Your Life Simplified: A Financial & Wealth Management Podcast

A Roth IRA is an important component of your retirement portfolio. In this episode of Your Life Simplified, Valerie Escobar, senior wealth advisor, and Michael MacKelvie , wealth advisor, discuss mistakes that can be made when investing in a Roth IRA and how to avoid them. Topics discussed include spousal contributions, Roth 401k options, the 5-year rule and contribution eligibility.

On this episode of Your Life Simplified, Valerie Escobar , senior wealth advisor, is joined by special guest, Brett Kunshek , head of options. They break down what an option is and dive into risk mitigation, generating income and return enhancement. They'll also cover areas of frustration for investors and examples.

To kick off the new year, Valerie Escobar , senior wealth advisor, and Michael MacKelvie , wealth advisor, share financial goals and new year's resolutions you may want to set in 2023. From retirement planning to estate planning and gifting, we cover ways to help you achieve your goals.

With only a few weeks left in the year, make sure you check everything off your financial list. On this episode, Valerie Escobar , senior wealth advisor, and Michael MacKelvie , wealth advisor provide an end of year wealth planning checklist, which includes areas like retirement planning, Required Minimum Distributions and gifting.

In this week's episode of Your Life Simplified, Valerie Escobar , senior wealth advisor, and Christina Lynn, practice management consultant, continue their conversation about financial conflicts between spouses. Topics discussed include tips for managing spousal differences as an advisor, suggestions for spouses when talking about financial conflict and examples of financial conflict.

In this week's episode of Your Life Simplified, Valerie Escobar , senior wealth advisor, and Christina Lynn, practice management consultant, dive into the topic of financial challenges between spouses including divorce, overspending and how wealth advisors and clients can communicate during this difficult time.

In preparation for Thanksgiving, Valerie Escobar , senior wealth advisor, and Michael MacKelvie , wealth advisor, share what they are grateful for. Each discusses one thing in the financial industry and one personal thing they are cherishing this season. Listen to hear more about their gratitude for compounding interest, investments and financial planning.

In this week's episode of Your Life Simplified, Mike MacKelvie wealth advisor, and special guest Kevin Ahern, Human Resources Manager, discuss Health Savings Accounts and the 5 benefits of having one.

In this week's episode of Your Life Simplified, Mike MacKelvie wealth advisor, and special guest Kevin Ahern, Human Resources Manager, discuss how to get the most out of your open enrollment.

In this week's episode of Your Life Simplified, Valerie Escobar, senior wealth advisor, and special guest Joe Reynoldson, associate wealth advisor, get into the spooky seasons spirit by discussing five financial decisions that can haunt you and tips to avoid making these mistakes.

Description: In this week's episode of Your Life Simplified, Valerie Escobar, senior wealth advisor, and Mike MacKelvie, wealth advisor, discuss what a donor-advised fund is, the best strategies to use a donor-advised fund and how they can be beneficial to your charitable giving.

In this week's episode of Your Life Simplified, Valerie Escobar, senior wealth advisor, and Mike MacKelvie, wealth advisor, discuss how financial decision making can be tied to emotion and why it is important to make logical decisions when managing your finances.

In this episode of Your Life Simplified, Valerie Escobar, senior wealth advisor, and Michael MacKelvie, wealth advisor, discuss how retirement plan rollover works. They also discuss your rollover options, including but not limited to the pros and cons of using an IRA as a rollover vehicle, and what options may be beneficial to your long-term goals.

In this episode of Your Life Simplified, Valerie Escobar, senior wealth advisor, andMichael MacKelvie, wealth advisor, discuss the checklist you should run through before the end of the year to make sure your taxes are in ordergoing into the new year.

In this episode of Your Life Simplified, Valerie Escobar, senior wealth advisor, and Michael MacKelvie, wealth advisor, talk about pensions and how you can use your pension to elevate your retirement plan. Mike and Valerie discuss the factors to consider when thinking about your pension, risk factors and the other pension options that may be available to you.

In this episode of Your Life Simplified, Valerie Escobar, senior wealth advisor, and Michael MacKelvie, wealth advisor, discuss the ins and out of tax-loss harvesting. Topics discussed include the selling of a security, capital gains brackets and tax deferrals.

Compensation for executives can come in different forms and be more complicated than simply earning a salary. In this episode of Your Life Simplified, Valerie Escobar, senior wealth advisor, and Natalie Haggard, senior wealth advisor, discuss the different retirement plans that are advantageous to executives, compensation in the form of stock and strategies to effectively make the most of your exe...

Long-term care insurance can be complex and costly. With so many different plans available, it can be difficult to know which one is right for you and your family. In this episode of Your Life Simplified, Valerie Escobar, senior wealth advisor, and Mike MacKelvie, wealth advisor, discuss the thing you should consider when searching for a long-term care insurance plan and how to have a successful l...

In this episode of Your Life Simplified, Valerie Escobar, senior wealth advisor, and Mike MacKelvie, wealth advisor, discuss the complexity of college funding and strategies to tackle to rising cost of college. Mike and Valerie weed through the complexity of paying for college talk about effective ways to pay for college including 529 plans, Roth IRAs, brokerage accounts, and things to consider be...

How do you, as an investor, sift through all these choices that you have when creating your wealth plan? What's the order of operations when building your financial plan and managing your cash flow? In this week's podcast episode, Mike MacKelvie, wealth advisor, is joined by special guest Abby Foster, associate wealth advisor, as they discuss tips to help maximize your wealth through this order of...

The one constant in life is change, and the investment world is certainly no exception. As the world changes, more investors seek to invest in a socially responsible way. In this week's podcast episode, Valerie Escobar, senior wealth advisor, and Mike MacKelvie, wealth advisor, talk about how you can invest in a socially responsible way. This area of investing can seem overwhelming and complicated...

Inflation is unavoidable right now. You see it every where you look and on the news, but what can we do to combat this inflation? Is there anything you can be doing differently in your portfolio?  In this week's podcast episode, Valerie Escobar, senior wealth advisor, and Mike MacKelvie, wealth advisor, talk through several different variables affecting inflation.  

An estate plan can play an important part in your overall wealth plan and can make a large impact on your spouse and children. Taking a few steps can help ensure that your estate doesn't end up in probate and your family isn't left with a headache. On today's episode, Mike MacKelvie is joined by special guest Drew McDowell, attorney and senior wealth advisor at Mariner Wealth Advisors, as they tal...

When keeping up with the, sometimes sensational, media coverage of the markets, things can seem bleak without proper context. In this week's episode, Valerie Escobar and Mike MacKelvie talk us through how to assess the information we glean from these news story headlines, and how it might impact our investing plans.

Are you thinking about retiring early? In this week's episode of Your Life Simplified, Valerie Escobar, senior wealth advisor, and Mike MacKelvie, wealth advisor, discuss several things you should think about before retiring early. Considerations discussed include Roth conversions, capital gains, when to take social security and how much income you should take during retirement.