|
Saving Big Time with These Unadvertised
Secret Deals
Saving and investing are two areas America needs to know about,
but rarely reads up on. It can cost you in money, in years
before retirement, even happiness or your possessions. Of
course, when it comes to investing to a goal that’s immediate,
there are a few key things I can suggest to you. First of all,
remember to consider your immediate goal and how immediate it
really is. Remember that debt also means it will cost you more
in the long run, with interest. It’s also very hard to pay off
debt before retirement, and even harder during retirement. This
goal has to be worth what you’re spending.
Secondly it’s important to remember that investment means you
expect something back from what you’re investing in. Of course
with investment, there is also risk. Never risk more than you
can afford to lose! I have to repeat that, because it’s vital:
never risk more than you can afford to lose. Let’s use the
analogy of gambling. Gambling is an extremely risky investment,
you could score big and get extreme profit, or you could walk
out with empty pockets. Some men gamble away their children’s
college funds and can’t pay their own bills. Though this is an
extreme case, it exhorts the amount of caution needed.
Okay, you’ve made your choice: now what? First of all, don’t
let your bills slide to make an investment. If the investment
flops, so does your bill money. Many would say if this is a
case of closer certainty, use your normal saving money. Either
way, there are people who went to school and trained and have
much experience in these very issues. Consult one of them
before you invest in any goal. They are available to give you
the confidence or warning you may need to take the plunge and
advice on how to not go broke doing so. Making investments can
be important to your future, if your investments go well that’s
a nice, healthy retirement!
Paying taxes can be stressful and annoying. A lot of things
also change when you’re considering retirement or in
retirement. Retirement is something America is still trying to
figure our correctly. When social security started, it was to
help us out of the depression and was a temporary fix. Later in
our history, that was changed. It didn’t turn out to help us
much-- the average social security check is $838.00, which is
not enough to support most people’s cost of living after
retirement. All of that said and done, how do you pay taxes on
retirement account withdrawals, penalty-free?
According to SmartMoney.com, “You probably know that taking
withdrawals from a tax-deferred retirement account before age
59 1/2 generally results in a 10% penalty. The penalty applies
to payouts from traditional IRAs, simplified employee pensions,
or SEPs, and qualified retirement arrangements such as pension
plans, profit-sharing plans, stock bonus plans, 401(k) plans,
Keogh plans and the like. So we are talking insult added to
injury here. While I certainly discourage raiding a
tax-deferred retirement account before actually reaching
retirement age, it sometimes can't be helped. In these
situations, a key objective is to dodge that darned 10% penalty
whenever possible.
Confusingly enough, the list of exceptions for IRAs and SEPs
isn't identical to the list for qualified retirement plan
accounts. One exception available for all types of accounts is
taking annuity-like withdrawals over your life expectancy. You
can use this calculator to figure the amount of penalty-free
annuity-like withdrawals that you can take from a particular
tax-deferred account. The annuity-like withdrawals must be
taken at least annually.” Because that may be confusing, most
experts would suggest you consider talking to a trained
professional, someone with skills and experience in these
areas. Make sure you trust this professional, as slip ups in
these areas could really cost you.
|