We had to rent an apartment in the Chicago Loop in 1989 after my daughter won a role in a musical. We had many options and chose a place on Wabash at E 9th Street. It was a great location with Grant Park nearly across the street, and Buddy Guy’s blues bar, Legends, right next door.
It also had a nice market one block over on State Street that we could easily walk to. 
Toledo is not like that,

Since Warren Buffet is considered at the top of investing game, I heeded his advice for  40 years.  No bonds and an Index 500 fund. Guess what folks, I rolled into retirement never looking back.  ROTH’s came on the scene late and didn’t really understand the taxation, oh well, my wife reminds me about RMD’s and taxation,,”such a problem!”

LOOKING FORWARD TO some downtime over the holidays? Below are some favorite new personal finance books and articles to consider for your reading list.
A Richer Retirement by William Bengen – Back in the 1990s, financial planner William Bengen developed what’s come to be known as the 4% rule. It’s a framework to help retirees determine a sustainable portfolio withdrawal rate. This year, Bengen updated and expanded his research. The most compelling addition: Bengen addresses the question of asset allocation.

BUSINESS OWNERS HAVE far more control over their tax bill than W-2 employees. But only if you know how the rules actually work. 
The tax code is structured to reward self employment, business investment, and retirement saving, yet many business owners leave significant money on the table simply because they are unaware of all the strategies.
If you are eligible, a Solo 401(k) plan can be an effective way to lower your taxes or shield your investments from future taxation.

I WAS HAPPY to read in The Wall Street Journal that 401(k) plans are “minting a generation of moderate millionaires.” I spent the last two decades of my professional life promoting 401(k) plans to workers, so the news felt like validation.
Moderate millionaires were loosely defined as coupon-clippers with seven figures. Sound familiar? It should to many HD readers. At Fidelity, a record 654,000 investors had a million or more in the 401(k) in the third quarter of 2025.

I wrote this article for HD four years ago. It was one of my favorites. It came to mind as we were setting up our Christmas tree this year.
EVERY YEAR AROUND this time, I think about one of the most memorable events in my life.
As a child, I was fascinated by trains. My father was a railway tower signal man during the Second World War and later a station master. My first toy trains were plastic and battery operated,

I dusted off this never published post after reading Mark Crothers’ recent post about killing a party by trying to offer advice. 
Have you ever been at a social gathering where the conversation turned to money matters?
I know a fella who has a reputation as an ace stock picker. I overheard someone recommending to a friend that they should talk to the guy for advice. The stock picker guy happened to be a tax client of mine.

This morning I had a surprise email in my inbox. I’d won a competition on Monevator, a fantastic, high quality UK financial blog site. The prize was a rather dapper festive Christmas sweater. I politely declined because, well, have you seen those things?
But the competition premise has been rattling around in my head ever since. The challenge was writing a note to convince someone—specifically, the partner of the finance blogger—to pay attention to her money,

Recently, a younger, intelligent, and well-educated relative approached me with questions about the book Lifecycle Investing by Ian Ayres and Barry Nalebuff. His curiosity piqued my interest, so I decided to read the book myself.
In essence, the book suggests that when you’re young, your future earnings (your “human capital”) are substantial and behave similarly to a bond. To balance your lifetime risk exposure, you could invest heavily in stocks early, even using leverage, and then gradually reduce risk as you age.

I consider myself fortunate when it comes to Christmas—not just because the anxiety of buying gifts for my wife Suzie is long behind us, but because this year, despite thinking we wouldn’t, we’ll all be together.
My daughter who lives in London had to work the morning after Christmas day, which meant she couldn’t make it home for the holiday. We were disappointed—it would have been the first Christmas ever that one of our children wasn’t with us on that special day.

The best financial advice I know is “live on less than you earn and save the difference.” For too many, though, there’s nothing left over to save after paying the bills.
Basic living costs seem much higher these days. Housing can take an outsized bite of family income as rents and housing prices have risen. Factor in other big expenses like health insurance, childcare, and student loan repayment, and there may not be any money left to save at month’s end.

I read here and elsewhere concern about profits. It seems people are concerned about the profits made by car dealers, health insurance companies, drug companies, health care providers, mutual funds, etc.
On the other hand, we seem unconcerned over profits made by professional sports teams, concert producers, casinos, gaming companies, celebrities, etc.  This group provides very little real value to us.
The first group provides goods and services we need or want.
Is that the difference?

This is going to seem dark, but it’s not my intention to scare anyone, but I’ve had an through about our operational security as investors that I can’t shake.
We’re all already doing complex passwords and two-factor authentication, which I completely agree with.  Be as safe as you can.  But how can any of us fully protect against a home invasion type attack where we’re coerced by force to divulge passwords.  Allow me to explain.
Imagine the worst (Heaven forbid,

I’m planning to rebalance at year-end, and I’m going to do something index purists might consider heresy: deliberately tilt away from the market’s weighting.
Lately, I’ve become increasingly uncomfortable with the portion of my portfolio devoted to the Magnificent Seven tech stocks, currently pushing towards 25%.
The index purist view would say that cap-weighted indices by definition represent the market’s collective wisdom about valuations. When the Magnificent Seven grows to nearly 25% of my developed world tracker,

I see a fair amount about how index funds will ruin the stock market. According to this Wall Street Journal article there is a different and more immediate issue. Seems that there is a drop off in companies raising capital on the open market, instead restricting IPOs or their equivalent to a hand-selected group of insiders. Is this a case for some kind of regulation? Hard to see what kind.