From the category archives:

Strategic Rollout

Setting Intentions for a Better Financial Future

January 29, 2012

Podcast: Download (22.9MB)

This week Doug Andrew discussed the following:

Upcoming Free Webinar

Attend our free 90-minute webinar live over the Internet this coming Tuesday, January 31st at 11:00 a.m. pacific (12:00 p.m. mountain, 1:00 p.m. central, 2:00 p.m. eastern), and again at 6:30 p.m. pacific (7:30 mountain, 8:30 central, 9:30 eastern). The topic is “True Asset and Wealth Optimization.” You’ll learn how to choose the right investments for liquidity, safety, rate of return and tax benefits.

Click Here to Register Now

All attendees receive a bonus hardcover copy of Last Chance Millionaire, Doug Andrew’s New York Times best-selling book.

Setting Intentions for a Better Financial Future

One of the great benefits a new year brings is the opportunity to improve our individual situation from the previous year.

Some people choose to seize that opportunity by setting goals pertaining to weight loss, stopping smoking, or accomplishing new ambitions. The key to realizing a brighter future always hinges upon doing certain things different than they were done previously. If we persist in doing things as they’ve always been done, we cannot expect to get a different result.

A good example of this can be found in how a person goes about taking ownership of their financial future.

Too many people have persisted in habits like following the crowd and continuing to put their retirement money into 401(k)s and IRAs where taxes are deferred. They do this with some perceived future tax benefit in mind such as being in a lower tax bracket when they reach retirement.

They stubbornly keep their money in the market where it is most vulnerable to economic volatility and they ride out the ups and downs waiting for the market grow enough to regain their losses.

But the future reality they’re more likely to encounter will include higher taxes rates at the precise time that they have the fewest deductions to offset their liabilities. It’s entirely possible that they’ll end up paying higher taxes than they did when they were earning more.

The past decade has been especially tough on those whose retirement nest egg lost, on average, nearly 40% of its value.

On the other hand, those people who are willing to make necessary changes in the way they do things will get different results than they did before. For instance, thousands of Missed Fortune clients have learned how to use a strategic rollout to safely move their money from their 401(k) or IRA.

By doing this, they pay the applicable taxes today and then move those funds into a vehicle where their money accumulates tax-free from that day forward.

They learn to use indexing strategies that indirectly link their money to market performance in such a way that they don’t lose a dime when the market goes down yet they benefit from any upside immediately. People who’ve implemented our indexing strategies sleep soundly at night with zero stress over what the market may be doing.

They’ve taken the time to learn and apply proven principles and they get very different results from when they were simply following the crowd. This brings confidence in the future and peace of mind.

Three Things Investors Must Know

There are three critical components to a prudent investment. When potential investments are lacking any one or more of them, you’d be wise to reconsider.

The three essential ingredients of a prudent investment, in order of importance, include:

Liquidity. This is a primary concern whether it involves your serious cash that you’re earmarking for retirement. In simple terms, liquidity means your money is accessible when you need it and isn’t tied up in your real estate, your IRA or anywhere else that you cannot get to it.
Safety. The safety we’re looking for is not just of an institution, but also safety of principal. It’s not enough to simply protect the principal that you invested initially. In addition, any year that you make money, your gain should also become newly protected principal that also continues to grow tax-free.
Rate of Return. A predictable, safe rate of return that is tax-free is the ideal.

These three ingredients combine to form the acronym LSRR (Laser) that is familiar to Missed Fortune clients everywhere. In order to choose the best investments that pass the Laser test with flying colors, you need to understand how the various investments stack up.

The sad truth is that most of the popular investment strategies advocated by many advisors fail the Laser test miserably. Liquidity, safety, and rate of return–in that order–are the hallmarks of a prudent investment. If you have them, chances are that you’re watching your money grow safely year after year.

If you don’t yet have them, it’s time to visit with a Missed Fortune advisor and learn how to put them to work for you.

Bonus Missed Fortune E-Book: Baby Boomer Blunders The average Baby Boomer has less than $50,000 accumulated for retirement (which means many have less than that), primarily due to bad habits and having money invested in the wrong places where economic downturns can diminish their nest egg. Download this e-book now at www.babyboomerblunders.com.

{ 0 comments }

Eliminating Roadblocks To Get Your Money Back On Track

January 22, 2012

Podcast: Download (22.9MB)

This week Doug Andrew discussed the following:

Upcoming Free Webinar

Attend our free 90-minute webinar live over the Internet this coming Tuesday, January 24th at 11:00 a.m. pacific (12:00 p.m. mountain, 1:00 p.m. central, 2:00 p.m. eastern), and again at 6:30 p.m. pacific (7:30 mountain, 8:30 central, 9:30 eastern). The topic is “True Asset and Wealth Optimization.” You’ll learn how to choose the right investments for liquidity, safety, rate of return and tax benefits.

Click Here to Register Now

All attendees receive a bonus hardcover copy of Last Chance Millionaire, Doug Andrew’s New York Times best-selling book.

Eliminating Roadblocks to Financial Peace of Mind

The last time a 401(k) or IRA statement arrived in your mailbox, how did you feel when you opened it?

Were you giddy, optimistic and excited?

Or did you feel frustrated, anxious and disappointed?

If your response is best described by the latter emotions, you’re not alone. For the past 4 years or so, record low rates of returns and the prospect of paying higher taxes have left many people feeling isolated and hopeless. They feel as though they’re not gaining any ground.

Wouldn’t it be preferable to have a definite game plan that allowed you to avoid the roadblocks that are frustrating so many today?

The roadblock of volatility has stood in the way of those who’ve been taught to expect average rates of return of 12%. They’ve been taught to “buy and hold” and that the market will always go up.

These are myths promoted by Wall Street that simply don’t reflect reality.

If a prospectus shows that your return will be up 50% the first year and down 50% the second year and then back up again 50% the third year and down 50% the fourth year, most people assume that they’d break even.

But the actual result looks much different.

If your $100,000 increased 50% up to $150,000 and then you lose 50%, you’re now down by $75,000. Let’s say you gain another 50% that takes you back up to $112,500 and then you lose another 50% that now takes you down to $56,250.

