that revolves around RMDs and QCDs. This is an episode that we recommend anyone 70 ½ or 72 really take a look at. You need to understand the requirements and rules of RMDs and QCDs to avoid potential penalties. 

For taxes, these are the episodes that we recommend that you listen to for a better understanding of taxation, requirements and maybe even ways that you can save money in 2023.

However, we also talked a lot about retirement planning this year, and it’s something that we also wanted to provide a guide on finding for you.

What are the Best Resources for Retirement Planning?

Planning for retirement is something people need to begin doing much earlier than they realize. However, the following episodes are ones that we believe are powerful and filled with a lot of great information:

  • Episode 182 – An episode titled “3 Questions to Ask Yourself About Retirement.” In this episode, we cover “what do we want to do in retirement?”, “do you need professional help with retirement?” and much more.
  • Episode 180 – Inflation and the federal reserve are two things that are nearly impossible to avoid in the news, online and at the store. In this episode, we answer questions about inflation, what the federal reserve is doing and how to navigate inflation. We talk about active management and how to navigate these situations before and during retirement.
  • Episode 177 – A major topic of discussion that is growing is the topic of IRMAA surcharges and how they impact your Medicare premiums. We explain how IRMAA works, the different tiers to be concerned about and more about these surcharges. We will be updating this in 2023 and will have a great insert for anyone who wants one (just call us for more information).
  • Episode 157 – Retirement bucket strategies are something of major importance to us because they help protect your retirement from massive fluctuations.  We discuss multiple buckets that make investing simple and include your cash bucket, income and safety bucket and growth bucket. Using these buckets, it’s possible to secure your retirement with less risk.
  • Episode 146 – An episode that talks about a risk-adjusted portfolio. We discussed your view of how much money you need to lose to lose sleep. We go through asset allocation, individual risk adjustment, safe growth and more in this episode.

When it comes to retirement planning, we truly believe that these are the best podcasts that we’ve had in 2022. However, we do have one more section of resources that we would like to cover:

Annuity Resources

Annuities are something that we talked a lot about this year, and we want to point you to some of our best episodes on this topic:

  • Episode 153 – Bonds and bond alternatives are something that we’ve seen change a lot in recent years. The old 60% equity and 40% bonds portfolio worked for decades. However, bonds have changed in recent years thanks to inflation and rising interest rates. Bonds have not allowed us to protect portfolios in 2022, so this episode dives into many bond alternatives that work well to offset the risk of the equity market.
  • Episode 187 An episode where we discuss fixed annuities and why they’re at their best rate in 15+ years. We discuss why inflation works to boost fixed annuities and how the right annuity can provide a lifetime of income to you that is very similar to a pension.

We’re excited for you to review these resources and feel confident about your retirement going into 2023. Of course, we have a lot of great episodes planned for this coming year that we know you’ll absolutely love.

If you do have any questions about retirement planning or any of the topics above, we would be more than happy to talk to you about them.Click here to schedule a call with us.