Welcome to A/B Conversations:

We Will Help You CFP® Your Way Out Of It, a podcast where you get into the minds of a couple Certified Financial Planners™ on how we think about everyday financial planning questions and what should really matter most to you.

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We’re over halfway through the year so that means it’s time for a Midyear Investment Outlook! Join Ben and Adam as they reflect on the market during the first six months of this year and give their perspective on the investment outlook for the remainder of 2023. Tune in to gain valuable insight on the opportunities and risks for investors.
The Department of Education is calling this the “most ambitious and significant redesign of the federal student aid application in decades.” Ben and Adam discuss how these changes may impact your situation and where new planning opportunities should be explored.
On our 100th episode, we discuss planning situations and strategies that go into preparing to live to age 100. Longevity is the biggest risk in retirement and it amplifies other risks such as cost of living, healthcare, inflation, and medical expenses. As the more time goes by, the more things are likely to change if your life. It's important to review your estate plan and financial plan on a regular basis because the earlier you can plan for longevity, the better. Tune in to hear tips for preparing for a long and financially healthy retirement!
In this podcast, we talk about the dangers of benchmarking yourself against others. We provide tips for focusing on what you can control to avoid making potentially harmful decisions based on what you would think somebody else would want you to do.
What is the 4% withdrawal rule? It's the general idea that when you get to retirement, whatever the pool of money is that you have, you can theoretically safely withdrawal 4% of that balance every year until you pass without running out of money. There are many variables that go into that such as inflation, how long you will live, how much income you will need in retirement, investment returns, and your own definition of success. We believe that it's important to engage in financial planning to help review trade offs and your specific situation. To hear our updated thoughts on the 4% withdrawal rule and if it requires a major change in strategy, check out this podcast episode!
Most people are familiar with trusts through conversations or experiences with their parents or friends. But just because the circumstances may have made sense for them to establish a trust, it doesn't mean that it is right for your situation today. In this podcast episode, we discuss what a trust is and what it does. We discuss circumstances where it may apply and where it may not. And, we also clarify what type of accounts you should put in a trust.
Money is said to be one of the top causes of marital distress. We sometimes joke that meeting with your financial planner can often feel like a combination of math class and marriage counseling. A big part of advising is listening, understanding, and communicating. When couples don't agree, we try to help them focus on the points of agreement, which usually includes what matters most to both of them. Our goal is to influence the way they talk to their spouse about money through partnership and a shared vision. In this podcast, Adam and Ben talk through how we can be the middle man - so to speak - in this type of situation.
Our experiences in life will shape the way that we think and feel about money. It's statistically impossible to run into somebody who hasn't lost a loved one and hopefully that's not a really painful story to tell. That's one reason why we talk about the role of life insurance in planning so hopefully emotional travesties don't become a financial one. In this podcast episode, we talk about the importance of life insurance and planning.
At Haas Financial Group we love statistics! We often play a fun game where someone has a statistic and the other person has to guess what they think it is. Oftentimes the actual answer is wildly different than what we were thinking. That proves the point that conventional wisdom is often not in line with the statistic and it leaves us trying to figure out why there is a disconnect between what somebody should be doing and what they're actually doing. In this podcast episode, we highlight some surprising facts in financial planning and investing. Will you go "huh" after listening?
In this podcast episode, we provide a checklist to help prepare for your final career year. This is partially a financial conversation, but what we've come to recognize is that during this time of change, many experience fears of getting it wrong, failure, and anticipating loneliness. There's a big psychological hurdle to approaching financial independence too. When we talk about preparing, it's really to help with those emotions and provide a sense of financial security. If you are thinking this may be your last year of work, there are also financial considerations for your bridge years. What happens when your paycheck stops? Do you know what your monthly expenses are? Have you thought about a budget? Have you thought about healthcare?We've walked many people through this process and if you're not really sure about the next steps to take with this checklist, then reach out to us!
Nobody wants to relive the results of last year from a market perspective. But, we can use this historical context as a guide to shape our outlook for 2023. The odds of us having a positive year this year are in our favor, even though we are still facing many of the same issues. Ben and Adam hope that giving some historical context will help investors understand what to expect from investments this year.