Far from breaking even, you’re actually down 43.75% from where you started thanks to market volatility.

This shouldn’t be surprising considering that the average rate of return for investors in the S&P 500 over the past 20 years has only been 3.83% according to DALBAR.

You can do much better. But you’ll have to do something different than what others have been doing.

Using an indexing strategy, you can protect your principal from loss when the economy declines and when the economy grows; your money grows as well. Any year your money grows, your gain becomes newly protected principal.

People who used indexing during the past four years found themselves up by 45-50% at time when others were taking a very unpleasant rollercoaster ride.

The Volatility of the Lost Decade

From January 1, 2000 to December 31, 2009 we saw a lot of changes in the market. $100,000 at the beginning of that time period was only worth around $79,000.

If you had used indexing during that same period, you could have locked in gains during 5 of those years that saw positive market growth. The market declined the other 5 years, but with indexing, your gains during the up years would have become newly protected principal and you wouldn’t have lost any money during those down years.

The reason your money was protected during the down years is that it was indirectly linked to the market’s performance rather than being directly at risk in the market.

Under this strategy, that $100,000 you started out with in 2000 would have been worth over $200,000 at the end of 2010.

Whose shoes would you rather be in?

Another roadblock is found in the record low rates of return.

How can you expect to row upstream at a low rate of 1.6 miles per hour when the current is moving downstream at 8 or 9 miles per hour? In this case the upstream rate represents your rate of return while the speed of the current represents inflation.

You have to have a strategy that automatically earns a rate of return 5-6% greater than the rate of inflation. Indexing makes that possible by linking your returns to the things that inflate when we experience inflation. This way inflation helps you rather than hurts you.

It’s shocking how many financial advisors don’t understand how to do this.

Missed Fortune strategies work. They remove the major roadblocks that have been preventing people from taking ownership of their future.

Learn more by contacting a Missed Fortune advisor today.

Bonus Missed Fortune E-Book: Baby Boomer Blunders The average Baby Boomer has less than $50,000 accumulated for retirement (which means many have less than that), primarily due to bad habits and having money invested in the wrong places where economic downturns can diminish their nest egg. Download this e-book now at www.babyboomerblunders.com.

{ 0 comments }

Turning Obstacles Into Opportunity

January 15, 2012

Podcast: Download (22.9MB)

This week Doug Andrew discussed the following:

Upcoming Free Webinar

Attend our free 90-minute webinar live over the Internet this coming Tuesday, January 17th at 11:00 a.m. pacific (12:00 p.m. mountain, 1:00 p.m. central, 2:00 p.m. eastern), and again at 6:30 p.m. pacific (7:30 mountain, 8:30 central, 9:30 eastern). The topic is “True Asset and Wealth Optimization.” You’ll learn how to choose the right investments for liquidity, safety, rate of return and tax benefits.

Click Here to Register Now

All attendees receive a bonus hardcover copy of Last Chance Millionaire, Doug Andrew’s New York Times best-selling book.

Transforming Common Obstacles Into Golden Opportunities

Entrepreneurial coach Dan Sullivan teaches a formula for success known as the VOTA Process.

It consists of the following steps:

Vision- you first establish exactly where you are and where you’d like to go.
Obstacles- you next identify the main obstacles that prevent you from achieving that vision.
Transform- next you transform those obstacles into strategies and opportunities which eliminate those dangers.
Action- a very specific action plan is created.

If you were to apply that approach to your own life today, it would probably start with a question like this, “3 years from today, what has to have happened in every area of your life–spiritually, emotionally, economically, personal relationships, etc.– in order for you to be happy with the results?”

Once that question has been answered, the next step would be to identify the obstacles that would prevent you from achieving that vision. Many of those fears and dangers will be financial in origin. There’s a great deal of uncertainty in the lives of many thanks to our economic woes.

These financial concerns often are centered in the market uncertainty that has caused many investors to lose a third or more of their serious money. Those concerns are compounded by the threat of increasing taxes and rising inflation rates.

Even a respectable retirement nest egg can be eroded very quickly when the forces of taxes and inflation go to work on it. Taxes will be going up, in part, due to the continued growth of the national debt that will soon swell to nearly $18 trillion.

Continued economic uncertainty is continuing to lead to market volatility. And with the Fed continuing to print money to keep up with government spending, inflation is just around the corner.

These are the likely obstacles that will affect our financial future. Turning them into specific strategies and opportunities requires doing something different than what we’ve always done.

Money isn’t the only thing we need to protect. Our time is extremely precious and cannot be made up easily.

This leads us to the final question that must be asked, “If, for some reason, you do not take action to solve these issues, how are you going to feel if the status quo doesn’t change?”

Here’s where specific actions come into play.

A strategic rollout, for example, allows you to move your money out of those IRAs and 401(k)s, pay the applicable taxes at today’s rates, and then move them into vehicles that are tax-free from today forward.

You can link your returns to those things that inflate so that when we have inflation it actually helps rather than hinders you.

Finally, you can implement indexing strategies that allow you to participate in the economy’s growth whenever it goes up, but protects your principal when it goes down so you don’t lose any money.

If you wish to learn how to put these actions to work for your financial future, that’s what the Missed Fortune strategies are here to do.

What Your Financial Advisor Doesn’t Know Can Hurt You

When it comes to protecting their client’s money and other assets, most financial planners don’t know what they don’t know. That can come back to bite their client’s hard.

Here are a few of the strategies your financial planner should know in order to allow you to enjoy liquidity, safety of principal and a predictable rate of return.

Indexing: When people lose money due to market volatility, it’s because their money is in the market where it’s most vulnerable. With an indexing strategy, your money is in a guaranteed instrument that protects your principal whenever the economy declines.

If the economy grows, you immediately participate in that upside because your money is indirectly linked to the market. If the market falls, however, you don’t lose a dime of your principal. The beauty of this approach is that every year you make money it becomes newly protected principal.

In 2008 when many people lost 40% of their principal in the market decline, those using the indexing strategy didn’t lose a dime. And the second the market rebounded, they were making money again.

