Retire Smarter with Kevin Kroskey, CFP® & Tyler Emrick, CFA® CFP®

Pension lump sums are higher in 2020 than 2019. But which should you prefer? Listen to Kevin discuss how to financially evaluate the decision as well as what research shows retirees prefer. Whether you have a pension from your company or not, you'll benefit from this episode. Why? Anyone can invest money with an insurance company and receive a lifetime income in the form of annuity payments. So th...

Sue is a recent widow and has gone through significant life and money transitions. Listen to Sue's unique story and learn why her financial concerns are likely the same as yours. And be sure to listen to why Sue refused to shake hands at the end of our initial meeting and what she did instead. Useful Info: True Wealth Design Website:  http://www.truewealthdesign.com/ Call: 855-TWD-PLAN or 855-893-...

Avoiding Ohio income tax is key for many snowbirds. The old adage of just having to be out of Ohio for 6 months never was correct. Listen to Kevin explain the key steps in documenting your Ohio nonresidency. Useful Info: Request The Ohioan's Guide To Snowbirding In Florida:  https://www.truewealthdesign.com/contact/ True Wealth Design Website:  http://www.truewealthdesign.com/ Call: 855-TWD-PLAN o...

It's that time of year again. The northern states are filled with grey skies and cold, wind, and snow. If you're thinking of heading south for the winter, here are four key considerations to making your snowbird experience a success. Useful Info: 10 Best Retirement Cities Episode:  https://retiresmarter.podbean.com/e/top-10-best-retirement-cities/ Request The Ohioan's Guide To Snowbirding In Flori...

Things in life and planning aren't necessarily cut and dry. You may take several paths to reach your destination. But which one may be best? Listen to Kevin discuss a retirement situation where several strategic paths existing and how he and his team came to the preferred path in creating an integrated, tax-smart distribution plan. Useful Info: True Wealth Design Website:  http://www.truewealthdes...

It's common to see articles or to-do lists for year-end tax planning. But these often lack substance and fail to answer why a strategy may or may not make sense for you. Listen to Kevin describe a simplified framework to understand your tax situation and then how to thoughtfully consider what tax-smart strategies make sense for you. Useful Info: Randall Munroe's "What If" Book:  https://www.amazon...

We want it all in life and for our retirement. We want the city where we live to have it too -- affordability, a plethora of activities, fantastic quality of life, and great healthcare. Learn the 10 best cities as ranked by Wallethub and what makes them great. Some may even surprise you. Tune in and start envisioning where you want to be in retirement and plan for how to get there. Useful Info: Wa...

You made it to retirement and seem to have enough. Now how do you go about recreating your paycheck and distributing money from your savings and investments and to do so in a tax-smart way. How do you do it? Listen to Kevin describe the process True Wealth goes through to make sure these important distribution details are handled to help you stay on your retirement track and pay no more than your...

While your asset allocation recipe is the most important portfolio decision, we still want good ingredients. Listen to Kevin explain the broad differences in active and passive (indexed) ingredients, the evidence behind each, and some exceptions to where an indexing approach may not work as well. Useful Info: True Wealth Design Website:  http://www.truewealthdesign.com/ Call: 855-TWD-PLAN or 855-8...

Your asset allocation recipe is the most important portfolio decision, and there are a few different flavors of asset allocation. Listen to Kevin describe the differences and what the evidence shows works best. Useful Info: True Wealth Design Website: http://www.truewealthdesign.com/ Call: 855-TWD-PLAN or 855-893-7526

Now that you understand the basic building blocks of an investing process, listen to Kevin explain what key factors investing science has shown to drive stock and bond returns over time and which to favor to build a better portfolio. Kevin also explains a recent phenomenon in stock prices that is reminiscent of the late 1990s Tech Bubble as it relates to one of the key factors that drive stock ret...

