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December 7, 2024 53 mins
December 7th, 2024
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Episode Transcript

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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Live from the w g y iHeart Studios. Welcome to
Retirement Ready with your host Dave Kopek from the Retirement
Ready Show. Every week, Dave and his team discuss the
ways they can help people make informed decisions about a
wide array of retirement planning information that can support you
and developing a more certain financial future for you and

(00:20):
your family. Now it's time for Dave Kopec, WGY's retirement
planning specialist.

Speaker 2 (00:46):
You man, Christmas, you remember spring time, feeling be love,
this sumer strange and around.

Speaker 3 (01:02):
Lot of Christmas? Do remember? Almost tipped a mask something?

Speaker 2 (01:14):
I consider them, but there was and.

Speaker 3 (01:19):
I even thought of Gamlember. It seems so fun to
go all right, that's a good.

Speaker 2 (01:24):
One to tar or a Christmas songs?

Speaker 3 (01:30):
Anamy songs they did, Zach, But they did a lot
of good ones together. Pretty good team there. Hello everyone,
Happy holidays. Ho ho ho. Today is the seventh, eighteen
more days and Sanna's coming down the chimney. Hopefully you
got I've got zero done as far as my Christmas shopping.

(01:52):
Goose egg el zippo, nothing nilch good, Zach. I always wait,
I always wait at the very end. Something about it
the energy. It's not about it, you know. You know,
you got to get it done and you just you
stay focused.

Speaker 4 (02:11):
Well, I mean you're a big sports guy, so maybe
you have that clutch gene.

Speaker 3 (02:14):
Yeah, yeah, it is. Put me on the line, coach,
I can hit it. They can hit it. Talking about
hitting it. Syracuse big win in football, one of the
biggest in a long long time. So tipper hat to
Syracuse and we've got a lot of listeners out in

(02:34):
that area that listen to WGY. So congratulations to the
football team. That should put them in a pretty major bowl,
shouldn't it. Huh. Top twenty five, Yeah, whether they twenty
three or something like that.

Speaker 4 (02:49):
Right now, I think they're number twenty three right now.

Speaker 3 (02:54):
Excuse me. I've got a little bit of a cold.
You know' tis the season. It's not my time of year.
But if you're a new listener, we are the retirement
planning group. We work with a lot of hard working savers.
This is the beginning of my forty third year and
in business number forty three, which is hard to believe.
All of our assets are held at the mothership Fidelity.

(03:15):
We are part of FI with Fidelity Institutional Wealth Advisors
Open architecture. We're independent, we have no bias, no predetermined destination.
We act in a fiduciary capacity to do investment management,
acid protection, the legacy that you wish to leave your
loved ones. And we have five locations now in New
York State, Syracuse, Oneana, Glens Falls, AUMNY, Saratoga. I was

(03:38):
in Quse this week, quite a little bit of the snow,
but the city is excited about their team, about their
football team. There's a lot of people that are optimistic
that this guy is the right guy, the guy that's
coaching the team now, but it's hard to believe. We're

(03:59):
at year end and briefly, as you know if you
listen to the show, I'm not big on talking about
the markets on a week to week basis because I
think it's for naught. If you're not long term, you
shouldn't be in the stock market. But this has been
a year where a lot of you can rejoice and

(04:21):
you have reasons to cheer. Stock market has been making
record highs. Our friends in the bond market are still
offering us very favorable yields, and most importantly, we're looking
at the underpinning what I considered be very solid financial markets,

(04:44):
US economy continues to grow at are above trend, and
there is no signs of the R word recession in
the horizon. So this has truly been a goldilos. And
for those that worry that the FED couldn't do it
to land it on a soft landing, well I think

(05:05):
they're going to be very unhappy because I think the
FED did what they were supposed to do. And when
new administration coming in with their agenda to have lower regulations,
less tax cutting, fat and waste in government, I think

(05:30):
you're going to see very my personal feeling, now this
is not Fidelity or any of the investment banking firms
that we work with, I think you're going to see
a very resilient economy in twenty twenty five. So I'm
very bullish. I'm very bullish. And as we're all quite
well aware, seventy percent of GDP, seventy percent of GDP

(05:53):
is of course, you the consumer, and we just keep
on spending, boys and girls. I just drove by Keiller
Motor Car and there's a car there that I looked at.
I'm looking for a car, a good one for my daughter,
maybe upgrade a little bit, and I called and I said,
can I speak to one of your sales representatives? And
they said no. I said, why is that? He said,

