And so begins another year. As the end of the year brings certain financial planning strategies like tax loss harvesting, maximizing retirement contributions or reviewing estate plans, the beginning of the year is also a good opportunity to revisit your finances and make sure you are doing all you can to reduce future stress when it comes to retirement. At Fagan Associates, at the end of the year and beginning of the new year, we like to revisit our stock and bond allocation and position ourselves for the next 6 to 12 months. However, the financial markets are unpredictable and sometimes it feels like you have little to no control of your financial future. Although the markets can be tricky and frustrating at times, we think it is important to control the things you can control - that includes dollar cost averaging into your retirement accounts every pay period. Every year brings changes in contribution limits to retirement accounts that account for Cost of Living Adjustments (COLA), just like social security. Below is a chart detailing the limit changes, and the maximum contribution to each retirement account.
If you need any advice pertaining to your 401(k) allocation or would like to speak regarding increasing your IRA contributions, please feel free to give us a call. We would be happy to sit down with you to discuss in further detail. To quote Sarah Newcomb (as we do in our Newsletter), a behavioral economist for Morningstar, “long-term investment plans are only useful if we can abide by them.” Control the things you can control.
“This presentation is not an offer or solicitation to buy or sell securities. The information contained in this presentation has been compiled from third party sources and is believed to be reliable, but its accuracy is not guaranteed and should not be relied upon in any way, whatsoever. Fagan portfolio characteristics and holdings are subject to change at any time and are based on a representative portfolio. Holdings and portfolio characteristics of individual client portfolios may differ, sometimes significantly, from those shown. This information does not constitute, and should not be construed as, investment advice or recommendations with respect to the securities listed.
Additional information including management fees and expenses is provided on our Form ADV Part 2. The actual return and value of an account fluctuate and, at any time, the account may be worth more or less than the amount invested. Bond Investments are affected by interest rate changes and the credit-worthiness of the issues held in the portfolio. A rise in interest rates will cause a decrease in the value of fixed income positions. Past performance results are not indicative of future results.”