Protection Against Inflation: When inflation was at 10% in the early 1980s, those who had linked their returns to the things that inflate when there is inflation weren’t losing sleep at night. Once you’ve learned how to do this, your rate of return outpaces the rate of inflation and your money grows fast enough to maintain your purchasing power.

Rising Taxes: If you have an IRA or 401(k) portfolio with $1.5 million, the sad truth is that not all of that money is yours. Uncle Sam expects to get his share in taxes and right now that’s about a third of your nest egg.

Compounding this problem is the fact that Congress is very likely to raise taxes in the near future with the Congressional Budget Office predicting a future tax rate of 50% or more. That means that taxes will take anywhere from a third to one half of your money as you withdraw it each year.

Your retirement money needs to be in a vehicle that allows it to accumulate, to distribute and ultimately to transfer to your survivors tax-free. Thanks to Sections 72E, 7702 and 101A of the Internal Revenue Code, there is such a vehicle. Most financial advisors don’t know about these sections of the code and that can cost you a lot of money down the road.

Learn more about how to implement these strategies and others by contacting a Missed Fortune advisor today.

Bonus Missed Fortune E-Book: Baby Boomer Blunders The average Baby Boomer has less than $50,000 accumulated for retirement (which means many have less than that), primarily due to bad habits and having money invested in the wrong places where economic downturns can diminish their nest egg. Download this e-book now at www.babyboomerblunders.com.

{ 0 comments }

Making the Changes That Make All the Difference

January 1, 2012

Podcast: Download (22.9MB)

This week Doug Andrew discussed the following:

Upcoming Free Webinar

Attend our free 90-minute webinar live over the Internet this coming Tuesday, January 3rd at 11:00 a.m. pacific (12:00 p.m. mountain, 1:00 p.m. central, 2:00 p.m. eastern), and again at 6:30 p.m. pacific (7:30 mountain, 8:30 central, 9:30 eastern). The topic is “True Asset and Wealth Optimization.” You’ll learn how to choose the right investments for liquidity, safety, rate of return and tax benefits.

Click Here to Register Now

All attendees receive a bonus hardcover copy of Last Chance Millionaire, Doug Andrew’s New York Times best-selling book.

Change Can Be a Reason To Cheer

We each have a choice regarding whether or not this is the year we’ll do things differently.

This is particularly true with respect to our financial futures.

It’s a perfect time for more of us to start taking ownership of our future instead of making Social Security the basis of our future retirement or waiting for government to take care of us.

Even among those who’ve been saving for retirement, too many people have simply kept following the crowd hoping to regain what market losses have cost them.

A perfect example of this is those who keep putting their money at risk in the market and “hang in there” waiting to realize the average 12% returns they were promised.

They don’t understand that if, over a decade, their return goes up 10% for half of those years and goes down 10% for the other half, they won’t break even. Instead they’ll end up with only 95% of the amount they started with. No one can afford to lose money on a regular basis.

This common error is compounded when many of these same people continue to sock money away in tax-deferred savings vehicles thinking they’ll be in a lower tax bracket when they retire. But with taxes on the rise combined with the loss of critical deductions, they may well end up paying higher taxes even though their income is less.

If your answer is to keep doing what you’ve always done, you can expect to keep getting what you’ve always gotten.

If those folks had used the Missed Fortune indexing strategies instead, they could see their money safely grow as the market goes up, but enjoy safety of principal and not lose a dime when the market declines. Over the past decade, these indexing strategies have enabled many people to earn 7.23% actual return—and that’s tax-free!

This may be the time to make a resolution to start rerouting some of the money you’ve been sinking into 401(k)s or IRAs and start taking distributions before the Bush tax cuts expire at the end of next year. This is known as a strategic rollout and it will make a world of difference when we see taxes go up again.

If you do want to learn how to do things differently, now is the time to empower yourself. Thousands of people have found a better way to take ownership of their future through learning and implementing the Missed Fortune strategies.

With these strategies, you’ll clearly understand the three key elements of a good investment:

Liquidity- The ability to get to your money when you need it.
Safety- The practice of protecting your principal by making turning the money you make in any given year into newly protected principal.
Rate of Return- This means that you are earning a predictable, tax-free rate of return that allows you to outpace inflation.

An investment that has all 3 of these qualities is far more likely to prove a good investment.

This is the kind of knowledge that promotes confidence and certainty at a time when so many are struggling with confusion and a sense of isolation.

Three Marvels of Wealth Accumulation

Motivational superstar Zig Ziegler loved to quiz his audience about the difference between a $10,000 racehorse and a $1 million racehorse. He’d ask them if the million dollar racehorse was worth 100 times more than the other one because it was 100 times faster than the $10,000 one.

After careful consideration, the answer was usually “no.”

Ziegler would point out that sometimes the only measurable difference between these two horses often came down to a few thousandths of a second out there on the racetrack.

His point was that the horses actually started out on a more level playing field than most people might suspect. What made the real difference was the way they were trained and how they applied their training.

When it comes to those who accumulate great wealth, the same principle applies. Many of the world’s wealthiest individuals didn’t merely inherit their wealth; they earned it.

More importantly, they earned that wealth because they learned to recognize opportunities that others around them did not. They didn’t possess superhuman capabilities or powers of discernment; they simply learned the principles of wealth accumulation and applied them.

These principles are not widely practiced, but they’re not secret, nor are they shrouded in mystery. The reason everyone isn’t practicing these principles of wealth accumulation is that they are simply not widely understood. They will work for anyone who is willing to learn them and apply them.

To better illustrate the kind of principles we’re dealing with, let’s look at three of the main ones relating to the accumulation of wealth.

The three marvels of wealth accumulation are:

Compound Interest. Einstein called it the most misunderstood phenomenon on the planet. One way to visualize how compound interest works is to imagine that you could fold over a piece of copy paper 50 times so that it doubled in thickness each time. By the 50^th time that paper had been doubled, it would be over 93 million miles in thickness.

Money can likewise accumulate at an astounding rate thanks to compound interest, but this is only true when that money is able to grow tax-free. Tax-advantaged vehicles are grandfathered into the IRS code, but they must be set up correctly.

Tax-Free Accumulation. The second marvel of wealth accumulation is one of the most important especially when considering the likelihood of taxes going up in the future. Taxes can quickly deplete even a sizeable nest egg within a matter of just a few years. Outliving your retirement money is a definite possibility.