(06:17):
they're all busy. So a lot of people are out
there and they're looking to purchase automobiles, furniture, trips, vacations.
So that's good. That's good for consumer out there purchasing,
consumer spending, and the labor market, of course, has been

(06:42):
resiled dollar. I mean, jobs came in yesterday at two
twenty seven versus an estimate of two twenty. So we're
a little bit higher on the unemployment. It ticked a
little bit higher to four point two from the four
point one. But we you know, I I think we're
going to see manufacturing. I think we're going to see

(07:05):
job openings. I think we're going to see more and
more individuals. They're going to reach into their pocket and
say that we want to expand now because of this
uncertainty that we've had. So as I said, I think
we're in a situation where we have climbed the wall
of worry and now we're going into confidence. Confidence, And

(07:33):
I know, as a businessman, I feel pretty good about
what's going on, and you know, uncertainty is never good.
For the financial market, stocks and bonds. So once we
get over the hump here in January, the Trump administration
gets locked and loaded, we'll see exactly where we stand. So,

(07:53):
but what I wanted to say, you know, if you
look back in the beginning of twenty twenty four, no one,
no one, with the exception of one financial guy, came
out with the numbers that we've realized. So far this year,
the Dow is up eighteen and a half percent. S
and P five hundred is up almost twenty eight percent.

(08:14):
Nasdaq is up thirty two percent. So we've had a
very very very very very strong year. And with the
bond market, you know, we're holding the yields, we're not
getting the total return that we thought because we have

(08:34):
had a little bit of spike in interest rates. But
with yields heading lower, I believe in the next year, uh,
you're basically I'm going to see the ability for you
get some total return where you get eight nine ten
percent total return between your coupon and the capital appreciation
of bonds, which is a very very favorable rate of return.

(08:56):
So overall, we're on track, in my opinion, for a
soft landing. I don't see any downturn in sight, and
I see lots of opportunities for investors coming into the
new year. So buckle up, Buttercup, because here we come,

(09:18):
opportunities present themselves. You need to sit down with your team,
your financial team. I had a couple that came in yesterday.
I apologize again for my cold, and they said, Dave,
the markets have done pretty good. Should we take some
of this money? And I allocated more to stocks and

(09:39):
I said, absolutely, positively not. You're up eight percent on
the year, and eight percent are sweet spot for people
that are conservative. If we get anywhere from six to
ten total return in a year, we're dancing in the street.
We're happy. So don't go outside your lane. Stay within

(10:06):
your lanes. Don't chase after yields or returns, because if
you're chasing after them and you're going against the grain,
you're going against what you filled out what we call
the RTQ, the risk tolerance questionnaire. You said that I'm
a conservative, moderate investor, and you're trying to go for growth,

(10:28):
and then the market corrects and you're down fifteen, eighteen,
twenty thirty percent, you will not be happy. Then you're
going to drive your financial advisor or your team nuts.
So today we're going to be talking about some of
this year end planning that you need to start focusing
in on a little bit more. We're going to talk
about titling some of your assets. It's time to do

(10:52):
some housekeeping. You know, when you get ready for spring, fall, winter,
you know you've got to do some house cleaning. Now's
a good time to do a little bit of house
cleaning for your end. So we'll talk about some of
the things. If you don't use it, you lose it,
especially before December thirty. First, I did touch base on
this a little bit last week, but I want to

(11:12):
go over it again because I think it's important for
people to understand that you can do some things that
not only will put smiles on your children's loved ones faces,
but also for you, the parents, the grandparents. There's nothing
better to transfer some of that wealth to your loved
ones during the holiday time and see the smiles on

(11:34):
their faces and the joy that you can bring. The
big thing that I always talk about, and you're gonna
hear me talk about this for a long time, is
the eighty four to eighty five trillion dollars of wealth
transfer that's going to happen over the next twenty thirty years.
You need to get in front of it. You need
to get ahead of it. Why is that because if

(11:55):
you don't, a lot of your money is not going
to go where you want it to go. It's going
to end up and someone else's pocket, or it's going
to end up at the state or the federal government.
As far as tax liability. So we'll discuss a few
of them. But if you're thinking about something, or if
there's something you want me to touch base on, I
am live in the studio today. I'm here in the

(12:18):
iHeartRadio studio in uh. Is this considered Latham or Niski
Unit Latham?

