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Shane Flait's Articles

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Estate Planning Addresses Your 5 Basic Questions in Later Life You may have heard about estate planning. Your estate is composed of everything you own - and that includes yourself. But what is the 'planning' really about and should you be concerned getting it done? At some point later in life you decide that you should make provisions for both you and your estate. This article addresses 5 basic questions that encompass those provisions, the consequence of not answering them, and the urgency for doing so. Family Courts Tyrannically Deny Fit Fathers Their Constitutional Right to Parent Their Children Family courts routinely deny one fit parent - overwhelming the father- his parental right to raise his child. They tyrannically allege a right to deny father's fundamental rights since they do so for 'the best interest of the child'. Such family court claims are tyrannical and directly conflict with constitutional rights and protections - as this article shows. How Taxation Rules Your Investment Options You grow your savings so to use them later. Outside of contributing they grow according to how you invest them. Government's taxation plays an important part in how you choose what to invest in and how to hold that investment. This article overviews how your savings or investments are taxed and how that influences what you choose to invest in. Jailed Father on Hunger Strike to Protest Denial of His Parental and Other Constitutional Rights Dr. Amir Sanjari, was divorce after a 17 year marriage. He's a UK Citizen who was originally invited to the United States to Stony Brook University, New York for a research position. Now he's destitute and on a hungar strike in jail to protest the unconstitutional denial of father' rights and more. IRAs, Roths, and 401(k)s with Taxed and Untaxed Minimum Required Distributions (MRDs) IRA and Roth IRAs are two examples of government-regulated retirement savings plans - called qualified plans. Both are generally personal plans you set up that you can contribute to and withdraw from. Other examples of qualified plans associated with work are 401(k), 403(b) and their Roth versions- like Roth 401(k). This article explains which qualified plans have minimum required distributions (MRDs) associated with them and some strategy. Making Yourself Financially Independent Isn't Lucky - It's Planning If you want to accomplish something, you'll invariably need a plan - an effective plan. Most people think becoming financially independent is a pie-in-the-sky happenstance for those with high incomes, lottery winners, and lucky investors. They're wrong. With commitment and a mindset, it's within reach of most. In this article I'll map out a way that almost everybody can achieve financial independence if they put their mind to it. Real Estate Can Give You High Growth Rates at Low Risk Buying residential housing offers the best investment for relatively little risk if done conservatively. Whether you buy home or a house to rent, tax laws, leverage, and demand help you to acquire and grow your real estate investment. This article shows you how. Earnings Are As Important As Contributions to Your Retirement Savings Just contributing to your retirement savings is not enough. You've got to make them earn decent returns so their compounding effects significantly add to what you eventually accumulate. To settle for pathetic investment earnings makes saving for retirement only a contribution game with meagre results. This article shows the kind of earnings you need to compound your way to a decent retirement. Government Asset Protection - Too Much and None Where There Should Be Government laws and its legal system play a part in asset protection. In some venues they may protect too much, while in others, they're the villain that we should be protected from. This article examines when and where. Your Life Insurance Policy Presents Many Options If You're Short on Cash If you're in need of cash or running short on income, you can turn to your permanent life insurance policy to help you out. Your policy carries both a cash value and provides a death benefit at your death. Both these attributes give it value you can extract for yourself. This article shows a variety of ways your policy can solve your cash needs. Coming to Terms with Asset Protection Strategies Asset protection deals with protecting your assets from others who may make a claim on them through a court action. Developing an approach to what asset protection strategy you need requires you to understand which assets of yours are vulnerable to be claimed, when, and from whom. This article outlines these points and the boundaries and limitations that affect your choice of asset protection device. Family Courts Give Fathers No Protection for Their Rights and Assets - Just Tyranny Divorce and paternity lawsuits have sky-rocketed over the last 40 years. They produce immeasurable damage to fathers, their children, their productivity, their assets and their futures. It's wholly uncalled for except for benefits that a mega billion dollar divorce industry receives at the expense of fathers by denying their most fundamental rights. This article explains why fathers find no protection for their children and their assets. How Much Income Tax Are the Feds Really Taking from You? If you're trying to save money, you ought to know how much the federal government is taking from what you earn. Most people just don't know. Finding out will show you why it's hard to get ahead. This article shows how the fed gets 35.4% of an $80,000 working income. Retirement Phase Questions to Answer Retirement brings a whole new set of considerations to our lives. It's our third - and last - phase of life. In this article I'll outline the sequential stages of our retirement years and the issues you should address - ideally, early in the first stage. Manage Your Retirement Income with the Critical Ages in Mind Certain ages are critical when managing our retirement plans. Failure to plan with those ages in mind can produce lost benefits. In this article I outline those dates and explain how they affect your retirement benefits. Enjoy Retirement by Recreating a New Mental Outlook Retirement is our third phase of life. Our first phase found us growing up and becoming educated to make a living. In the Second phase we create a family and the wealth to support and raise the kids through their own first phase. we need to recreate our outlook for our third phase to reap a new opportunity for enjoyment and avoid the depression and loss of purpose that many retirees feel. This article addresses how you can do just that. It's Never Too Late to Create an Agreeable Retirement If you're a Boomer or fast approaching retirement age but you're far behind in retirement savings, don't give up. You can still pull together a retirement that you can enjoy. With perseverance, planning, and sacrifice, you can retire in relative comfort even with a late start. In this article I show you how to set up a strategy for achieving a good retirement by maximizing your retirement income and minimizing your living expenses. Medicaid Planning With an Annuity Medicaid planning refers to arranging or transferring your assets to prevent