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Try
a Little LTC: A Guide to Long-Term Care Insurance |
| A couple of
weeks ago, I did something I haven’t done in a long time. I
hoisted my daughter up onto my shoulders while we were walking
through the park. My daughter loved it; she was laughing,
bouncing up and down, and really enjoying the view. But I
quickly realized why I hadn’t done this in quite some time. My
daughter, who is four-and-a-half years old, is just a little bit
too big for this kind of thing. And I, at 44, am getting just a
little bit too old.
The next day, I had a very sore neck and back. It was about a
week before I could turn my head without spasms of muscle pain
shooting through my left shoulder. The simplest movements —
like bending down to tie my shoes or getting in and out of a car
— became excruciatingly slow and painful. I never knew how
many back muscles were involved in a simple sneeze until I
sneezed and ended up writhing in pain on the floor as the left
side of my spine seized up. I had a scary glimpse into how it
must feel to be old, and an even scarier insight into how it
must feel to require help in performing the most trivial tasks
of daily life. For the first time, I thought seriously about
long-term care (LTC) insurance. Read
more about long-term
care planning in this editorial from best-selling author James
Geary.
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Preparing
Your Financial Fire Drill
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| Dual-income
families, in which both partners contribute to the household
finances, are increasingly the norm. That’s good news, since
it means two revenue streams instead of one are available for
all the (big and little) expenses of daily life. But in their
book The Two-Income Trap, Elizabeth Warren and Amelia
Warren Tyagi highlight an unexpected side effect of the
dual-income household: Families are still struggling to make
ends meet, even with a second income. This financial squeeze is
not, according to Warren and Tyagi, due to over-consumption.
Instead, it’s the rising cost of bare necessities — like
housing, health insurance and education — that are causing the
strain, even as more and more families bolster their earnings
with a second breadwinner. "Today’s parents are working
harder than ever … holding down full-time paying jobs and
still covering all their obligations at home," say Warren
and Tyagi. "Yet, paradoxically … they are more vulnerable
to financial disaster" if they are hit with job loss,
divorce, health problems or some other unexpected crisis. The
authors suggest a way for families to safeguard themselves:
Prepare your own financial fire drill. Read
more.
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Understanding
Your Brokerage Statements
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| Investing
doesn’t stop with researching, selecting and purchasing
investments. After you’ve bought an investment, you need to
keep track of its value and performance and determine how well
it is meeting your needs. To help investors monitor and evaluate
their investments, investment firms provide those who purchase
securities such as stocks and mutual funds with an important
tool: brokerage statements. Three national securities
organizations — the Securities Industry and Financial Markets
Association, the North American Securities Administrators
Association and the Securities Investor Protection Corporation
— recently published an updated version of their
"Understanding Your Brokerage Account Statements"
brochure to help investors use their brokerage statements more
effectively. Read
more.
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Financial
Alerts
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The Federal Trade Commission recently issued a consumer
alert about the unsolicited loan and insurance offers many
people receive after they apply for a mortgage loan. Your
interest in obtaining a mortgage loan will be reflected on
your credit report as soon as the lending company reviews
your credit report, and that information may become
available to certain other companies, such as lenders and
insurance companies. Learn more about why your mortgage
loan application may trigger unsolicited offers from other
companies, how you can benefit from the competing offers
and how to request a stop to unsolicited offers at: www.ftc.gov/bcp/edu/pubs/consumer/alerts/alt171.pdf
As life expectancy continues to rise in the U.S., more
and more Americans between the ages of 40 and 84 are
purchasing long-term care insurance in preparation for
their golden years. Because costs for long-term care
insurance rise with age, it’s important to know the ins
and outs of long-term care insurance, including when to
purchase it. Read more about the potential benefits of
long-term care insurance and what to consider before
purchasing it in a consumer alert from the National
Association of Insurance Commissioners at: www.naic.org/documents/consumer_alert_ltc.htm
NASD has issued an alert to inform investors –
especially military personnel – of the costs and risks
associated with investing in systematic investment plans,
sometimes called “contractual plans” or “periodic
payment plans.” These investment plans require investors
to make a long-term commitment of 10 or 15 years, have
high upfront costs and are expensive if the full term of
payment is not met. Before you make any decisions about
investing in a systematic investment plan, learn more
about the costs and risks involved at: |
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Read
more about these
and other financial alerts. |
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Free
Online Introduction to Financial Planning Available from
University of California, Irvine
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| Many people
think first of retirement or investments when they hear the term
"financial planning," but financial planning is much
more than that. Financial planning is a process designed to help
you take a "big picture" look at where you are
financially and help you manage your finances so you can reach
your life goals. To help people learn more about the variety of
financial issues involved in financial planning, University of
California, Irvine has developed a new course, "The
Fundamentals of Personal Financial Planning."
Made possible by a grant awarded in 2006 through CFP Board’s
Financial Planning Grants program, this online course provides a
comprehensive but easily-understood overview of personal
financial planning and is available for no cost. Read
more.
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About
This Newsletter
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You are receiving this e-mail because you subscribed to CFP
Board's eNewsletter. Periodically, CFP Board will e-mail you
"It's Your Turn," which includes information about
financial planning, financial planning tools and resources,
consumer alerts and much more. Suggestions and feedback are
welcome at mail@CFPBoard.org.
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