Speaker 5 (12:25):
It is?

Speaker 3 (12:26):
You gotta be right out of the border right here,
Latham or Lotham, Lotham. So, if you want to partake,
if you want to come in and have a chat
with us, Zach is here. If you don't want to
go on the air, that's fine, be more than happy
to have Zach give the question. It's one eight hundred
Talk WGY. That's one eight hundred eight two five fifty

(12:48):
ninety nine, one eight hundred Talk WGY and Dave Kopek.
We'll be right back the eighty six percenters. Do you
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(13:10):
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Speaker 2 (14:55):
Christmas nears this Christmas, I'm travel around in this country
across the water.

Speaker 3 (15:06):
Here back Old Dolly and Kenny. Happy holidays, Merry Christmas,
getting into the season. Be safe, don't drink and drive. Please,
you're gonna go out and have a few refreshments. There's
so many opportunities now, uh restaurants, bars will basically get

(15:30):
you a taxi can uber. I think the big team there,
the big guys, the big hitters, they're doing their cabs
again this year. So don't don't. Don't drink and drive.
It's just it's not worth it and you're just better off.
Just dit in your eyes and cross your t's. Put
the keys in somebody else's pocket and get get a

(15:52):
right home, get a right home. Well, this is the
time of year, Like I said that people are thinking
about gifting right, and we have certain provisions in laws
that are provided to us as far as the state
tax and lifetime giving. So if you have a not

(16:19):
a large estate, it doesn't have to be a large estate,
but if you have monies, excess moneies, how's that say,
consider gifting during your lifetime as a strategy to help
reduce a state taxes or taxes in general. Okay, and
we're going to go through some of the ease quickly today.

(16:40):
But we've had a lot of individuals, our clients and
prospective clients that have talked to us about what they
can do in order to gift money outside their estate
and also put themselves possibly in a better position. But
when you give asses monies to somebody, whether it's stocks,

(17:03):
the government wants to know about it and they want
to collect some taxes on those dollars. Right. Fortunately, a
large portion of your gifts is excluded from taxation, and
there are numerous ways to give assets tax free. Is

(17:24):
that a nice word? Tax free? You can use the
annual gift tax exclusion, which we'll talk about in detail.
You can use the lifetime gift and estate tax exemption,
and you can make direct payments to medical and educational
providers on the behalf of your loved ones. Right, So,

(17:50):
how the gift tax exclusion works? Okay, this is the
one that you heard most about. Currently, in two thousand
and twenty four, give any number of people up to
eighteen thousand dollars each in a single year without incurring
a taxable gift. That's thirty six thousand dollars for spouses.

(18:13):
That's up one thousand dollars from twenty to twenty three.
It used to be seventeen thousand dollars. If you exceed
the eighteen thousand to any one individual, you have to
report it on a gift tax return. But for a
lot of people, they're not gonna do that. Okay, we'll
just keep this simple. Kiss, We're gonna keep it super simple. Okay.

(18:36):
So I got a whole bunch of money sitting on
the sidelines. I want to gift it to my kids
and my grandkids. I'm gonna keep it simple. I'm gonna
take eighteen thousand. My wife's gonna take eighteen thousand. I
got Billy and Susie. Billy and Susie are goes both
gonna get thirty six thousand dollars. They're gonna have big
smiles on their faces. They can go out, they can

(18:57):
reduce the mortgage, they can buy a new car. You
can put some money in the kids college education fund.
But the thing is, nobody has to pay the tax
on it. Isn't that nice. No one has to pay
the tax on it. That's a nice gift for the holidays.
Eighteen thousand dollars each husband and wife, thirty six thousand

(19:19):
as many you got ten kids, that's thirty six times ten.
That's three hundred and sixty thousand dollars you can get
outside your estate. So that's one idea. You can stuff
that eighteen thousand dollars into the stocking. Let's go to Paul. Oh,
there's my buddy, big bye bye Paul and Connecticut are

(19:41):
how are you doing? Brothers?

Speaker 5 (19:42):
Can you hear me? Okay?

Speaker 3 (19:44):
I can hear you? Great?

Speaker 5 (19:46):
Great, Okay, sometimes the phone doesn't work.

Speaker 3 (19:49):
That's good.

Speaker 5 (19:51):
I did call your office, So Jim's going to give
you my memo or whatever I say.

Speaker 3 (19:55):
You okay, cool.

Speaker 5 (19:56):
This is a serious point I've wrestled with for the
better part of a few years.