Consider that your million dollar tax-deferred nest egg will only be worth around $666,000 after Uncle Sam claims his share. Get those taxes out of the way up front and your money will grow, distribute and eventually transfer tax-free to your spouse or children. There are specific sections of the IRS code that make this possible.

It’s in your interest to learn what they are and how to apply them.

Safe Positive Leverage. This describes the ability to own and control assets with very little or none of your money actually tied up or at risk of being lost in the asset.

If you’re borrowing money at 4% and are able to leverage that money where you’re earning an 8% rate of return, you’re now getting infinite return. The main reason most people don’t avail themselves of safe positive leverage is that they don’t know what they don’t know.

These three marvels are just a few of the principles that can make all the difference for those who wish to accumulate wealth in any economy; including our current struggling one.

Learn how to make these principles work for you by contacting a Missed Fortune advisor today.

Bonus Missed Fortune E-Book: Baby Boomer Blunders The average Baby Boomer has less than $50,000 accumulated for retirement (which means many have less than that), primarily due to bad habits and having money invested in the wrong places where economic downturns can diminish their nest egg. Download this e-book now at www.babyboomerblunders.com.

{ 0 comments }

Different Results Require Different Action

December 25, 2011

Podcast: Download (22.9MB)

This week Doug Andrew discussed the following:

Upcoming Free Webinar

Attend our free 90-minute webinar live over the Internet this coming Tuesday, December 27th at 11:00 a.m. pacific (12:00 p.m. mountain, 1:00 p.m. central, 2:00 p.m. eastern), and again at 6:30 p.m. pacific (7:30 mountain, 8:30 central, 9:30 eastern). The topic is “True Asset and Wealth Optimization.” You’ll learn how to choose the right investments for liquidity, safety, rate of return and tax benefits.

Click Here to Register Now

All attendees receive a bonus hardcover copy of Last Chance Millionaire, Doug Andrew’s New York Times best-selling book.

Resolving to Make the Right Changes

As we make our New Year’s resolutions, a question to consider is whether this is the year you’ll do things differently.

This is especially true with respect to your financial future.

More people need to start taking ownership of their future instead of waiting for the government to take care of them or making Social Security the basis of their future retirement.

Too many folks have simply kept following the crowd hoping to recoup their losses. They’ve continued to sock money away in tax-deferred savings vehicles thinking they’ll be in a lower tax bracket when they retire.

A perfect example of this is those who keep putting their money at risk in the market and “hang in there” waiting to realize the average 12% returns they were promised.

They don’t understand that if, over a decade, their return goes up 10% for half of those years and goes down 10% for the other half, they won’t break even. Instead they’ll end up with only 95% of the amount they started with. No one can afford to lose money on a regular basis.

If your answer is to keep doing what you’ve always done, you can expect to keep getting what you’ve always gotten.

If those folks had used the Missed Fortune indexing strategies instead, they could see their money safely grow as the market goes up, but enjoy safety of principal and not lose a dime when the market declines. Over the past decade, these indexing strategies have enabled many people to earn 7.23% actual return—and that’s tax-free!

This may be the time to make a resolution to start rerouting some of the money you’ve been sinking into 401(k)s or IRAs and start taking distributions before the Bush tax cuts expire at the end of next year. This is known as a strategic rollout and it will make a world of difference when we see taxes go up again.

If you do want to learn how to do things differently, now is the time to empower yourself. Thousands of people have found a better way to take ownership of their future through learning and implementing the Missed Fortune strategies.

With these strategies, you’ll clearly understand the three key elements of a good investment:

Liquidity- The ability to get to your money when you need it.
Safety- The practice of protecting your principal by making turning the money you make in any given year into newly protected principal.
Rate of Return- This means that you are earning a predictable, tax-free rate of return that allows you to outpace inflation.

An investment that has all 3 of these qualities will be a good investment.

This is the kind of knowledge that promotes confidence and certainty at a time when so many are struggling with confusion and a sense of isolation

The 3 Big Secrets

Zig Ziegler used to talk about the difference between a $10,000 racehorse and a $1 million racehorse. He’d ask if the million dollar racehorse was worth 100 times more than the other one because it was 100 times faster than the $10,000 one.

The answer was “no.”

Sometimes the only measurable difference between these two horses was a few thousandths of a second.

His point was that the horses started out on a much more level playing field than you might suspect.

When it comes to those who accumulate great wealth, the same principle applies. Many didn’t inherit their wealth; they simply saw opportunities that others around them did not.

The three marvels of wealth accumulation are:

Compound Interest. Einstein called it the most misunderstood phenomenon on the planet. If you could fold over a piece of copy paper 50 times so that it doubled in thickness each time, it would be over 93 million miles in thickness.

Money can likewise accumulate at an astounding rate thanks to compound interest, but only when it grows tax-free.

Tax-Free Accumulation. The second marvel of wealth accumulation is one of the most important especially when considering the likelihood of taxes going up in the future.

A million dollar tax-deferred nest egg will only be worth around $666,000 after Uncle Sam claims his share.

Safe Positive Leverage. This is the ability to own and control assets with very little or none of your money actually tied up or at risk in the asset.

If you’re borrowing money at 4% and are able to leverage that money where you’re earning an 8% rate of return, you’re now getting infinite return.

These three marvels are just a few of the principles that make all the difference for those who accumulate wealth in any economy.

Learn how to make them work for you by meeting with a Missed Fortune advisor today.

Bonus Missed Fortune E-Book: Baby Boomer Blunders The average Baby Boomer has less than $50,000 accumulated for retirement (which means many have less than that), primarily due to bad habits and having money invested in the wrong places where economic downturns can diminish their nest egg. Download this e-book now at www.babyboomerblunders.com.

{ 0 comments }

Protecting Your Nest Egg By Sticking To the Recipe

November 13, 2011

Podcast: Download (22.9MB)

This week Doug Andrew discussed the following:

Upcoming Free Webinar

Attend our free 90-minute webinar live over the Internet this coming Tuesday, November 15th at 11:00 a.m. pacific (12:00 p.m. mountain, 1:00 p.m. central, 2:00 p.m. eastern), and again at 6:30 p.m. pacific (7:30 mountain, 8:30 central, 9:30 eastern). The topic is “True Asset and Wealth Optimization.” You’ll learn how to choose the right investments for liquidity, safety, rate of return and tax benefits.

