Serving proudly since 1873 as the beautiful Nebraska Panhandle's first newspaper
Serving proudly since 1873 as the beautiful Nebraska Panhandle's first newspaper
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Like everyone else, you have financial goals. To help achieve these goals, you may need to invest — and when you invest, you’ll need to take on some risk. But the more you understand this risk, and the better you are at managing it, the greater your potential for staying invested for the long term. To begin with, then, take a look at these terms: • Risk tolerance — Your risk tolerance is essentially your comfort level with taking risk. For example, if you have a high tolerance for risk, you may be comfortable investing aggressively. Convers...
Warren Buffet, the “Oracle from Omaha,” is considered one of the most successful investors in history. Yet while the investment world may seem complex, Mr. Buffet’s advice is actually pretty simple. Here are a few Buffet quotes, along with some suggestions on putting them to use: “Whether we’re talking about socks or stocks, I like buying quality merchandise when it is marked down.” Essentially, this means you should look for good investment vehicles whose price may have dropped. A “bear” market tends to drag down many stocks — even those wi...
As 2014 draws to a close, you may want to look back on the progress you’ve made this past year in various areas of your life — and that certainly includes progress toward your financial goals. At the same time, you may want to make some end-of-year moves that can close out 2014 on a positive note while paving the way for a productive 2015. Here are a few such moves to consider: • Boost your retirement plan contributions. This actually isn’t an “end-of-year” move because you have until April 15, 2015, to contribute to your Roth or Traditional...
It’s almost Thanksgiving, a holiday that once celebrated the harvest season. Although many of us today may not be directly connected to agriculture, we still gather on Thanksgiving with our loved ones to share whatever “bounty” we may have. But this practice doesn’t have to begin and end with food. Why not incorporate the spirit of sharing into your overall financial strategy? Here are a few suggestions for doing just that: • Make financial gifts. You could give shares of stock to your loved ones, or perhaps give them money to help fund their I...
Americans are pretty generous — in fact, 83% of us donated money to charitable organizations last year, according to a Gallup survey. And now that we’re entering the holiday season, charitable giving well may be on your mind. Your key motivation for making charitable gifts, of course, is to help those organizations whose work is meaningful to you. However, by supporting these groups, you can also make life less “taxing” for yourself. Specifically, by making charitable contributions, you may be able to receive some valuable tax breaks. To clai...
All investors probably wish they had gotten in on the “ground floor” of Apple or Microsoft or any other big success story. And, in fact, you can indeed “be there from the beginning” by taking part in a company’s initial public offering (IPO). However, the ground floor of many IPOs may be shakier than you’d think — and might not provide you with the solid footing you need to invest wisely. Of course, not all IPOs are the same. Many large, profitable companies, seeking to raise capital, have gone public in recent years through IPOs. However...
November is Long-Term Care Awareness Month – a month dedicated to educating the public about the need to prepare for the potentially devastating costs of long-term care. And the more you know about these expenses, the better prepared you will be to deal with them. To begin with, just how expensive is long-term care? Consider this: The average cost for a private room in a nursing home is more than $87,000 per year, according to the 2014 Cost of Care Survey produced by Genworth, a financial-services company. And the average cost of an assisted l...
Whether you have young children or not, you’re probably well aware that Halloween is almost here. However, despite the plethora of skeletons and ghosts you might see floating around this week, you probably don’t have much to fear (except, possibly, running out of candy). But in real life, some things genuinely are frightening — such as “scary” investment moves. Of course, investing, by its very nature, is not a risk-free endeavor. Ideally, though, these risks are also accompanied by the possibility of reward. Nonetheless, some investmen...
If you work for a medium-to-large company, you may now be entering the “open enrollment” period — that time of year when you get to make changes to your employee benefits. Your benefit package can be a big piece of your overall financial picture, so you’ll want to make the right moves — especially in regard to your employer-sponsored retirement plan. Take a close look at your 401(k) or similar plan, such as a 403(b), if you work for a school or a nonprofit group, or a 457(b), if you work for a state or local government. And keep these pos...
As an investor, you may find that the elements of your portfolio that seem to draw most of your attention are stocks and bonds. After all, these investment vehicles, and others derived from them, provide you with potential growth and income opportunities — which is why you invest in the first place. Yet, you also may find significant value in a more humble financial asset: cash. In fact, you might be surprised at the various ways in which the cash, and cash equivalents, in your portfolio can help you complete your financial picture. One way to...
The kids are back at school and summer vacations are now just fading memories, so it must be autumn. But the seasons don’t just move on the calendar — they also change in your life. And, speaking of changes, you’ll have to make many of them as you move through the years — and that includes changes to your investment portfolio. But how will you know when it’s time to take action? Just as Mother Nature sends out “signals” to indicate a change in seasons — blooming flowers, falling leaves, warmer or colder temperatures, longer or shorter days, e...
As an investor, you’re well aware that, over the short term, the financial markets always move up and down. During your working years, you may feel that you have time to overcome this volatility. And you’d be basing these feelings on actual evidence: the longer the investment period, the greater the tendency of the markets to “smooth out” their performance. But what happens when you retire? Won’t you be more susceptible to market movements? You may not be as vulnerable as you might think. In the first place, given our growing awareness...
