Who doesn’t love a good influx of cash from a nice bonus!? The thing many people often don’t think about is the tax implications of bonuses…

Let’s talk some of the tax strategies that can help mitigate a surprise tax bill or tax penalty.

Have you received a Voluntary Separation Package (VSP)? We know of a few people who have recently and it sure can bring up a lot of questions, the biggest one being, “Do I have enough money to retire?”

But there are other questions and considerations to take into account, including the hardest one, “Am I ready to retire?”

Is charitable giving important to you? Are tax savings important to you? Well, I like both of those things too. Giving can be so rewarding and worth every penny. But if there’s also an opportunity to save some money on taxes while you’re at it, that sounds good to me.

With that in mind, let's take a look at a few changes to the tax rules from the One Big Beautiful Bill Act pertaining to giving that are going into effect next year. Some may help you, some may hurt you. But it's good to be aware.

There’s been a lot of talk recently about the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, and no matter how we may or may not feel about it, there are some tax-and-personal-finance-related items in there that will affect you and me.

Let’s check out some of the main features of this bill and how they may affect us.

What are tail risks? What does it have to do with financial planning? A lot. Tail risk is the risk that's associated with an extreme event that has a small probability of occurring.

Let’s look at a few examples of possible tail risks and some ideas of how we can prepare for them. Of course we never want them to happen, nor think they’ll happen to us. But IF/WHEN they do, we should have things in place so that the tail risk doesn't ruin us.

Are you in search of ways to make yourself a better investor? Do you feel like you don’t know what to do when and how? Do you get overwhelmed and confused by all the advice out there about investing?

Well, let me be one more person giving you advice. No frills, selling points, or fancy terminology, just 6 quick and easy ideas of how to become a better investor.

In Part 1 of this quick two-part series on bonuses, we looked at how to deal with the uneven cash flow aspects of receiving large bonuses.

In this installment, we’re going to go into more detail about different ideas of what to do with the money.

Bonuses. They’re the best, no?

A nice infusion of cash that comes in and opens up so many opportunities.

A common issue people run into is how to deal with the “cash flow” aspects of receiving a large bonus. In this post, we’ll look at a couple of different ways to deal with the issue of having uneven cash flow, illustrated with specific examples.

Not that Bond. Those Bonds.

I Bonds have been very popular investments during the past few years. But as inflation has cooled down, so has the interest rate on I Bonds.

Where do things stand? Should you sell? Or stay put?

Let’s take a quick look.

How should you be invested during retirement? Where will your spending money come from? What happens if the stock markets go down? Are your investments safe enough? Let’s take a look at the concept of Investment Buckets.

Several of my clients are in the process of either buying or selling a home. The top two questions for those who are buying are:

1. Should I buy a house now or should I wait?

2. How much house can I afford?

Here are some high-level thoughts.