Click Here to Register Now

All attendees receive a bonus hardcover copy of Last Chance Millionaire, Doug Andrew’s New York Times best-selling book.

Following the Recipe For Financial Success

The last few years have been frustrating for those who have been searching for the right recipe of how to best protect their retirement nest eggs.

This has been tricky of late thanks to the prospect of rising taxes, inflation and continuing market volatility. The key to success is following a recipe that works.

If you set out to make cinnamon rolls but you either don’t know the recipe, or received a faulty recipe or chose to wing it on certain ingredients and preparation steps, your result will most likely be disappointing.

Failing to follow the proven recipe sets you up for failure. Now, apply that standard to securing your financial future.

Keeping your serious retirement money liquid, safe and tax-free requires first knowing and then strictly following the right recipe in order to be successful.

Here’s an example:

The LSRR (laser) test is an acronym for Liquidity, Safety, and Rate of Return.

Liquidity refers to how easy it is to access your money or to get your money back when you want. Safety deals with how secure your money is and whether or not it is guaranteed or insured. Rate of return is what makes our money grow in spite of the effects of inflation or taxes.

Investment vehicles that can pass the LSRR test are a much safer way to accumulate money tax-free rather than tax-deferred like IRAs and 401(k)s. Not only should your money accumulate tax-free, but also you should be able to access it and eventually transfer it tax-free to your heirs.

The painful reality that will dawn upon those with tax-deferred retirement vehicles is that, upon withdrawing their funds, they’ll be paying nearly a third of their money in income taxes. Their tax liabilities and tax rates will likely have increased, while their deductions will have disappeared. If inflation goes up, the purchasing power of their savings will have diminished.

This means that even a million dollar nest egg will be whittled down to size much quicker than most people can imagine. Between the bite of taxation and even a modest 5% rate of inflation, a million dollar nest egg will be completely depleted in just 11 years.

There’s simply no substitute for learning and following the right recipe.

The Five Toughest Questions Most Financial Advisors Will Face

What has been the actual (cash on cash) rate of return that your clients have realized during the last 10 years?

Take whatever percent they tell you, and divide that into 72. For instance if they tell you their client’s rate of return was 12%, divide 8 into 72 and you’ll get 6.

You’re using the “Rule of 72” to determine how quickly their clients’ money is doubling. So if the rate of return was 12% you’ll ask them if their clients’ money doubled every six years.

Remember, if their clients are subject to taxes on the back end of their investment, that 12% really equals only 8% after taxes. There are better ways to get an 8% rate of return that’s tax-free.

Can you give me a guarantee of no loss of principal or at least a guaranteed return of 1-3% even when the economy is tanking with upside potential when the economy is doing well and can you make it tax-free?

The answer to this question will tell you if your advisor understands how to use indexing so that their clients don’t lose money even in a down economy and start making money the second the economy grows.

During good years they can make up to 14-15% and during bad years they’ll still make 1-3% guaranteed, and it will accumulate tax-free. Again, not that many advisors know how this is done.

Can you protect my money automatically from the effect of inflation if we start experiencing higher inflation rates?

Financial advisors who’ve received Missed Fortune training will understand how to link your returns to those things that inflate. This means that your money grows at a rate that outpaces that of inflation.

Advisors who don’t have this knowledge will likely just shrug their shoulders.

Can you protect my nest egg from the effects of taxes going up in the future?

Again, most advisors will squirm when faced with this question because many of them still advise their clients to save their money in tax-deferred vehicles like IRAs and 401(k)s that subject them to further taxes when they begin accessing their money.

There are better vehicles that allow a client’s money to accumulate tax-free, and remain tax-free when at distribution and again at transfer when they pass away.

Can you help me get my money out of my IRAs and 401(k)s with reduced tax or maybe no tax impact?

Most advisors, most CPAs and tax attorneys will be dumbfounded when asked to do this, but an advisor who knows how can help you withdraw 50, 60 or 70,000 dollars a year without getting hammered for taxes.

It’s called a strategic rollover and its another of the Missed Fortune strategies that have been helping people grow their money safely, predictably and tax-free for decades.

Simply knowing to ask the right questions can get you headed in the right direction.

The next step is meeting with a Missed Fortune advisor to learn what to do next.

Bonus Missed Fortune E-Book: Baby Boomer Blunders The average Baby Boomer has less than $50,000 accumulated for retirement (which means many have less than that), primarily due to bad habits and having money invested in the wrong places where economic downturns can diminish their nest egg. Download this e-book now at www.babyboomerblunders.com.

{ 0 comments }

Skip These Mistakes & Own Your Financial Future

November 6, 2011

Podcast: Download (22.9MB)

This week Doug Andrew discussed the following:

Upcoming Free Webinar

Attend our free 90-minute webinar live over the Internet this coming Tuesday, November 8th at 11:00 a.m. pacific (12:00 p.m. mountain, 1:00 p.m. central, 2:00 p.m. eastern), and again at 6:30 p.m. pacific (7:30 mountain, 8:30 central, 9:30 eastern). The topic is “True Asset and Wealth Optimization.” You’ll learn how to choose the right investments for liquidity, safety, rate of return and tax benefits.

Click Here to Register Now

All attendees receive a bonus hardcover copy of Last Chance Millionaire, Doug Andrew’s New York Times best-selling book.

Welcoming the Prospect of a New Painful Era of Self Reliance

ABC News recently reported on president Obama speaking at a San Francisco fundraiser warning that America was poised to enter a “new painful era of self-reliance in America.”

Do you know what they call people who rely upon themselves? Adults.

Taking ownership of one’s future is not only possible; it’s essential if we wish to be free to prosper. Aren’t we supposed to be self-reliant?

It’s not reasonable to expect government to pay off our mortgages, to pay for our healthcare or to pay for our kids’ college education.