Do you have an investment process? Most people don't understand their advisor's process (if they have one). Yet, in investing, you cannot control your investment results, but you can control your process, which should lead to better results over time. Listen to Kevin give you a high level of a science-based investing process you can understand without having to get a graduate degree in Finance. Fo...

Most financial people only focus on your assets. Listen to Kevin share four examples of clients where better incorporating a holistic view of their finances -- assets and liabilities included -- made a significant financial improvements in each of their lives. For more about True Wealth Design, visit: http://www.truewealthdesign.com/

Believe it or not Congress actually agrees on something ... that your beneficiaries shouldn't be allowed to stretch IRA required distributions over their lifetime. Listen in to hear Kevin talk about this likely law change is an issue, who is mostly affected (hint: larger IRA owners), and what to do about it. For more about True Wealth Design, visit: http://www.truewealthdesign.com/

How much money do you have in international investments? How much should you have? Listen to Kevin discuss what the science of investing says and why you are likely underallocated to international markets. And be sure to listen to the end where he shares a story of a recent conversation with a new client related to international investing. For more about True Wealth Design, visit: http://www.truew...

Financial life planning is being purposeful in continually moving your life in the direction you desire and then matching your finances to support it. Said another way, it is financial planning done right. Listen to Kevin share a story of a client evaluate trade-offs and find a work-life balance that is better for them. He also shares a story of how he and his wife made big life changes after thei...

Social Security’s future solvency is a regular discussion point when considering your retirement planning. Simply put: can you rely on receiving what is shown on your Social Security statement? Tune in to hear the latest nuggets from the 2019 Social Security Trustee’s report – he read it so you don’t have to – and what Kevin believes to be the most likely reforms. For more about True Wealth Design...

Jane is in her mid 60s. She recently inherited money from her father and is soon to be getting remarried. She had two advisors – her own and now dad’s advisor – but didn’t have the clarity and confidence she felt she needed around her money and these big life transitions. Listen to Kevin share her story as she considered what she really wanted from a relationship with an advisor and wrestled with...

When choosing investment vehicles, for many people the most important factor is the guarantee that they'll receive a certain amount of income across their lifetime. But what exactly will that guarantee cost you? We'll find out on the fifth and final episode in the Retirement Income Planning Series. For more about True Wealth Design, visit: http://www.truewealthdesign.com/

When building a financial plan that's based around investing, it's important to take into account a handful of dynamic elements that will likely vary quite a bit throughout your retirement. Tune in to our fourth installment of the series to hear how you can organize your plan around dynamic market expectations, dynamic allocations, and dynamic spending. For more about True Wealth Design, visit: ht...

If you're taking a probability-based approach to investing as we discussed in the first part of this series, you'll need to build a strategy for how to most efficiently invest your savings to provide an income throughout retirement. That's where the Total Return Portfolio comes into play. For more about True Wealth Design, visit: http://www.truewealthdesign.com/

We continue on with the series by discussing a lesser known type of risk called bad-timing risk. What happens when you retire into a bad period in the market? How can a few years of negative returns affect the outcome of your retirement? For more about True Wealth Design, visit: http://www.truewealthdesign.com/

For many people, one of the biggest fears going into retirement is where money will come from when you're no longer receiving a paycheck. That's why creating a retirement income plan is so essential. Join us as we go over the basic strategies for building a retirement income plan on this first episode of the new series. For more about True Wealth Design, visit: http://www.truewealthdesign.com/

When it comes to building a holistic retirement plan, all of the individual pieces should be working together harmoniously, whether that's planning, investing, or taxes. Let's talk about why integrated advice is often hard to come by, and why it's crucial to building a successful retirement plan. For more about True Wealth Design, visit: http://www.truewealthdesign.com/

You've likely heard that making short-term predictions about the market is just about impossible, but what about long-term predictions? Can experts accurately anticipate what will happen over the next 10 years? Kevin discusses a recent Morningstar article by Christine Benz about what you can take away from long-term stock and bond return predictions. For more about True Wealth Design, visit: http:...