Getting Your Finances Ready For Baby

So you are having a baby or maybe this is your second baby. While this is definitely one of the biggest changes of your life from an emotional and physical standpoint, it also impacts your finances. As if you don’t have enough to worry about! Just taking a few steps and making some financial preparations will only help you after the baby comes.

Family Finance Handbook: Discovering The Blessings Of Financial Freedom by Frank Damazio, Rich Brott With insights gained from twenty-five years in business and ministry, the authors lead you through the book using biblical principles of stewardship and financial management. They show you how to get out of debt and guide you carefully through the investing process. Family Finance Handbook shows you how to develop a right perspective, especially relating to your value system, priorities, vision, personal goals, and lifestyle.

It’s never too early to start your spending plan and budget. Items are definitely going to cost more than you think they will. Who knew formula would be at least $22 a can and that a baby can go through 2-3 cans a week? Some additional items to think about when redoing your budget: medical insurance, childcare, food, furniture, clothing, and toys. Ask your friends with children what they are spending to get a rough idea of how much things cost in your area. Instead of thinking about how much you are going to give up, think instead about setting priorities on what is important to spend. So maybe you won’t be traveling as much but you still want to get your hair done. If your family is considering a loss of income, this is especially important! Go over your spending plan regularly, at least once a month.

There are a few key financial papers you need to think about, your will and life insurance. Updating (or creating a will) can be one of the toughest decisions you and your family will have to make. It’s not just about changing the beneficiary but deciding who would be the trustee in case anything happens to you. In addition to thinking about who would be the best person to raise your child, you have to decide who the most fiscally responsible person is too!

Money Came by the House the Other Day: A Guide to Christian Financial Planning and Stories of Stewardship by Robert W. Katz, Jamie Katz "This is a practical, common sense handbook that every Christian should have. I heartily recommend [it]" by Ronald E. Cottle, Ph.D., Ed.D., President, Christian Life School of Theology, Columbus, GA

While life insurance isn’t the most exciting thing to think about it, it has to be done. Having a baby is one of those times to make sure you have enough life insurance. Schedule a few appointments with agents to make sure you getting the right type of life insurance (term or whole life) as well. Visit www.accuquote.com to learn more about life insurance.

Finally, don’t forget about your retirement. With more and more women staying-at-home or working part-time, your retirement plan often gets forgotten with everything else going on. Next thing you know, you haven’t been saving for more than five years and you have been missing out on precious compound interest. You can always use the money for your child’s college education. Remember, children weren’t raised in a day and your finances can take a few months to iron out the kinks as well. Just take it month by month and enjoy the newest member of your household.

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Demystifying Mutual Funds

Mutual funds are an essential part of your personal finances. They are the fuel of your retirement plan, can help you buy a house and the easiest way to take advantage of the stock market. If you don’t have any money saved, you can still start investing in mutual funds immediately. With over 12,000 mutual funds in the marketplace, they can definitely be overwhelming!

A mutual fund is a group of stocks or bonds (and sometimes both). When you buy shares in a mutual fund, you are buying equity in all of its holdings. The rule of thumb is that if you have less than $75,000 to invest, you should stick to mutual funds to be properly diversified. For a small management fee (more on this later), you get a qualified money manager to manage your money. Mutual funds are much easier than individual stocks and bonds to monitor and determine how your investments are performing. Plus, if you don't have a lot of money, you can start investing in mutual funds for as little as $50 per month!

Because there are so many mutual funds out there, it can be overwhelming on where to begin and how to select a mutual fund that is right for you. The first place to start is to determine what your needs are. Do you want the investment for the short-term (less than 3 years) or mid-term (5-7 years) or long-term (10 years or longer) – like retirement? This will help you decide what kinds of mutual funds you should buy. You want to make sure you are properly diversified which means you are spreading your risk among different types of mutual funds.

If you are investing for the short-term, you should stick with relatively safer Money-Market Funds. For the Mid-Term and Long-Term, you want to build a portfolio with a combination of Large-Cap Growth, Large-Cap Value, Small or Mid-Cap, International and Bonds. The percentage you want in each of these categories depends on your age, time horizon and risk level. If you don't have any investments and only a small amount to invest, a great mutual fund to choose is a Balanced Fund (also called a Domestic Hybrid or Moderate Allocation). This is one mutual fund that combines stocks and bonds. There is also the Target or Lifestyle Mutual Funds. You pick the mutual fund according to the date that you want to retire (ex: 2030) and it will combine all the investments you need for a diversified portfolio. I call it One-Stop Shopping.

You have three main choices from where to buy a mutual fund. You can go to a mutual fund company, such as Vanguard or T. Rowe Price and pick five mutual fund styles such as: Large-Cap Growth, Large-Cap Value, Small or Mid-Cap, International and Bonds. Or, you can go to a mutual fund supermarket such as Fidelity or Schwab. There is a lot to pick from here, which can also be overwhelming. Lastly, you can go through a broker. The broker usually suggests which mutual fund to buy. Just be careful because this is the most expensive route and the broker might be "pushing" a certain fund based on the commission he or she gets paid.

If you don’t have the minimum needed for a mutual fund (which is usually $2,500), some of these mutual fund companies will let you invest $50 a month as long as you make it automatic and link it to your checking account.

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Pension Management - Can We Do It Better?

Everybody wants to be able to afford to retire happily and securely in some wonderful place where great hobbies are available, with a nice respectable community of like-minded residents.