If just 20% of the $3.6 billion in stimulus spending were instead given to employers to expand their workforces, it could have created a $50,000/year position for two years for every unemployed person in this country. Instead unemployment went from 7.2% to 9.2%.

We need to get out of the mindset that big government should be taking care of us. We need to take ownership in our future. Ownership makes great things happen.

When’s the last time you washed a rental car or changed the oil in one? If you own your residence, it’s almost certain that you’ll take better care of it than if you were just renting it.

Taking ownership and being self-reliant is the American way. This is especially true regarding our financial future. When we have incentive to take ownership of our own future, we can redirect otherwise payable taxes to causes you support.

These aren’t tax loopholes, they’re decades-old, grandfathered sections of the IRS code that even tax attorneys and CPAs are rarely taught in their training. These include section 163 of the Internal Revenue Code, which provides tax incentives regarding home ownership.

You need to take ownership in providing for your own retirement instead of counting on the government to provide it for you. After all, the government is still on the hook for $115 trillion in unfunded liabilities including Social Security and Medicare. They’ll gladly try to take care of your retirement, but you can do better.

If you take ownership of your own health or even caring for the poor, you get incentives in the form of tax deductions. All of this is possible if you understand legally how to redirect otherwise payable taxes to the causes you support.

So why don’t more people do it?

The problem is that we simply don’t know what we don’t know and powerful opportunities are missed as we follow the herd.

Seven Ways Most Financial Advisors Fail to Protect Their Clients’ Money

Here are seven things that more than 90% of financial advisors don’t know how to do to protect their clients’ money.

Give you guarantees with an upside potential. Traditional financial planning in this country usually gives you guarantees but usually without upside potential if the economy does well. Or they may give you upside potential without any guarantees if the economy loses. This is one of the reasons so many people lost a third or more of their IRAs or 401(k)s during the last decade. Missed Fortune Indexing strategies enable you to earn a predictable, conservative rate of return even if the economy loses. At the same time you can enjoy upside potential up to a certain capped rate of return when the economy grows. Few advisors know how this is done.
Protect you from loss of principal. The key here is not only to protect your principal you invested, but also in any year that you make money, to turn that money into new protected principal that’s not subject to loss.
Protect you from the effects of inflation. We’ve been fortunate for the past two decades to have inflation remain steady around 2-3%. But those days are gone and inflation is likely to rise due to the incredible amount of money that’s been and is being printed. This means that your rate of return must be able to outpace the rate of inflation, and most investment advisors don’t know how to do that.
Protect you from the danger of rising taxes. Most advisors simply hope that when the future arrives, you’ll find yourself in a lower tax bracket when you retire. But that often doesn’t happen for various reasons. Your dependents have moved out. Your home is paid off. You’re not only missing out on these deductions, but Congress is looking to raise taxes too.
They don’t know how to get tax-free returns rather than just tax-deferred returns. Most people are in a for a rude awakening when they see just how quickly taxes will eat up their nest egg as they’re taxed before contributing to their IRA or 401(k). They’re then taxed upon withdrawing their funds and taxed again when they try to transfer what’s left to their heirs. A better way is through investment vehicles that have been grandfathered for more than 4 decades and have been around a lot longer than IRAs or 401(k)s. They’re safer than municipal bonds and pay a higher rate of return than municipal bonds, plus they accumulate money tax-free and the money transfers tax-free at your passing.
Provide predictable rates of return. The stock market has only averaged a 3.83% rate of return for the past two decades. Trying to get an average return of 12% is just not realistic. But if you choose, you can convert all of your income to generate predictable rates of return of about 8% tax-free.
Help people get their money out of their IRAs or 401(k)s with the least amount of tax impact. This is where a strategic roll-out can help protect you from some of the tax-deferred woes by getting your money out of those IRAs and 401(k)s and into a vehicle that will allow it to grow tax-free.

If you’d like to empower yourself to learn how to overcome these common mistakes make by many tax planners & financial advisors, it’s time to learn more by visiting with a Missed Fortune Advisor.

Bonus Missed Fortune E-Book: Baby Boomer Blunders The average Baby Boomer has less than $50,000 accumulated for retirement (which means many have less than that), primarily due to bad habits and having money invested in the wrong places where economic downturns can diminish their nest egg. Download this e-book now at www.babyboomerblunders.com.

{ 0 comments }

Moving Your Money to Safety

October 30, 2011

Podcast: Download (22.9MB)

This week Doug Andrew discussed the following:

Upcoming Free Webinar

Attend our free 90-minute webinar live over the Internet this coming Tuesday, November 1st at 11:00 a.m. pacific (12:00 p.m. mountain, 1:00 p.m. central, 2:00 p.m. eastern), and again at 6:30 p.m. pacific (7:30 mountain, 8:30 central, 9:30 eastern). The topic is “True Asset and Wealth Optimization.” You’ll learn how to choose the right investments for liquidity, safety, rate of return and tax benefits.

Click Here to Register Now

All attendees receive a bonus hardcover copy of Last Chance Millionaire, Doug Andrew’s New York Times best-selling book.

Losing Trust in Our Financial Systems

A recent article by Catherine New in Daily Finance shows that Americans are losing trust in the country’s financial system.

The results of the magazine’s quarterly survey indicate that trust in our financial institutions is slipping.

The article points out:

“The latest figures from the quarterly Chicago Booth/Kellogg School Financial Trust Index showed that only 23% of those surveyed said they trust the country’s financial systems, down from 25% in June. The index measures trust in four areas: banks, the stock market, mutual funds and large corporations.

“The findings in this issue reflect what’s been reported in the news and demonstrate the fragility of trust many Americans still have in the institutions where they invest their money,” said Luigi Zingales, a finance professor at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and co-author of the Index.

Trust in banks has experienced an even steeper decline, falling from 39% in June to 33% in October. Notably, people were much more inclined to trust local banks and credit unions: More than half of those surveyed said they still had faith in those institutions.

The survey also revealed that nearly 60% of respondents were either angry or very angry about the current economic situation — the highest level of anger measured since the earliest months of the financial crisis.”

These findings back up an earlier survey by CNN that revealed that nearly 90% of Americans say the economy stinks.

3 years after the financial crisis pushed this country into a deep recession, financial conditions are as poor as they’ve ever been.

