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I thought the IRS gifting rules were pretty straight forward and I understood them. Any individual can give $19K (in 2025) to anyone else w neither a gift tax or reporting requirement. Seems pretty clear.
Then I dug a little deeper online which was maybe a mistake and came up w some issues.
One was the IRS reference to “gift splitting” by spouses where one spouse can use the other spouses gift exemption to gift in excess of the $19K.
We have discussed many times when to start Social Security and pretty much concluded the decision is personal and need based. I don’t have a problem with any of that, but what bugs me is concern over breaking even considering amount received and years of benefits.
It seems to me the monthly benefit, the income when needed most is all that matters. Since I once again find myself in the minority, I asked a neutral party,
I usually go for my four-mile walk before sunrise. I like to get an early start to my day. I’ve gotten to know a few folks who I see on my way around the neighborhood. We exchange pleasantries as we pass each other.
But there’s one gentleman who is not so friendly. He looks like he’s in his early thirties—about forty years younger than me.
All the people I encounter walk on one side of the sidewalk,
It’s been a topsy-turvy year in the financial markets. Has that prompted you to make any changes to your portfolio’s asset allocation? I’m thinking about four key dimensions:
Stocks vs. bonds vs. cash investments
U.S. stocks vs. foreign shares
Large-cap vs. small-cap stocks
Growth vs. value stocks
If you’ve tweaked your asset allocation, I’d love to know what changes you’ve made—and why.
Throughout my working years, one thing that disturbed me greatly was the lack of concern even disregard shown by many workers for a spouse, especially a surviving spouse and nearly always a woman.
I remember the “good old days” when the husband’s earnings were his money, his pension was his pension. I remember when workers hid their overtime pay from the wife and when they elected a single life annuity pension because only they earned it,
On April 30, Kitces posted an comprehensive article regarding the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) describing in detail where the congress is currently at and what steps are necessary to extend and/or change the the TCJA before the current tax law sunsets at the end of 2025.
https://www.kitces.com/blog/tax-cuts-and-jobs-act-tcja-sunset-budget-resolution-reconciliation-salt-cap-qbi-deduction-congress-republication-house-senate-bill/
I agree with the conclusion of the article to currently “wait and see” before taking action until I have a concrete expectation of what the individual income tax rules will look like in 2026.
Three Points
It’s a simple lesson I learned when I piloted an 18 wheeler in order to make ends meet while getting my business up and running. If you ever stood next to semi-trailer truck you would have noticed that the last step into or out of the tractor is a doozy. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that HD’s resident physical therapist Ed Marsh treated a few injuries that occurred when a driver fell getting out of his truck.
Every few decades or more often our federal tax system has a major upheaval. After I got my accounting degree in 1977 my first two jobs were working in state government auditing focused on matters internal to the function of the government. I still feel I learned a lot during those jobs but it was not a good fit for me.
In the early 1980’s I entered the world of public accounting which to a large extent is broken into two segments.
YOU MAY BE FAMILIAR with Peter Lynch. In the 1970s and ‘80s, he was one of the most visible figures in the investment world. As manager of Fidelity Magellan Fund, he achieved the best track record, by far, among his peers. He shared his wisdom in a series of popular books for individual investors.
Among the ideas for which Lynch is best known is the notion of “diworsification.” As its name suggests, Lynch argued that diversification simply for the sake of diversification isn’t always a good thing.
I’m withdrawing a bit from IRAs, ahead of RMDs in a few years, which will decide for me how much I’ll be taking out each year. For those of you who make voluntary withdrawals, do you go with a fixed percentage, like 4% every year, plus an inflation boost, calculated on Jan. 1 and taken at the beginning of the year? Or do you recalculate to reflect market change, and withdraw gradually throughout the year? Or wait till Dec.
None of us is smarter than the collective wisdom of all investors, as reflected in today’s share prices. So, why did investors dump stocks, causing the S&P 500 to plunge 10.5% over two days? The selling was likely driven by both a distaste for uncertainty and an expectation of slower economic growth, though we don’t know the precise combination of those two factors.
Investors hate uncertainty, and there’s a lot of that right now. Still, that uncertainty should fade in the weeks ahead.
You can learn a lot about history by studying it but to truly understand it, you had to have lived through it. This holds true for the popularity of financial instruments as well. This is a companion piece to Jonathan Clements’s recent post, “Seeking Uncertainty,” in reference to Savings Bonds.
Savings Bond mania was in full swing during World War II. They were introduced by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1935, before I was born.
https://www.morningstar.com/retirement/ed-slott-how-roth-iras-can-help-with-estate-planning?utm_source=eloqua&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=AdvisorDigest&utm_content=None_62149&utm_id=32158
Every day brings me another insurance offer. In today’s mail, I was invited to insure against identity theft for $34.99 a month.
Last week, I was sent a “final notice” to purchase a home warranty. In the same batch of mail, I was offered a $20,000 whole life insurance policy for $132 a month.
My most faithful correspondent is my water company. Every month it invites me to insure the water pipes under my lawn for about $1,000 a year.
Here is the link to Christine Benz of Morningstar interviewing Ed Slott, who many consider THE expert in the country on the IRS’s interpretation of IRA laws/rules for 2025.
Ed is a gold mine of information as to how to decide on whether to convert traditional IRAs to Roths, and it’s effect on your beneficiaries.
https://app.mscomm.morningstar.com/e/er?utm_source=eloqua&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=MorningDigest&utm_content=None_62004&utm_id=32087&s=1258972516&lid=91893&elqTrackId=894e84e4e6dd4e4ea71a9bc97420afd2&elq=c1c50cb96d48485491b4d81fbe5a229d&elqaid=62004&elqat=1&elqak=8AF55770D8A5B2AC19A42DE86CB56351215EDD04764F052A1F72EA4FA79B9C459194