It probably doesn’t happen as much as you’d like, but from time to time, you have some extra disposable income. When this happens, how should you use the funds? Assuming you have adequate emergency savings — typically, three to six months’ worth of living expenses — should you pay off debts, or fund your IRA or another investment account? There’s no one “correct” answer — and the priority of these options may change, depending on your financial goals. However, your first step may be to consider what type of debt you’re thinking of paying...
Are you ready for this? September is National Preparedness Month. Sponsored by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), National Preparedness Month seeks to educate Americans on preparing for natural disasters and other types of emergencies. But you’ll also need to prepare for unexpected events in many other areas of your life — particularly those events related to the financial security of you and your family. Here are some of the most important of these events, along with possible preparations for them: • Unanticipated early retir...
On Sept. 8, we observe National Grandparents Day. If you have grandchildren, they will hopefully mark this occasion by sending a card, making a call or, best of all, paying a visit. But however your grandchildren express their feelings for you, you undoubtedly have a very big place in your heart for them. In fact, you may well be planning on including your grandchildren in your estate plan. If that’s the case, you’ll want to do the best you can to preserve the size of your estate — without sacrificing the ability to enjoy life during your...
It’s just about Back-to-School time again. If you have young children, you might be hustling them to the store for backpacks and binders. But if you fast-forward a few years, you can envision driving your kids a little farther — to their college dorms. And when that day comes, you’ll want to be financially prepared. So you’ll want to avoid making costly mistakes when preparing for, and paying, those big bills. Here are some of the most common of these errors: • Not saving enough — Only half of all families with children under 18 save any mo...
On Sept. 1, we observe Labor Day — a celebration of the American worker. Of course, you work hard at your own job, but, when you think of it, every worthwhile endeavor in life requires significant effort — and that’s certainly the case with investing. The harder you work at it, the more likely you are to make progress toward your goals. So as you think about investing, consider the following areas in which you will need to apply yourself: • Work to identify your goals. It’s important that you know just why you’re investing. Do you want to sen...
If you’re a baby boomer, you’re at the point in life where, if you haven’t actually entered retirement, you’re at least approaching the outskirts. But if you’re like many of your fellow boomers, you may be experiencing more than a little trepidation over your financial prospects as a retiree. That’s why it’s so important for you to determine what steps to take to help improve your chances of enjoying a comfortable retirement. Just how worried are baby boomers about their future? Consider these numbers: Seventy-two percent of non-retired b...
Unless you keep close track of obscure holidays and observances, you probably didn’t know that August is “What Will Be Your Legacy? Month.” Still, you might want to use this particular month as a useful reminder to take action on what could be one of your most important financial goals: leaving a meaningful legacy. A legacy isn’t simply a document or a bunch of numbers — it’s what you will be remembered for, and what you have left behind that will be remembered. It’s essentially your chance to contribute positively to the future, whether that...
If you want to send your children or grandchildren to college, retire comfortably and achieve other important life goals, you will have to invest — it’s that simple. But the process of investing can sometimes seem anything but simple. What can you do to gain confidence that you are making the right investment moves? The answer may depend on how involved you want to be with your investment decisions. Initially, you might think that you would like to be totally “hands on.” After all, how you save and invest your money is unquestionably a highly p...
Baseball’s best players gathered in Minneapolis this week to participate in the All-Star Game. If you’re a fan or even a “weekend athlete,” you can admire these players for their abilities, even if you — like the vast majority of humanity — can’t hope to duplicate them. But if you’re an investor, you may be able to learn some practical lessons from the All Stars. So let’s look at a few common All Star traits to see how they might apply to investors: • Consistency — All Stars typically don’t just have a few good weeks or months — they tend to b...
Everyone needs to be aware of the financial resources they will have available in retirement. But if you’re a woman, you must be particularly diligent, for a variety of reasons. And that means you’ll need to know just what to expect from Social Security. Why should you, as a woman, pay extra attention to Social Security? For one thing, women often take time off from their careers to care for children and older parents, so they may accumulate less money in employer-sponsored retirement accounts, such as 401(k) plans. And women still live several...
It’s almost the Fourth of July, the day when we celebrate our independence as a nation and the many liberties we enjoy as individuals. Still, we have to keep working to earn some freedoms — such as financial freedom. But by making the right moves, you may eventually enjoy your own Financial Independence Day. Here are a few such moves to consider: • Set free your vision. Your first step in moving toward financial independence is to establish a vision of what this freedom might look like. Ask yourself some key questions: When do I want to retir...
Here’s an interesting statistic: Over the past three decades, the centenarian population in the United States has grown about 66%, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Of course, this doesn’t necessarily mean that you have a good chance of living to 100 — but the possibility may not be as remote as it once was. In any case, if you do plan to retire in your mid-60s, and you are in good health, you may well have two, or even three, decades ahead of you. To enjoy this time to the fullest — and to help prevent the possibility of outliving your fi...
Summer is almost here — which means it’s officially vacation season. You may be looking forward to “getting away from it all,” but, as you know, vacations actually require a fair amount of planning. And it might surprise you to learn that some of the efforts required for successful vacations can impart some valuable lessons in other areas of your life — such as investing. Here are some vacation-related moves that you may want to transfer to the investment and financial arenas: • Secure your home. If you’re going on vacation for a week or so, y...