Ask yourself: would you want to stay on board a sinking vessel that has been foundering for the past decade? Those Americans who’ve had their retirement money in the stock market have made little, if any, gains in the past 10 years.

If you had $100,000 socked away in an IRA or 401(k) you saw it take a 30 or 40% hit following 9/11. Then after growing back to its high-water mark it took another huge 39-40% decline in 2008. Even today few people have managed to break even thanks to the market volatility of the “lost decade.”

The situation becomes all the more uncertain when considering that Congress and the president are still spending with abandon. In just three years the national debt has soared from $9 trillion to nearly $15 trillion.

If you remain on board a sinking vessel by keeping your money in IRAs and 401(k)s thinking that future taxes will be lower, you’re not seeing the writing on the wall. Taxes are only one of the threats to your retirement money; the other two components of the upcoming triple whammy are inflation and market volatility.

You need a strategy that moves your money to safety.

The Triple Threat of the Next 10 Years

Taxes will be going up. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that tax rates could go as high as 62.5% for couples making over $200,000 or single filers making over $100,000. Even if the Bush tax cuts are allowed to expire at the end of 2012, it will be the largest tax increase in history.

Inflation is the second big danger. Over the past two decades inflation has averaged around 2-3%, but those days are over. The days ahead will likely see inflation inching up to 5% on the low end and perhaps as high as 7-10% on the high end.

It’s essential that you protect yourself from the effects of inflation as it robs every dollar you have of purchasing power.

The third big danger is continued market uncertainty. This type of economic uncertainty is what prevents employers from hiring and contributes to the growing unemployment rate.

These three dangers combine to form an economic triple whammy that requires different action than simply following the crowd.

You must understand the tax and inflation power curve.

Let’s say you socked away $10,000 a year for 30 consecutive years and earned 7.2% interest. You’d have a nest egg of about $1 million. Now if you were to withdraw only 7.2%, in order to maintain your principal, you’d be taking out $72,000 a year.

But if that money is in an IRA or 401(k), you’ll be paying a nice chunk of any money you withdraw to the IRS. Your tax situation will be complicated because most people, by this time, will have no dependents to claim, their home will be paid off, and they’ll no longer be contributing to their retirement fund.

This means their tax liabilities will be higher rather than lower. It’s a safe bet that of that $72,000 you’re withdrawing each year, about 1/3 of it–$24,000 will be gobbled up by state and federal income taxes.

Now consider what inflation will do to the remaining $48,000 a year you’re expecting to live on. Even at just 5% inflation, the purchasing power of your dollars will be cut in half twice over that 30-year period. This means that you’ll only be able to purchase with $4,000 per month what $1,000 per month today would buy.

Now you start to see why the effect of the tax and inflation power curve is so important to understand and even more important to counter.

You need strategies that reposition your serious money for the future with a strategic rollout before the end of 2012. This will allow your money to accumulate tax free from that day forward as it’s grandfathered under the Internal Revenue code.

The strategies you choose must allow you to access your money tax-free and transfer it tax-free when you die. They must tie your money to those things that inflate so when inflation comes, your rate of return is outpacing the rate of inflation.

Your strategies must allow you to index your money to the markets without putting it at risk to the volatility of the market. It should grow when the economy grows and protect your principal when the economy declines.

These are the Missed Fortune strategies that have been working for decades for those willing to break away from the crowd and move their money to safety

Learn more by meeting with a Missed Fortune advisor.

Bonus Missed Fortune E-Book: Baby Boomer Blunders The average Baby Boomer has less than $50,000 accumulated for retirement (which means many have less than that), primarily due to bad habits and having money invested in the wrong places where economic downturns can diminish their nest egg. Download this e-book now at www.babyboomerblunders.com.

{ 0 comments }

Reasons To Smile Even When the Economy Stinks

October 9, 2011

Podcast: Download (22.9MB)

This week Doug Andrew discussed the following:

Upcoming Free Webinar

Attend our free 90-minute webinar live over the Internet this coming Tuesday, October 11th at 11:00 a.m. pacific (12:00 p.m. mountain, 1:00 p.m. central, 2:00 p.m. eastern), and again at 6:30 p.m. pacific (7:30 mountain, 8:30 central, 9:30 eastern). The topic is “True Asset and Wealth Optimization.” You’ll learn how to choose the right investments for liquidity, safety, rate of return and tax benefits.

Click Here to Register Now

All attendees receive a bonus hardcover copy of Last Chance Millionaire, Doug Andrew’s New York Times best-selling book.

Is the Economy Half Empty or Half Full?

In a recent CNN article titled “90 Percent of Americans Say Economy Stinks” the following observations were made:

“Three years after a financial crisis pushed the country deep into recession, an overwhelming number of Americans – 90% – say that economic conditions remain poor.

The number, reported Friday in a new CNN/ORC International Poll, is the highest of Barack Obama’s presidency and a significant increase from the 81% who said conditions were poor in June.”

Now imagine that you came across an article that said, ” Ex-financial planner reveals the secrets as to how he protected himself from any losses during the last decade and what his wealthy clients did to become wealthy and to protect their wealth during the past several years.”

Would you want to know more?

If you’re familiar with the Missed Fortune Strategies, you already know that Doug Andrews is that ex-financial advisor turned consumer advocate.

The last 10 years are often referred to as the Lost Decade because most of the people who had their money in the stock market or real estate market lost more than 40% once in 2007 and again in 2008.

On the other hand, those who followed the Missed Fortune indexing strategies, didn’t lose a dime in the last decade. Many of them actually doubled their money tax-free even if they just sat there and never re-balanced during the past 10 years.

Those who did re-balance according to Doug’s advice enjoyed an average of 9.6% tax-free during the past 10 years. Let’s put that into something we can more easily visualize.

For every one million dollars they had 10 years ago they now have $2.6 million. For those taking income in retirement, they were able to take $8,000 per month or $96,000 a year, in tax-free income, without depleting their $1 million principal.

Even during the last 4 years, arguably the worst 4 year period since the Great Depression, people following Doug’s advice have realized an average 9.75% tax-free annual return.

