Best ways to prepare for college during each year of high school.

As a parent, of course you want to give your child the best opportunity for future success, and for many, attending college is part of that opportunity. If you have a high school student, it's time to start preparing them for their college years. Ideally, you have been saving funds to pay for education, but, if not, now if the time to begin serious planning for how your family plans to cover college costs. Today, the average college graduate owes $37,731 in debt, while the average salary for a recent graduate is $49,785.¹

You've reached the retirement summit - now what?

We put a lot of time into saving and investing money for retirement, but we don’t spend nearly as much effort developing a strategy for withdrawing those assets once we retire.
However, developing a retirement strategy is similar to planning a mountain trek — how we get down from the peak is just as important as how we scale up it.

If it seems like the cost of, well, everything has gone up lately, it’s true.

The inflation rate jumped in the first half of 2021, leading to price increases on everything from gas and groceries to bigger ticket items such as cars and homes.
The jump in inflation can be especially jarring after nearly a decade of steady, low rates.¹  But what causes fluctuations in the inflation rate?

And most importantly, could rising prices pose a risk to your plan for retirement?

This topic is showing up more often in news stories which can cause anxiety. As with all financial decisions, it's important that we gather information and think logically about how inflation could impact our future plans

Today we'll explore some of the common questions about inflation. We’ll also look at how to think about inflation as you plan for a retirement that could span 20, 30 or even 40 years.

Cola and Social Security.

The news keeps getting better for Social Security recipients.

It's now projected that benefits will increase 6.1% in 2022, up from the 4.7% forecast just two months ago. That would be the most significant increase since 1983.^1,2

It’s all about inflation. Social Security cost of living adjustments (COLA) are based on the consumer price index, which rose 5.4% in June — its largest 12-month increase since 2008. The official announcement is expected in October and, once it’s confirmed, the revised payment will go into effect in January 2022.³

More than 65 million Americans receive Social Security, and the annual cost of living adjustments are designed to help recipients manage higher costs. At the start of 2021, recipients saw a 1.3% increase.⁴

In a perfect world, logic would always guide our financial decisions. Emotions wouldn't come into play. However, we don't live in a perfect world. . . far from it.

At Creekmur Wealth Advisors, our job is to design unique strategies that help our clients reach their goals in the most efficient manner possible. However, despite our best efforts to plan for the future, sometimes life steps in and throws us a curveball. Experiencing a catastrophic life event could quickly derail an otherwise effective plan and leave us scrambling to pick up the pieces.

What would you say if someone asked you to name your most valuable financial asset? Many high earners believe their most valuable assets are their savings and investments. You may have substantial savings in both your home, savings, and investment accounts. They’re the most significant part of your tangible asset portfolio. And yet, none of these is your most valuable asset.

When you marry, you buy life insurance. Right? You buy it out of consideration for your spouse, and also realize that in the event of either your untimely death or your spouse’s untimely death, your household could be left with one income to shoulder expenses that may not lessen.

These days, people are marrying later in life. Take first marriages, for example. A recent study by the Pew Research Center says the median age for marriage in America is now 30 for men and 28 for women, compared to respective median ages of 23 and 21 in 1968. Today, 16% of us are waiting until at least our late forties to marry.^1,2

This summer we have plans to take a few days off here and there to relax and spend some time with family – always a good thing to do during the summer months! One of these occasions included a long weekend in Park City, UT which is one of our favorite places in winter and summer. My son Alex wanted to take a mountain biking trip and, although I haven’t ridden a bike in quite some time, I agreed to tag along. Overall, it was a good experience and a beautiful day in spite of the downhill tumble that I took! Get the “full” story in my video below!🚵

Much of the material available regarding personal finances is directed towards W-2 workers, or what we would consider a traditional “employee.” This makes sense, research from 2019 showed that roughly 72% of Americans are traditional employees.¹ But, the other 28% of our working population has some specific financial planning needs as well. Today we want to touch on a few tips to help self-employed workers keep their financial house in order.