Speaker 3 (20:01):
Yep.

Speaker 5 (20:01):
And I have a scenario that if you have the answer,
I'll take you to dinner, okay, or lunch or something
that if you try to transfer via gift, whether it
be eighteen or all the way to the lifetime gift
exclusion and file the form to someone in what I'm
going to characterize as hut AJ housing. I've read the

(20:23):
regulations at nauseum, the handbook, the eight hundred or I
mean series big number page documents that are published either
at the state or federal level or by the agency
which can get into a DOGE is going to look
at if you do that to a person in aight
a housing, no matter what you try, it will be income.

(20:47):
I don't know if you realize that really yep. And
here and I'm generalizing because I've gone to other CPAs
who have been CFOs of big organizations around boards and
attorneys not practicing who've done high networth tax returns, and
they word it so that I'm just if you, I'm

(21:11):
not going to bore you with the details of this circumstance,
but but I have spent days, two days on this
let's say reading and then saying, look it. Here's an
example of what they'll do if, in fact, you certainly
this is all about board. If you give them a
payment of thirty grand and you don't even put it

(21:34):
in the bank, but you do recognize it filling out
the eight A forms and so forth, they'll still impute
the going rate of interest, or if they don't do that,
they may just recognize it as a gift that one year.
But then if you give the same amount the next year,
it's a recurring gift. It's automatically going to be income.
It's very nuanced the way they write it, because a

(21:55):
lot of people, in my opinion, are gaining the federal
bureaucracy and I think you know what I mean with
medicaid and right. So I've read this for hours and
had other people read it, and I threw my hands
up in the air because it almost requires an attorney
to proceed with the individual state or development you're going through,

(22:21):
and the danger zoneus when you talk to your neighbor
and you know this, the cocktail party guy goes, I
hit it big with you know, Navidia. What'll happen is
somebody will go, oh, you could just do this. My
cousin did it, and then you do it, and then
all of a sudden it hits their income and they're
out of the eight A housing getting you know, paying
thirty percent of their overall rent based on their income,

(22:43):
which is low. So instead of paying two grand a
month your pay which you would have to pay, you're
paying maybe four fifty a month. These are real examples
telling me how I know that with a child that.

Speaker 3 (22:56):
Has SSD soial security disability, you know, I know that
you have to sure extremely careful with that because you
don't want to screw the best.

Speaker 5 (23:04):
I'm just saying, and it's not a slam dunk. So
when people try to do the good thing, or you know,
you have a death in the family, or you try
to give gifts, you may start to ask questions and
all of a sudden you find out it's not as
simple as that. I swear it's a real life case
that I'm dealing with. I'm just I'll get most frustrating thing.

(23:26):
I dealt with it a long time.

Speaker 3 (23:27):
I'll do a little sniff sniffing around on it. I
got a good buddy of mine, he just left. I'll
ask Lou But the thing is is that you get
you gave Jim your telephone number.

Speaker 5 (23:39):
Absolutely, it's even in the email. But okay, I didn't
plan on calling. But when you start talking about gifting,
I've heard every scenario on this well, and I just said,
you know, I'm going to play Belmont Park tomorrow. I
can't worry about it anymore.

Speaker 3 (23:54):
You know, you know, you know, Paul, there's uh trillions
of dollars out there, trillions we're starting to see here.
We're already at the tip of the iceberg of this
as far as we're starting to see the wealth transfer.
And the thing is is that if people don't get proactive,
a whole hell of a lot of that money is
just going to evaporate in taxes.

Speaker 5 (24:14):
Well, you know what, look at I'm going to tell
you this too, and I don't want to go on
too long, but my main if you didn't ask about
the gift issue and start getting into it and make
note of it, I was going to just reflect on
a book that I read years ago called Jesse Livermore
Stopped Speculator King, And I'm of the strong opinion that

(24:37):
the S and P. Five hundred is incredibly overvalued due
to indexing, and I watch all these seminars, so a
lot of people are thinking they're smart, but they're participating
in a speculative liquidity flow into indexes and value based

(24:58):
and vesting with dividends which you might be a proponent of,
and just solid companies who make something, which is not
to say that Navidia doesn't make something or Microsoft doesn't
they're going to have an awakening when I don't know,
and I don't mean like I'm a bear. I believe
Trump is good for the markets, but I believe in

(25:21):
every indicator I've seen, and I'm listening to Kudlow now
like now i'm listening to you. I composit it all
together and reach charts. It doesn't smell right. It just
doesn't smell right. The longitudinal point I make goes back
to Jesse Livermore in the in the nineteen twenties.