The past two years have been incredible since Indexing strategies perform very well in a lateral market when in goes up and down with a lot of volatility. Folks who’ve found themselves paralyzed by fear the past few years, could have instead employed the indexing strategy to enjoy a nice conservative return of 4.5% up to an astonishing 15% return–tax free–without losing a dime of their money.

When we don’t know what we don’t know, our options remain limited. But when we’re willing to learn, new pathways are opened up to us.

3 Keys to Prosper In Any Economy

The strongest financial dangers we face in America over the next decade include taxes going up. The Congressional Budget Office warns that rates make climb as high as 62% for couples earning over $200,000 and single filers making over $100,000.

The second significant financial danger we face is the prospect of rising inflation. For the past 20 years inflation has averaged just under 3% annually, but it’s likely to rise to 5% on the low end to as high as 10% on the high end over the next 10 years. This means that the cost of living could be doubling every seven to ten years because the purchasing power of the dollar is being cut in half every seven to ten years.

The third financial danger to beware of is continued economic uncertainty which is the only one of the three dangers we’ve seen in abundance this past 10 years.

These financial dangers are likely to combine for an unforgettable triple whammy in the next decade, so let’s consider 3 proven strategies to eliminate these dangers.

Analyze your situation and determine if it’s time to do a strategic roll-out. This means getting your money out of those 401(k)s and IRAs and recoup what you may have lost in a safe, tax-free environment. Move that money from tax-deferred vehicles into someplace where your money can accumulate tax-free, now and in the future. You’ll need to do this before the Bush tax cuts expire at the end of 2012.
Link your returns, from here on out, to the things that inflate so that when we do experience higher inflation, it helps rather than hinders you. This principle works even when the inflation rate is in double digits just like it was in the early 1980s. Your money should be growing, tax-free, at a rate that outpaces inflation.
The third strategy is to eliminate the downside risk while participating in any upside potential when the economy grows, by using indexing with a lock-in and reset feature. This means that when the economy goes down, you don’t lose money. Likewise, when the economy grows, you can make money. This is protecting your principal from loss. Any year that you make money, that gain becomes new principal that is also protected from loss.

Avoiding these dangers is absolutely possible once you’ve learned and implemented the Missed Fortune strategies. Get started by meeting with a Missed Fortune advisor.

Bonus Missed Fortune E-Book: Baby Boomer Blunders The average Baby Boomer has less than $50,000 accumulated for retirement (which means many have less than that), primarily due to bad habits and having money invested in the wrong places where economic downturns can diminish their nest egg. Download this e-book now at www.babyboomerblunders.com.

{ 0 comments }

Retiring Boomers Find 401(k) Plans Fall Short

July 24, 2011

Podcast: Download (23.0MB)

This week Doug Andrew discussed the following:

Upcoming Free Webinar

Attend our free 90-minute webinar live over the Internet this coming Tuesday, July 26th at 11:00 a.m. pacific (12:00 p.m. mountain, 1:00 p.m. central, 2:00 p.m. eastern), and again at 6:30 p.m. pacific (7:30 mountain, 8:30 central, 9:30 eastern). The topic is “True Asset and Wealth Optimization.” You’ll learn how to choose the right investments for liquidity, safety, rate of return and tax benefits.

Click Here to Register Now

All attendees receive a bonus hardcover copy of Last Chance Millionaire, Doug Andrew’s New York Times best-selling book.

Come Retirement, Boomers Will Be Sad Consumers

Think that 401(k) will get you enough to retire with your current standard of living?

Think again.

The Wall Street Journal recently reported that the median household headed by a person age 60-62 with a 401(k) account has less than 1/4 of what is needed to maintain their current standard of living.

This data was compiled the Federal Reserve and analyzed the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College.

401(k). The Holy Grail of retirement. What’s supposed to see you through old age.

Well, that Holy Grail is rusty and empty.

Most 401(k) participants have far too little savings for retirement, even when including their Social Security and pension savings.

Even those with substantial, six-figure 401(k) savings may likely fall short before reaching age 85.

This means they’ll probably be dusting off the ol’ resume during their supposed “golden years.”

And what’s the standard advice you continue hearing from traditional advisors?

Stay the course.

Piffle and pooh.

If you keep doing what you’ve always done, you’ll keep getting what you’ve always gotten.

Despite the millions who lost fortunes in the 2008 market crash, others didn’t lose a penny.

Those who applied Missed Fortune strategies have not only protected their serious money in a down market, but they did it safely in the worst 4-year period since the Great Depression.

Most people who follow the Missed Fortune strategies have 50 percent more than they did just 4-5 years ago.

You can do it too.

Meet with a Missed Fortune advisor today and learn how.

Taxes & Inflation: Like Acid on the Holy 401(k) Grail

Can you live on a $1,000 a month?

Of course not. Funny thing is, those who have saved at least $1 million for retirement think they’ll be just fine.

But a million dollars just ain’t what it used to be.

Because of taxes and inflation, in the future $1 million generating $6,000 a month of taxable income will only amount to about $1,000 in today’s dollars.

$1 million earning 7.2 percent interest a year should allow you to pull out $72,000 annually ($6,000/month) without depleting principal.

If you earn $68,000 a year, you’re in the 33% marginal tax bracket.

The Congressional Budget Office estimates that by mid-century most Americans will be paying at least 50% of their income in taxes.

If you paid a third of your income in taxes on $6,000 a month, that leaves you $4,000 of net spendable income per month.

But let’s not forget about inflation.

At a 5% rate of inflation the cost of living will double every 15 years and the purchasing power of the dollar will be cut in half.

30 years down the road you’ll only be able to buy the same gallons of gas, loaves of bread, prescriptions, golf greens fees, etc. for $4,000 a month that you can currently buy for $1,000 a month.

Do you have a hedge against taxes and inflation?

Missed Fortune clients do.

Are you ready to learn how they do it?

Bonus Missed Fortune E-Book: Baby Boomer Blunders The average Baby Boomer has less than $50,000 accumulated for retirement (which means many have less than that), primarily due to bad habits and having money invested in the wrong places where economic downturns can diminish their nest egg. Download this e-book now at www.babyboomerblunders.com.

{ 0 comments }

← Previous Entries