or to minimize their use by Medicaid if pay for your long term care. This article explains how you can shelter some of your assets with an annuity while you or your spouse has Medicaid pay for your long term care costs. IRAs and Qualified Plans Offer Limited Asset Protection You can lose your assets to creditors (whom you've borrowed from), to claims under divorce or paternity suits, to trumped-up claims against your deep pockets, or to government for taxes owed. What you have in your IRA or other qualified plan has some asset protection. But federal and state laws together determine when and how much protection those assets actually have - and from whom. That's what this article addresses. A Self-directed IRA: the Pros and Cons Government rules allow use of your IRA for more types of investments than banks and mutual fund companies allow. But you must steer clear of violation self-dealing rules for those nonconventional IRA investments. But, taxation of IRAs obliterates the tax-advantages of some alternative investments. This article overviews nonconventional investments, tax rules and restrictions, and suggests reasons for and against investing in them. How to Let Medicaid Pay for Your Long Term Care 'Medicaid Planning' has come to mean planning to transfer your assets to loved ones in order to qualify for Medicaid coverage of your long term care (LTC) costs. That's because annual nursing home costs about $75,000 nationwide and can easily eat through assets and savings. This article explains some key issues involved in arranging to let Medicaid pay for your long term care. Annuities Help Retirees Secure An Income for Later in Retirement One aspect to living is that we never know when we'll die. Having saved money for their retirement income, retirees often worry that they'll outlive their savings since life expectancies are increasing. An annuity is an investment that is uniquely addressed to providing income for life. This article shows how you can use an annuity to assure yourself a future income if you live longer than you planned. Income Taxation of Annuities, When and On What? An annuity is both a contract with an insurance company and an investment. Your contributions (often called premium payments) to it are invested to produce earnings. This article explains when and what is taxed as income under annuitization, withdrawals, and gifts of your annuity. How to Calculate Your Minimum Required Distribution If You Own an IRA An IRA owner is the person who started and contributed to his IRA. As an owner, you must take a minimum required distribution (MRD) from your traditional IRA or non-deductible each year after reaching 701/2. This article explains the MRD rules for IRA owners only - not for beneficiary owners who have slightly different rules. Your Remaining Life Expectancy for Retirement Planning How long will you statistically live? You probably think that statistically you'll live to about 75. But that's somewhat of a misconception. Having a better idea on what life expectancy means will help you better project how many years of retirement you need to plan for. And clearing up what life expectancy means to you is what this article is about. Different Tax Treatments Suggest an Order for Tapping Your Sources of Income By the time you hit retirement, you've probably acquired a variety of savings and income assets. From these you'll withdraw income to live on and enjoy your retirement years. But because the tax treatment of your various assets differs, you should know that ordering how you withdraw from them can help preserve them longer. In this article I suggest a sequential order you should withdraw from the six common assets categories and why. Keep Your Wealth Longer by Withdraw Income from Your IRA or 401(k) Only After Using Up Your Taxable As a retiree you've probably accumulated savings in both IRA-type retirement accounts and regular taxable accounts. You'll withdraw from them for your annual living expense. But the different tax treatments that apply to IRA-type and regular taxable accounts make it confusing about which type you should withdraw from first. Below I'll show that withdrawing from your taxable accounts first allows you to preserve your wealth longer. A Reverse Mortgage Is a Costly Option to Use Your Home Equity The first advantage of a reverse mortgage is that it allows you to borrow from your home equity without having to pay it back for as long as you live there. But it's a costly way to access your home equity. Here, I consider why it's costly, who might best use a reverse mortgage and other options to access home equity. 3 Serious Health Questions You Must Answer Before Others Do - When You Can't Strokes and dementia can put you at the whim of someone else's decisions about your health care. To keep control of your own health-related decisions when you become incapacitated you must create distinct medical directives that answer how you'll be treated when incapacitated, when relying on life-sustaining equipment, and when you should be resuscitated. In the following I explain what each of these directives mean. Know the 7 Key Parameters of Long Term Care Insurance Our chance for needing long term care (LTC) increases the longer we live. Directly paying for LTC can easily deplete an average person's estate leaving a beneficiary with no legacy. You can purchase LTC insurance to protect your legacy. But you must understand if the 7 key parameters of your policy will do the trick for you. These are explained below. 3 Strategies for Using Your IRA to Invest in Real Estate With real estate prices depressed and a lot of wealth sitting in qualified plans, you may wonder how you can use that wealth to invest in real estate. In this article I offer considerations and strategies for using your IRA to position yourself in real estate for your future benefit. Six Answers about You and Long Term Care Long term care of elderly is everyone's concern since it will most likely affect you or your loved one. In this article I'll respond to 6 questions that encompass your long term care (LTC) concerns: 1. What is LTC? 2. Who needs LTC? 3. Who provides help for LTC? 4. What's the cost of LTC? 5. Who pays for LTC? 6. What should you do about LTC? Know Your Retirement Health Phases To Optimize Lifestyle Choices at Minimum Expense Our health and activity level passes through 3 phases during retirement. And that'll alter our living options and expenses. By recognizing this, you can modify your living expenses now to suit your wishes and happiness. I'll outline these phases and the actions you can take to optimize your lifestyle choices by minimizing your expenses. Plan Not To Be Gouged By Estate Taxes in 2011 Just because the Estate Tax has been phased out in 2010, don't be lulled into thinking it won't be back with a vengeance. On the books, it's slated to return with only a $1 million exemption. Efforts to get rid of it altogether have failed. The government will be looking for more money anyway now anyway. The following give you the full picture and how to prepare for it. Medicare - What's It All About? Medicare is a government regulated healthcare program for those 65 and older. We'll all be on it, so it's important to understand how it works. In this article I summarize the different parts and coverages that come under the Medicare program.