Speaker 3 (25:40):
We'll talk all right, Hey, listen, brother, I got to
go off for a hard break. God bless them.

Speaker 5 (25:44):
No problem.

Speaker 3 (25:45):
I'll call you pel. We got I guess about eight
or ten seconds here, I'm going to come back. I'm
going to talk a little bit more of things that
need to get done before yours and contributions to your
qualified plans. Also, we'll be right back. I'm assuming that

(26:23):
there's no singing for this. Nay, Happy holidays, hoping everybody
is enjoying the weekend. It's a Saturday, big football day.
How many big games today? Bunch?

Speaker 4 (26:44):
Right, A bunch probably like six or seven, all.

Speaker 3 (26:48):
For championships of their conferences. Correct, and don't forget about CBA.
Got CB a.

Speaker 4 (26:56):
Hunter Box.

Speaker 3 (26:56):
CBA wins, You're gonna win. I think it's the first
time ever in double a New York state where you've
got CBA and already playing CBA Syracuse. I think I
can't verify that, but speaks volumes about those two schools.
So go brothers. That's my message. So we're talking about

(27:22):
things that need to get done. Paul from Connecticut, my buddy,
called in, and you know, he's very on top of
the game. I you know, I want, I just want
to say something because I know that Paul's an advocate
for it too. He's an advocate for annuities. He believes
in them. Nyga's. There are new products are out there

(27:42):
right now that I've done some research. I've gone to
conferences called buffered annuities, Okay. If you haven't looked at him, folks,
and you're worried about the market, or if you think
that the market can do a correction, I call him
the touchdown account. These are products that have done exceptionally
well and they protect on the downside and the bottom
line gets down to down. If you haven't looked at him,

(28:04):
and you are adverse to risk, you should take a
look at him. I went to a one day conference.
We are starting to integrate these types of products for
our retirees, people that are in the red zone, and
I think they make all the sense in the world.
So okay, so I said, gifting eighteen thousand dollars per individual,

(28:28):
as many as you want to give to Mom and
dad can both do eighteen thousand. You got ten kids,
you can give three hundred and sixty thousand dollars a year.
Why do I like this because it gets it outside
your estate. You're seeing the smiles on their face. Some
of us have done exceptionally well over the last few
years as far as our net worth and the amount
of assets that we've accumulated. Why not take advantage of

(28:51):
it as long as you can. So the other thing,
this is for mom and dads that are out there
that are over the age of seventy and a half,
not seventy three, but seventy and a half. The IRS
allows you to do qualified Charitable distribution, which allows IRA

(29:16):
owners up to one hundred thousand dollars in tax free
gifts to a charity per year. So if you're sitting
on a pile of cash in an IRA and you're
saying to yourself, I don't need this money. I've done
better than what I anticipated. I'd like to get some

(29:38):
of this down to where I know don't have to
worry about it as much as far as my rm DS,
the Internal Revenue Service allows you, and I went overemphasized
individual retirement accounts. People at are over seventy and a half,
they can transfer up to one hundred thousand dollars to

(29:59):
a chair tax free. Say that again, one hundred thousand
dollars to a charity tax free. These transfers, which are
known as qualified Charitable contributions or distributions or qcds, or
for you, a great opportunity and an easy way to

(30:22):
give to a charity before the end of the year.
In those that are over the age of seventy three.
That magical age now, which is called RMD, that you
have to take a certain amount of money out of
your IRA, whether you want to or not. The QCDS
Qualified Charitable Distribution counts towards your RMD distribution for the year.

(30:50):
So how many times have I heard of the forty
three years that I've been in the business, Dave, I
don't want the rm D. Dave, I don't want to
take the money. Well, how about if you take the
money and now you transfer it to a qualified charity, church, synagogue, college,
whatever it may be. But here's the key, here's the key.

(31:16):
You cannot do this yourself, Lisa. In my office, my
operations manager has been working on this for weeks. As
far as what we're doing for our clients, they must
be made directly, Okay, I'm going to say this again,
made directly by your trustee, which for us is fidelity
of the IRA to the charity. Okay, has to go

(31:42):
from the trustee of the IRA to the charity. No check, right,
you don't take the money out, put it in your
personal savings account and then write a check because it's
not going to work, so, believe it or not. Each
year IRA owner over the age of seventy and a half.

