A $100,000 annual income is the target millions of Americans aim for in retirement: enough to cover housing, healthcare, travel, and comfort without touching principal. The question is how much capital it takes to…
An $850,000 brokerage account sounds like a lot of money until you do the math on what it actually pays. To pull $55,000 a year out of that account in income, you need every…
A 30-year-old single mother carrying $74,000 in debt wants to know whether she should open a 529 college-savings account  for her 4-year-old son. Dave Ramsey had a quick answer for the caller on his…
A recent Animal Spirits episode centered on a listener who had reached $1 million in investable assets and hated it. He called it “the single worst level of realistic wealth a normal person can…
Six years. That is how much time separates retirees from a Social Security system that, by its own projections, runs out of money. If you are 56 years old today, you will be 62…
In litigation-exposed professions, the creditor protection gap between a 401(k) and an IRA is one of the most consequential and least discussed features of the retirement system for high-balance savers. A $1.8 million 401(k)…
If there’s one thing that tends to upend retirement budgets, it’s inflation. You can estimate your monthly costs at the start of retirement and do a good job of not spending beyond what you’ve…
Inheriting a $500,000 traditional 401(k) triggers mandatory distributions under the SECURE Act‘s 10-year rule, and the tax consequences can accumulate across the full distribution window. The SECURE Act eliminated the stretch inherited 401(k) for…
A $500,000 portfolio in a savings account earning near-nothing is a missed opportunity. That same $500,000 deployed into income-generating assets can produce roughly $31,000 per year in dividends without selling a single share. The…
I was stunned by a number from the Money Guy Show recently: for every single dollar that flows into a 401(k), 40 cents of that comes out as a premature withdrawal on average. Americans…
A 32-year-old with $45,000 in non-mortgage debt recently called into The Ramsey Show to ask: “Would it be smart for me to open up a Roth IRA now even though I’m still in debt…
I’m mostly a tech investor, but I like to keep some dividend holdings as well. For example, I’ve been a Vanguard Dividend Appreciation Index Fund ETF (NYSEARCA:VIG) investor since 2011. Among my fellow dividend…
You log into your old employer’s 401(k) portal and the balance reads $0. No transactions. No explanation. Just zero, where $40,000 or $80,000 used to be. This plays out thousands of times a year,…
A 63-year-old with $1.4 million in a traditional 401(k) who delays Social Security to 70 can collect $3,720 per month instead of $3,000 at full retirement age, but funding that delay through 401(k) withdrawals…
Social Security benefits will be paid until you pass away, and periodic Cost of Living Adjustments in most years ensure that your benefits largely keep pace with inflation so your buying power does not…