Managing Pension Plans: A Comprehensive Guide to Improving Plan Performance by Dennis E. Logue,Jack S. Rader Managing Pension Plans is essential for anyone who wants to know about pension fund management. Logue and Rader have distilled an complex subject into a comprehensible work. Their excellent book fills a void, providing an accessible, yet complete guide for finance professionals, students, and anyone involved in the pension plan decision.

The unfortunate drawback to this entire plan is, of course, the money. Such luxuries are expensive and if you imagine you have always spent a small fortune each month trying to keep your lifestyle going along a pleasant track, then think what you are going to have to allow for when every day is fundamentally a holiday.

Some people think that retirement is some sort of holding stage just slightly short of actual death, and it therefore might seem silly to stash away a huge amount of money to fund this stage along life’s rich path. Well, they could not be more mistaken.

Many people spend twenty or even thirty years in retirement. Could you fund your living expenses for the next thirty years without working another day? I know I could not. Many pension schemes and life management companies base their policies on standard scenarios, where the man is four or five years older than the woman, both working, expected to retire at the appropriate time, with no contingencies allowed for, such as sudden death of the man and the woman being considerably younger.

My own parents staged their retirement in the worst possible way. My mother was more than ten years younger than my father and he died with a very small pension payable, as he was still working and expected to continue doing so. My mother was unexpectedly left with a tiny pension yet enormous financial commitments and no other source of income. Her final years were spent worrying about bills.

Friends of mine got themselves into a huge problem by deciding to divorce in their later years. Of course their pension covered only a joint payment based on the assumption they would always be together. In an age where divorce is almost more commonplace than successful marriage, that is a startling assumption to make. Not that I have a solution to the problem. As always I prefer to highlight the difficulties and let someone else find the solution to them, it is what I do best!

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5 Reasons Why Index Funds Should Be Part Of Every Portfolio

Index Funds: The 12-Step Program for Active Investors by Mark T Hebner Shows investors how to obtain their optimal rate of return by matching their risk capacity to an appropriate risk exposure.

What is an index fund? An index fund is a mutual fund that duplicates as closely as possible the performance of a stock market index or bond market index that it tracks. A few examples of indices are: S&P 500, Wilshire 5000, Russell 2000 and Dow Jones Industrial Average.

• Index Fund Introduction
• MUCH LOWER FEES AND EXPENSES. Who wouldn't want to save money on their investments? Because index mutual funds are passively managed, they charge lower fees resulting in some of the lowest expense ratios in the mutual fund market. Vanguard, one of the leading index fund providers, has an average expense ratio of 0.27% versus the market average for all mutual funds of 1.50%!
• BETTER PERFORMANCE. Most non-index funds do not outperform their relative index. Only 35% of active fund managers beat their index [according to Ibbotson Associates]. Why not go directly to the index?
• TAX EFFICIENT. For your taxable investments, you could have much lower capital gains tax due to less stock turnover - which will save you money on your taxes. Because the mutual fund is mirroring the investments in the index, the manager is trading much less - which means fewer capital gains or losses. Mutual funds with a high turnover ratio are hit with higher capital gains taxes in an up market, even if the investor didn't sell her/his mutual fund shares. For people that have a high investment income tax bill, this is especially important.
• LESS STRESS. Index funds are usually easier to monitor and check performance. For example, if you invest in an S&P 500 index fund, you can easily check the Year-to-Date performance each week by just reading the front page of the New York Times Data Bank section on Sunday. Much easier than reading your statements, wouldn't you agree?
• EASIER TO FIX YOUR ASSET ALLOCATION. You just finished your financial checkup and found that you are lacking small-cap value stocks. The easiest way to remedy this, assuming other characteristics meet your standards is to find an index fund of small-cap value stocks.

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Get Your Hands On Unclaimed Money Texas

You may be wondering why I have titled this article as "Unclaimed Money Texas". Well, it appears that there are more inquiries for claims coming out of Texas. Why this is, I don't know, but the people of Texas appear to know how much is in the pot of unclaimed money in the United States. It is wise that you know too.

There are startling statistics about unclaimed money in the US. You will be surprised to learn how much is in the pot, and why it is difficult to discover the process in which to make a claim.

Here are some facts:

1. An estimated 7 out of 10 Americans are owed unclaimed money.
2. $1,000, $5,000... even $10,000 claims are not uncommon.
3. The U.S. Government DOES NOT have one central database for unclaimed money.
4. There is, right now, approximately 35 Billion dollars of unclaimed money, property, stock, cash and more. And the US Government is earning interest on it!

I think you'll agree that these facts ARE startling.

Look at fact 4 above. Notice that the US Government is earning interest on that money. I believe this is why it is made to be difficult to make a claim. If you do your research, you will find this difficulty to be true.

It is not only money that goes unclaimed, but property too.

There are some US States that take further advantage of this money and property. Unclaimed money has been known to be seized, and one State generates about $400 million in annual revenue from this source. Don't forget - this is YOUR rightful money being seized.

If you DO - and I seriously recommend that you do - look into making a claim, then beware of all the scams that are around. There are people and agencies that will make the claim for you... for a fee. Some of these services are legitimate, but many are not. For instance, some States put a cap on what these services can charge, so if you go this route, be aware of this.

I have done my research and found a great resource for the unclaimed money and property process. Alas there was no money for me, but I did find my mother $4200! Believe me, this was a GREAT feeling, maybe even better than if the money had been mine. And since then I have helped others find their unclaimed money too. It still amazes me how much unclaimed money there is out there. So my advice to you is to find out if you have a claim. It is YOUR money after all.

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