(32:05):
I think it used to mirror R and D and
they'd never made the change on it can exclude from
their gross income up to one hundred thousand dollars for
qcds for a married couple, mom and pop over the
age of seventy and a half, mom and dads can
do two hundred thousand dollars. So if you both have
large iras and you're trying to figure out what are

(32:27):
we going to do, I'd like to send some money
to this charity or this college or whatever it may be. Okay,
you can do it, and you can put a big
smile on your face because you're gonna do it and

(32:48):
you're not gonna suffer any text consequences. Okay. So one
of the things for you to think about on this
end of the year, right holiday season, when you go
through you know, the laundry list of things that need
to get done and the reasons why you want to
basically high five and jump up and down. Yes, the

(33:09):
stock market has been making record highs like anything else,
the stock market is cyclical. Just like about next year,
we could be sitting here and we can be down
twenty or thirty percent. No one has a crystal ball
on the direction of the stock market. Okay, if we
look at it overall, the economy has continued to grow.

(33:31):
There's no signs of a recession right now. I mean,
there are some people that believe that the market is
a little frothy, meaning that the pe ratios are a
little bit high. But as we look towards twenty and
twenty five, I think we can look at the consumers
to be a little bit more resilient. You're going to
have lower interest rates most likely, and wage growth that

(33:54):
hopefully will exceed inflation. And they usually as a recipe
for a little bit of a smile on our face. Okay,
So we talked about charitable intent. We talked about the
eighteen thousand dollars that you can gift of non qualified assets.

(34:16):
We talked about taking an advantage. Doesn't have to be
one hundred thousand, be ten thousand, you'll be twenty whatever
you want to do that makes you as far as
a tax free distribution to a charity as long as
you're over the age of seventy and a half. What
else is in the stocking. Here's one that I think
a lot of you should pops. Possibly, you have monies

(34:41):
that we call safe money, right, moneies that have been
sitting there for an extended period of time, nine to
one to one money. A lot of times people will
use that money right and they let it's set, Let
it's set, dividends go in their cash distributions, your social security.

(35:02):
The next thing, you wake up one day and there's
two three, four hundred thousand dollars in there. You need
to reposition some of that wealth in order to get
yourself a more competitive rate of return net to you now.
Tax re municipal bonds, I know, not too sure if
you've been watching them last couple of years, two years ago,

(35:24):
two three years ago, they've been kicked in the teeth.
The last twelve months they've rallied. We've had some pretty
nice returns and tax free municipal bonds. I'm an advocate
of short term, short duration, tax remunicipal bonds for your
safe money. Why is that if it's state specific, we'll

(35:45):
use New York State as an example. There is no
tax on that money, no tax, no state, no federal tax.
And you can take all of those dividends and all
that money that you've accumulated in that account and you
can allow it to grow. Now is it for everybody? No,

(36:06):
because you are going to get market fluctuation like you
don't get with a money market account, a savings account
or a CD. But if you're in a situation where
you're getting kicked in the teeth a little bit as
far as your tax liability, not a bad idea. Diversification
is your friend. Remember that diversification is your friend. The

(36:28):
more asked classes you have, the better off you're going
to be. Never put all your eggs in one basket.
And our job as financial advisors is not only to
give you that diversification, but also to find tax preferenced money,
money that will allow you to get tax free benefits
or tax preference when it's being paid out to you.

(36:50):
So I'm going to take my next break. I apologize
for my voice. I'm I'm quaffing here a little bit,
and I apologize for that got my early cold for
the winner of twenty twenty four. When I come back,
I will you talking about some ideas and suggestions before yours.

Speaker 5 (37:08):
En.

Speaker 3 (37:10):
If anything that I'm talking about you want to come in.
You've had a lot of individuals this year come into
the Retirement Planning Group at one of our locations. We
are in five locations now in New York, Syracuse, Albany, Oneanna, Malta, Saratoga,
and then of course Glen's Falls. Give us a call
five one eight, five eight zero one nine nine, check

(37:31):
us out on the web RPG retire dot com. And
as I said, drive safe out there. It's starting to
get a little bit of flurries here in the Latham
area right now. Just be careful, don't drink and drive.
Enjoy the holidays. You need to go somewhere. You're going
to have a couple of refreshments, get an uber or
get a d D designated driver. We'll be right back.

