Generational Planning For Generation X
(1965 - 1980)
Planning for the Generation X group is when everything starts to hit home. Many are established in their careers making decent amounts of money while possibly having a growing family. Those with kids are watching them grow up so fast in front of their eyes running them to all their extracurricular activities. They have more expenses than they ever imagined, find themselves reminiscing the days of recording songs off the radio on their 8-Track tape, and racing home for curfew when the street lights turned on. It’s at this age, we really start to hit home how fast time is flying by and the significance of FINANCIAL PLANNING. Millions of Gen Xers think, “Am I doing all the right things? Is my 401(k) invested properly? Am I saving enough for retirement? Are there other investments I need? How do I pay off this debt faster? How do I save when my kid now needs braces and college is coming up?” Let me guess, with all of life events over consuming you, you’ll say, “I’ll get to this later or I know I need to get it done, but I don’t have time.” But, you never do, it gets pushed to the side because something came up and you forgot to get to it. Don’t fall into this trap because truth be told, we do have time. We have many baby boomers tell us, “if I only knew then, what I know now, I would have done things differently and been better off.” You have the time, don’t waste it. This is where we come in, hold your hand, let’s build a plan, and help you relax. Here are the following planning ways we work with Gen X’s….
Financial Planning: Financial Planning at this Generation is of the utmost importance than any retirement, any investment, anything else you can do. Why? Because you are entering into some of your most prime earning years and really getting yourself established. We need to take a large overview satellite snapshot of what you are doing and see if everything that’s being done, is in the most efficient manner. Are you saving the right amount for retirement? Is it in the right investment vehicle? Are your investments allocated properly for the growth we need? Do we have enough insurance coverage God forbid one passed and now we have a significant loss of income? Will my family stay in our dream home that we worked so hard for if something happened? Do I have the funds to help pay for college and pay for braces? What happens to our young children if something happened to us? And while thinking all this, you’re running your kids to their after-school activities thinking, did I get dinner out to thaw for later? I have loads of laundry I need to get done! Your mind is racing a mile a minute, so let US, come in, and alleviate the financial concerns and help you formulate a plan to make sure we are on track for the future and you focus on the day to day activities!
Investments: Generation X individuals are in that unsure state of the proper investments and allocations. We know that you need to stay somewhat aggressive for that long term growth, but after the housing market crash and the Great Recession in 2008 – 2009, it’s heavily spooked us into fear and wanting a bit more conservative approach. Remember, everything is based on an individual’s risk tolerance, but many are nervous from what they hear in the media about another correction and recession. After all, we are seeing that retirement is coming up faster and faster, so what do we do? Well, interest rates are all time lows, markets are very volatile, so where do I go? We need to make sure we do a risk tolerance analysis together and have a well-rounded managed diversified portfolio with some alternative investments. What are Alternative Investments? Let’s sit down and learn about them.
Insurance: Hopefully by this time, you have an adequate amount of life insurance to protect your family, but if not, let’s shop the market to find the best policy we can. You probably have a medical, dental, and vision policy to take care of the day to day’s of your family, but at this stage, we also need to review your Disability Insurance. You’re in your prime years, you insure your car, your home, your jewelry, your life, your toys, but are you adequately insured on protecting that one thing that allows you to have all these items to insure? Your income is what you use to buy these items, support your family, and insure everything you have, so why aren’t you protecting the driving factor of all this….YOUR INCOME! Also, we should be bench-marking your home and auto policy to see if we can save money or obtain greater coverage for same price; and have we looked for an umbrella policy? Which is very reasonably price for a lot of liability protection. You have built up so much, you certainly don’t want to lose it all!
Retirement: Retirement planning for this generation is very very important! It’s very unsure of what may take place with Social Security, and many Gen X’s are not banking on social security. Will it be around? Will our Full Retirement Age be delayed? Have you ever thought, if I get social security, it’ll just be icing on the cake? This generation doesn’t have many of the pensions that the baby boomers and older generations had, but instead have employer 401(k), 403(b), 457, TSP, Stock Option, etc. plans. This generation is one that may need to either, unfortunately, cut retirement lifestyle expectations, scale back current lifestyles to save for future retirement desired lifestyles, or work longer into older ages. If we haven’t started saving, we NEED TO NOW! It’s not an easy conversation to tell anyone that if they want the retirement they desire, they now need to sock a few thousand dollars a month to catch up for lost time. Also, we should look into incorporating Roth IRA’s for future income that based on current tax codes will not be taxed; Roth IRA distributions are tax free if made 5 years after the initial contribution to the plan and you are over 59 ½!
Taxes: Generation X is making more money than ever before, and they get excited about making more and more money, but then get frustrated with seeing all the taxes come out of their paycheck. I’ve seen it and I’ve heard it! So, what do we do? Well, this where our firm works very closely with your Accountant or CPA. If you don’t have one, we can make an introduction. We will work in sync with your tax professional to construct tax planning strategies to obtain as many tax deduction benefits that we can find. Any tax advice will be conducted by your tax professional, but we will be part of the tax planning process with your CPA’s.
College Education Savings: Feels like yesterday you were in college yourself right? Missing those days of only worrying about going to class, studying, get your work done, and working part time for side cash. You’d go out to the bars or house parties, putting down a few drinks with friends and going to school basketball and football games; life was great wasn’t it! Man we miss college! But now, we have kids ourselves that are getting closer to entering that stage of life themselves, and college’s costs more than ever! Do I qualify for FAFSA or make too much money, how do I complete a FAFSA application, where do we get grants and scholarships, will my kid receive more money out of state or in state? Sound familiar? All very good and frequent questions we hear. Well, in our college savings accounts, we need to evaluate how risky our investments are and not take a lot of risk for growth when our kids are close to their freshman year. Should we review state sponsored college 529 savings plans, or prepaid tuition? Or maybe we want to review other accounts that aren’t just specific to college so we look at Individual TOD or JTWROS accounts, or possibly even a Roth IRA? Why Roth IRA for college savings? Let’s sit down and review ALL your options.
Estate Planning: Estate planning here is not difficult, but is starting to become more complex. We still need updated wills / guardianship's to carry out our wishes for our Estate that has grown over the years and who to watch over our minor children God forbid both parents pass. Now we also really need to consider medical directives in the event one becomes ill or in an unconscious state for any reason. Also, and one that I am a strong believer of, are Revocable Trusts. We can explain more together, but this is one way to protect your family’s financial future from any outside parties. Beneficiary updates are also very crucial on all accounts, contracts, and life policies as well so we need to verify they are accurate and updated properly!
Bradley Wealth Advisors
Maryland Location:
10411 Motor City Drive, Suite 750
Bethesda, MD 20817
Texas Location:
5726 Basin Ranch Lane
Katy, TX 77493
Ph: 240-395-1423
Registered Representative, Securities offered through Cambridge Investment Research, Inc., A Broker/Dealer, Member FINRA/SIPC and Investment Advisor Representative, Cambridge Investment Research Advisors, Inc., a Registered Investment Advisor. Bradley Wealth Advisors and Cambridge are not affiliated.
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