LOOKING TO UPDATE your financial plan for 2026? Below are ten strategies you might consider:
Gaining control
January is a good time to audit your investments. I’d start with this very basic step: If you have accounts at multiple brokerage firms, see if you can consolidate them. This won’t necessarily lead to better investment results, but if you have fewer accounts, it’ll be easier to monitor and to manage them. This might not seem like an important exercise,

THE IRS RECENTLY announced inflation adjustments for the tax year 2026.
2 quick changes:

Standard deduction

For single taxpayers, the standard deduction rises to $16,100 for 2026, an increase of $350 from 2025.
For married couples filing jointly, the standard deduction rises to $32,200, an increase of $700 from tax year 2025.

Capital Gains Rates

For single taxpayers, long-term capital gains are taxed at 0% if the taxable income is up to $49,450 ($98,900 for married couples filing jointly).

I don’t know about your state, but in Ohio, if you drive a hybrid or electronic vehicle, expect to cough up between $100 and $200 extra for license plates, in order to offset the loss of gas tax revenue. Gas tax revenue helps keep our roads in good condition, so it’s only fair that vehicles using less gas, or no gas at all, do their part to maintain the roads.
Even before Henry Ford invented the assembly line,

I’m curious when this shift happened for you if it has.
A lot of us picture retirement travel as freedom—until at some point it starts feeling like logistics: packing, airports, long walks, tight schedules, rental cars, luggage, sleep disruption, and “do we really want to do this again?” Sometimes it’s health. Sometimes it’s energy. Sometimes it’s just interest.
So—at what age did travel start feeling like work for you, and what changed your plan?
What was the turning point—health,

With families spread out across the country—and sometimes across the world—I’ve been chewing on something for a while.
Quick definition: a nuclear family is the basic household unit—parents (or a single parent) and kids living together.
What I’m really asking about is the older geographic family nucleus—grandparents, siblings, aunts/uncles close enough to be “boots on the ground” when you need help.
It seems like that this started loosening after WWII and, by the late 70s/80s, more families were scattered for careers,

Six months ago Scott Dichter wrote a forum post (Coast FIRE! Who would have thought that FIRE could have so many flavors? – HumbleDollar) about Michael Kitces’s blog post about Coast FIRE.  For those unfamiliar with the term, please check out the articles.
In a nutshell, Coast FIRE is when one accumulates enough money whereby the money currently saved for retirement is sufficient to meet one’s future goal to retire early without the need to continue adding to retirement savings.

If a budget helps you manage money, provides a sense stability, etc., go for it, but…
recognize a budget doesn’t do any of the things often attributed to it, it doesn’t do anything. Doing or not doing something is up to the individual…including sticking to a budget🤑
Several times I have looked up the question, “why do I need a budget.”  The answer always comes back implying the budget somehow actually does things without human involvement,

Another year begins, and I’m already thinking about how it might end—or if not this one, the next. I’m not sure “lucky” is the right word, but I’m past the hardest of my own sandwich years. Both my parents are gone now. My mum was the last to go, two years ago, after five years of slow decline from vascular dementia—five difficult, traumatic years. Through the pain of her loss, I also felt grateful it was over.

Happy New Year, HumbleDollar folks! Today, besides being the first day of 2026, is also the six-month anniversary of my retirement. How’s it going so far? I thought I’d follow up on a couple of posts from last year–this one was a year ago today (a “six months out” post).
So far, I absolutely love being retired. Seriously, I’m just ecstatic about it. I said to my husband recently, “I thought I’d miss it (my career) a 

I am looking for advice on Vangauard’s recently launched active ETFs – VDIV, VUSG and VUSV. Their expense ratio is ~ 0.40. They are managed by Wellington funds which has been managing some known Vanguard funds
It will be interesting to see how it does in 2026
Thanks.

Between Thanksgiving and the New Year, I mourned the passing of five people in my life. All were born in the 1920s or ’30s—a generation that navigated world wars and technological revolutions, from the birth of air travel to the digital age. While they shared a history, each taught me a valuable lesson about how they enjoyed and suffered life in their own unique ways.
I recently came across an interview with 94-year-old author Judith Viorst on her tips for the “Final Fifth”

“The riskiness of an investment is not measured by beta but rather by the probability—the reasoned probability—of that investment causing its owner a loss of purchasing-power over his contemplated holding period. Assets can fluctuate greatly in price and not be risky as long as they are reasonably certain to deliver increased purchasing power over their holding period. And a non-fluctuating asset can be laden with risk.” — Warren Buffett, in his 2011 Berkshire Hathaway shareholder letter.

New Year’s Eve is the ultimate reminder that the clock never stops. As we prepare to flip the calendar, it’s natural to look back at the year, and the decades, gone by. We often focus on what we want to change in the future, but rarely do we consider which part of the journey we’d actually like to keep.
Youth has many advantages—health, strength, vigor, and vitality. Everything feels possible, and you’re certain you know what’s right and wrong in the world.

“There’s been a lot of talk
about an AI bubble. From our
vantage point, we see something
very different.”
Jensen Huang, CEO Nvidia
 
“No company is going to be immune
(if the AI bubble bursts), including us.”
Sundar Pichai, CEO Google (now known as Alphabet)
 
Is the AI revolution a blessing or a curse, an enduring breakthrough or impending economic and cultural apocalypse?

Nothing like Christmas and the rolling of one year into the next for a little reflection. A chance to think a little more broadly than the daily minutia. And to catch up with friends and family that we haven’t seen for a while.
For me, this included a lot of us in our early fifties. I sensed a common theme in the discussions – everyone seems pretty sick of striving for a promotion or more money.