(37:53):
Your partner for success, David Kopek, heir WG WISE Retirement
Planning Specialists, the Retirement Planning Group. We understand that retirees
face many important decisions that can affect their long term
financial success. Some of these decisions revolve around making investments
that will help create a hedge against outliving their assets,

(38:13):
the impact of inflation, taxation, and rising health care costs.
Most of our clients like the time, the desire, or
the experience to manage their own investment portfolios. We consider
it to be an honor and a privilege to help
our clients make sound investment decisions though contribute to a
secure financial future for them. Because over ninety percent of

(38:35):
our clients or retirees with similar concerns, we are in
the best position to approach such challenges with experience and skill.
Give us a call today at five one eight, five eight,
zero one nine one nine five one eight five eight
zero one nine one nine or RPG retire on the web.
The greatest risk in retirement most of us have no
plan for We're insurance to cover the expense. A long

(38:58):
term care event can impop spouse, drain your life savings,
and cost stress and anxiety on your family. What is
your plan and how will you pay for a long
term caravan? Call the Retirement Planning Group today discuss options
you should consider to protect your estate and have choices
and independence. Take action call today five one eight, five
eat zero one nine or RPG retire on the web.

Speaker 6 (39:31):
Jingle Bell, jingle Bell, jingle bell, jingle bell, swing and
jingle bells, ring snow and blowing up bushels of fun.
Now the jingle House has big guns. Jingle Bell jingle bell,
jingle bell rock, jingle bells, China jingle.

Speaker 4 (39:53):
Bells, all right, prancing jingle bell square and.

Speaker 3 (40:00):
You got your Christmas tree up yet day after Thanksgiving?
Is it a real one or a make believe one?

Speaker 4 (40:09):
Artificial? It's real, real, artificial.

Speaker 3 (40:14):
I'm trying to convince my wife. My wife has got
this thing where we got to have a real tree.
And I don't mind doing it. But you know, by
the time it's the end of the holiday season, the
neils are all over the place. It's just you know,
you got to go out, you got to set it up.
It's just so much easier if it's a make believe one.
But it is what it is. You know what, happy wife,

(40:38):
happy life, you got it? Remember that. Well, you bachelor's
out there, they're getting married. I frequently tell my kids,
make sure the mama is happy, mama's happy, everybody's happy.
All right. We're at the time of year we have

(40:59):
a lot of meeting with clients. We're talking a little tidbit,
little house cleaning before yours n and a request. I
don't know why this is, but we get it a
lot this time of year where a parent will call
and say I would like to add my child to
my bank account in case something happens to me. Sounds

(41:27):
familiar for some of you, it will, and I guess
the goal for a lot of the parents when they
ask about this, is to give their children access to
their money during a nine to one to one situation.
And it seems like, of course it's an easy process,

(41:50):
but parents should be aware that's simply by making a
child a joint owner. When I say a child, I
mean it's not a minor, talking about you know, twenty thirty,
forty fifty year old individual. It can have unatteniced consequences

(42:13):
and it's a lot of times, folks, to be honest
with you, it's not the best solution during a family
crisis because I've seen some horror stories with this, and
I'm not saying that it happens with everybody, because it doesn't.
But when you set up a joint tenants with right

(42:36):
of survivor, this type of account generally states that upon
the death of either one of the owners, either one
of the owners, the assets will automatically transfer to the
surviving owner, and that can create unexpected consequences, to say

(43:06):
the least. So Billy's a good boy, I know, that
Billy will do what's right. Billy knows what I want
to happen once I passed away, because Joey and Susie

(43:28):
and Barbara live outside of town. But he'll know what
to do. So the intent is good, right, But sometimes
money changes people. Sometimes circumstances changes people. And as I said,

(43:54):
at death of either one child or parrot, the money
automatically will transfer to the surviving regardless of what your
will says. The will has no play in this whatsoever,
zero zippo. So adding anyone other than a spouse could

(44:20):
add in some complications. What's the first one. What happens
if Billy gets into a bad situation financially? What happens
if Billy goes out and has a car accident and
it gets sued. What happens if Billy gets divorced unexpectedly?

