Capital Gains on Home Sales A home is a capital asset, this means you can owe capital gains on home sales. In this article, we will go over what capital gains tax is, and how you can avoid it. How It Works If you sell a home for profit, you will owe capital gains [...]
Using Life Insurance as an Investment Life insurance is typically used as a tool to care for your loved ones after you pass. But you can also use life insurance as an investment during your lifetime. You can only utilize whole life and universal life insurance as an investment. This is because they have [...]
Types of Retirement Accounts To help you save for retirement there are several types of retirement accounts. These accounts include Traditional IRAs, Roth IRAs, SEP IRAs, SIMPLE IRAs, 401ks and 403b plans. In this article, we will go over the basics of these 6 types of retirement accounts. Traditional IRA IRA stands for Individual [...]
Qualified Domestic Trust (QDOT) A Qualified Domestic Trust, or QDOT, is a special type of trust that you can use for estate tax planning. In this article, we will go over what a Qualified Domestic Trust is and how it works. Marital Deduction Under IRS Section 2056A the surviving spouse is eligible to deduct [...]
5 Tips to Help You Survive an Audit Finding out you are the subject of an audit can be stressful and scary. But there is some basic information that can help make this process easier. In this article, we will go over 5 tips to help you survive an audit. It Does Not Mean [...]
Deferred Annuity A deferred annuity is a contract you make with an insurance company. In exchange for paying over a sum the insurance company promises to pay you regular income payments at a future date. This is opposed to an immediate annuity which begins payments on the spot. In this article, we will go [...]
Derivative Basics A derivative is a financial contract. Its value is contingent on an underlying asset or group of assets. The price of a derivative will fluctuate with the value of the underlying asset. The underlying assets can include stocks, bonds, commodities, currencies, interest rates, and market indexes. They are often used to hedge [...]
Estate Planning for Blended Families Blended families occur when people with children from previous relationships enter a relationship and start a new family unit. Sometimes this even includes children that result from the new relationship. Estate planning can be complicated in these situations. In this article, we will go over some of the basics [...]
Tax Advantages of Homeownership When you rent there are no tax breaks available to you. However, if you purchase a townhome, condo, apartment, or single-family home there are tax deductions available to you. In this article, we will go over four of the tax advantages of homeownership. Credit Verses Deduction Tax credits are subtracted [...]
Universal Verses Variable Universal Life Insurance Universal life insurance and variable universal life insurance are both types of permanent life insurance. In this article, we will compare universal verses variable universal life insurance so you can decide what is best for you. Universal Life Insurance Basics With universal life insurance you are able to [...]
