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May 4, 2015 in Family Money, Financial Life Planning, Gratitude, Insurance, Mindful living
Long-time readers of the SAGEbroadview Blog are already familiar with my story but permit me a moment to fill in our new readers. On May 4th, 2008 (just as the Great Recession got under way!) my family and I were in a serious car accident. My husband and two sons were banged up but otherwise fine; I had multiple abrasions and contusions and my neck was fractured in two places....

April 28, 2015 in Investing
If you haven’t noticed, we’ve been on a blog roll lately, explaining common mishaps investors face when assessing how their investments are performing in ever-turbulent markets. We’ve covered Time-Weighted vs. Internal Rates of Return and Confusing Cost Basis with Fund Performance. Today, we’ve got one more area to explore: Comparing your returns to popular benchmarks such as the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) or the S&P 500 indexes. Compared to What? “How...

April 21, 2015 in Investing, Tax Management
In our last post, we introduced two investment terms that are a little more technical than we normally prefer, but worth knowing when you want to accurately measure your portfolio’s performance:  Time-Weighted Rate of Return (TWR) and Internal Rate of Return (IRR). Since calculating rates of return and portfolio performance requires complex formulas and computer software that may not be readily available, we often see investors turning to an investment’s cost basis...

April 17, 2015 in In The News
USAToday.com via AdviceIQ.com published Sheri Cupo’s post "Is It Better to Buy or Rent Your First House?" "Spring – a time for fresh starts and, for some, a new home. Before you head out to open houses, your first question should be: Should I own a home at this time? Your second: Or should I remain a renter?" Read the full article here: USAToday.com ...

April 14, 2015 in Investing
If you’ve been reading our blog posts for a while, you know that we try to avoid financial-speak whenever possible. But until the rest of the world follows our lead, sage investors are best served by familiarizing themselves with two weird, but worthy terms: Time-Weighted Rates of Return (TWR) vs. Internal Rates of Return (IRR). We’ll explain what we’re talking about in a moment. But first let’s talk about why it...

March 24, 2015 in Risk Management, Tax Management
  As a follow up to our recent blog post, “Five Warning Signs That It’s NOT the IRS Calling,” a handful of SAGEbroadview clients and others have let us know that they have experienced another form of fraud. Some have received mailings from the IRS (the real IRS), alerting them that they may have fallen victim to identity fraud in the form of a bogus tax return being filed in their name....

March 17, 2015 in Advisor Role, Fiduciary
If you are keeping an eye on the financial press, you may be noticing a flurry of commentary of late, with respect to a financial advisor’s duties and obligations to his or her clients. The White House recently released its report, “The Effects of Conflicted Investment Advice on Retirement Savings.” Shortly after, the Department of Labor reignited its own efforts to raise the bar on retirement plan advisory stewardship. Much of...