(44:51):
He owns half those assets, right, So if a parent
adds a child to let's say a five hundred thousand
dollars saving account, and then you're in a situation where

(45:14):
the child, the child right inherents those assets because the
parent has passed away, and there is nothing stated specifically
as far as a TOD or a pod a transfer

(45:37):
on death or a payable on death document. That means
that Billy gets five hundred thousand dollars and the other
three kids got their fingers crossed that Billy's going to
do the right thing. So what's the better way? Well,

(46:04):
I just said it, TOD transfer on death. Most financial
institutions will allow you to structure what they call a
TOD or a POD, depending on whether it's a bank
account or a broke rech furm. And then when you
pass away, the beneficiary on those accounts receives the percentages

(46:25):
that are allocated. Right, has no impact on you, there's
no impact on the kids. They still receive the assets
of a step up and basis, and it's an easy
way to simplify. To simplify transfer of wealth, all you
need to do is walk into the bank or into

(46:46):
the brokerage firm and show a death certificate, no probate,
no delay in time, as long as you're in name
beneficiary on that account. We are big believers for a
lot of reasons in order to do a revocable trust,

(47:11):
not in you're revocal, but a revocable trust. And there's
many reasons for that, but that's for another show. Because
I'm getting short on time today. So what I'm saying
to you is that if you're sitting on a whole
bunch of money there and you're relying on one of
the children, I'm going through a nightmare right now with
a client of mine. Total nightmare. Father died, mother received

(47:42):
all the assets, family feud. One of the children has
basically been the point person. That child now is basically
pulling the strings on the financial assets or probably eighty
percent of the wealth is going to go to that

(48:03):
child and twenty percent to the remaining two children. So
regardless on how you set up your overall estate, if
you give someone that magical power called durable power, durable

(48:30):
financial power, you're adding them basically as a joint owner
to your accounts and they basically sit in your seat.
So this is the time of year what I said
at Thanksgiving, this is a great time of year to
sit down and have the chat. It's also a great

(48:51):
time of year in order for you you look at
your financial statements, your beneficiary forms, any documents, change, marriages,
change people's health change. You need to be proactive about
these planning opportunities or what I call unforeseen events that

(49:14):
can basically destroy a family. It's complex. You need your
financial team, you know, I need to talk to a
state planning attorney like lup Piro and your financial advisor
kiss make things simple for your loved ones, and then

(49:41):
you should be able to basically have a plan that
will be implemented without a destruction of a family or
bad feelings. Excuse me. So I'm gonna highlight what I
talked about, and if you want to come in and
have a chat with us, we do offer a complimentary

(50:04):
consultation at any of our five locations. Will come to you, plane, train, boat,
whatever it is. We can do zoom meetings, Ring Central,
doing a lot of those. Now, give us a call

(50:24):
five eight five eight zero one nine. That's our telephone
number at the office. Check us out on the web
rpgretire dot com. It's just the initials of the Retirement
Planning Group. And as I always said, things happen, Unexpected

(50:47):
things happen. But if you have a plan that's in
place where you can basically alleviate, basically modify some of
these unforeseen events, it's gonna go a long way to
make a complicated situation uncomplicated. So, like I said, don't

(51:12):
do it alone. You need a team. Eighty five trillion
dollars is transferring. It's already happening. We're already seeing it.
And if you do it right, you're basically leaving a legacy.
If you do it wrong, you're either gonna leave complicated
assets or you're gonna leave assets that they're gonna be

(51:35):
major tax liabilities. People running all over God's creation with
death certifics trying to put everything together. So we can
help you do that again. If you'd like help, check
us out on the web rpgretire dot com. It's just
the initials of the Retirement Planning Group rpgretire dot com.

(51:58):
Give us a call at the office. Tell Jim, Lisa
or Jared you're listening to me on the radio. You
want to come in for an appointment. Five one eight
five eight zero one nine nine, God bless, have a
great weekend.

Speaker 1 (52:11):
Thank you for listening to Retirement Ready, hosted by Dave Kopek,
w G wise retirement planning Specialist. If you'd like to
talk with Dave for someone of the Retirement Planning Group,
call five one eight five aid zero one nine one nine.
That's five twenty five eight zero one nine one nine
during business hours or visit rpgretire dot com. The Retirement

(52:34):
Planning Group has five convenient offices located in Albany, Malta,
Glens Falls, Syracuse, and Oneanna. Tune in again next week
for retirement planning strategies with Dave Kopek right here on
WG wise Retirement Ready. The information our services discussed on
this show is for informational purposes only and is not

(52:56):
intended to be personal financial advice. The investments in services
offered bias may not be suitable for all investors. If
you have any doubts as to the merits of an investment,
you should seek advice from an independent financial advisor.
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