How to Shield Your Retirement from Inflation and Taxes

6.23.23: Audio automatically transcribed by Sonix

6.23.23: this mp3 audio file was automatically transcribed by Sonix with the best speech-to-text algorithms. This transcript may contain errors.

Producer:
Any examples used are for illustrative purposes only and do not take into account your particular investment objectives, financial situation or needs and may not be suitable for all investors. It is not intended to predict the performance of any specific investment and is not a solicitation or recommendation of any investment strategy.

Producer:
Welcome to Safe Money Masters with Greg Castle. Get ready for a full hour of financial information and economic news you can't afford to miss. Greg works hard each and every day to help hard working Americans like you navigate challenges and reach the financial freedom they desire and deserve. So now let's start the show. Here's Greg Castle.

Greg Castle:
Hello and welcome again to Safe Money Masters, where our main goal is to help you become masters of your money and teach you how to keep it safe. Now, we hope you're having a terrific Tuesday. I'm Greg Castle. I'll be your host, along with my co-host and producer, Matt McClure. Matt, I think we have another great show lined up for our listeners today. So why don't you tell us a little bit about what we should expect?

Producer:
Yeah, Greg, thank you. We do have a lot coming up here over this next hour and a lot to kind of cram in here. And we'll spend as much time talking about each subject as we possibly can. Of course, we begin with our quote of the week, which is always good inspiration for the rest of our conversations that we have. The inflation demonstration this week is going to talk about a lot of current events and why a lot of the central banks around the world are saying, yeah, we think that that high interest rates might have to be here to stay for a little while. We're going to take more questions from our listeners. You know, we did that last week and it was it was a popular thing. It went well. So we got more of those. We got some listeners to send them in. And so we'll do that as well. We also have, you know, this is is kind of rounding out Annuity Awareness Month. So we're going to give another little shout out to annuities today and talk about them a little bit more as Annuity Awareness Month winds down here in June. And that, of course, that means that as June winds down, the 4th of July is not far away. So we'll have the travel forecast and maybe a little tip or two for how you can make the traveling, whether it's on the roads or in the air, a little bit less painful. Also, this week in history, we'll have a little bit of that kind of conversation and hey, maybe even more. Who knows what we've got up our sleeve here over this next hour? Greg, it's going to be a good one.

Greg Castle:
I am looking forward to the show. Hope our listeners are as well. Hey, Matt, before we get started, I'd like to take a moment just to remind our listeners what this show is about. You know, we're a relatively new show, so the whole premise of this show is to bring you the topics and tools that will help you grow and protect your wealth and retirement income. So we hope you keep tuning in. And once again, you can catch us every Tuesday evening at 6 p.m. on Moneytalk 1010 and on your local FM stations, 92.1 and 103.1 up north. Now, if you happen to miss an episode, we certainly hope that you'll go to catch the replay at SafeMoneyMasters.com or wherever you happen to listen to your favorite podcast. And also you can check out our YouTube channel and subscribe to see weekly video highlights a special content. And if you ever have any questions at all or any comments, we'd love to hear from you. So feel free to email me personally at Greg@SafeMoneyMasters.com Or you can give me a call at (813) 430-7100.

Producer:
And now wholesome financial wisdom. It's time for the Quote of the Week.

Producer:
Some very wise words this time around, as we usually do think. These come from Sam Ewing, who, as a matter of fact, was a former baseball player. Sam Ewing. So no relation to J.R. and he was eliminated as a suspect in the shooting of J.R.. So here we go. Sam Ewing said this once, quote, Inflation is when you pay $15 for the $10 haircut you used to get for $5 when you had hair. But luckily.

Greg Castle:
We both still have hair. Maybe not as much as we used to have, but we have it. That's true.

Producer:
Well, I do have a little bit less than I did.

Greg Castle:
Yeah, I assure you that for the haircut I ended up getting just went up recently too, that it's not $5 or $10 anymore or even $15. So.

Producer:
Um, I hear you. They keep going up and up and up. And sometimes, though, when I'm at the at the barbershop or at the, you know, the salon or whatever, if if it depends on where I go, I'll look at the prices. You know, they'll usually have the prices up on the wall. And I will say, thank goodness I am not a woman because those prices oh, my God, you almost have to take out a second mortgage just to be able to pay for a haircut. Yeah.

Greg Castle:
My wife's hair is so thick that. I mean, she can't. Nevermind. I forgot what I was going to say. Forget I say this all because I've got in trouble. Last time I mentioned her name on air, so. But she has a lot of hair and with a lot of hair comes a lot of cost. And it is it is a pricey endeavor when she goes to the salon.

Producer:
So, yeah, absolutely.

Greg Castle:
She looks beautiful when she comes back.

Producer:
We'll see. There you go. Now, that's the way to talk about your wife and stay on her good side, right? Yeah.

Greg Castle:
Yeah. I just thought I would throw that for brownie points, so see what we come out with here.

Producer:
Yeah, absolutely.

Greg Castle:
All right.

Producer:
Well, you know, I mean, as we talk about inflation, I think two two things are going to keep coming back up here in this show. That's inflation, of course, and also taxes and how you kind of prepare a plan to sort of deal with both of those things in retirement. And one of the things that we want to start out talking about is regarding taxes, and that is that there are only two types of tax free investments. Now, Greg, explain those two types of tax free investments to our listeners.

Greg Castle:
All right. Uh, you know, the first we've talked about it before is basically open a Roth IRA, you know, start a Roth IRA, set up automatic contributions if you can. You can also convert your existing tax deferred retirement savings into a Roth IRA by implementing a Roth conversion plan. So if you need any help with that, feel free to give us a call. The second type is actually whole life or index universal life insurance. Insurance is really one of the best ways, according to Ed Slott, who is the premier IRS and IRA experts said. He basically indicates that life insurance is the greatest tax advantage the IRS has ever given to normal consumers. There are so many things for you you can use it for to transfer. You're basically legacy. You can use it for legacy to pass it on to your heirs tax free. You can use it for estate planning to mitigate other estate taxes you're going to have whenever that you pass away to ensure that your family gets the amount of money that you wanted to leave them. And also, insurance also gives you the opportunity to have living benefits, which is a relatively new feature over the last decade or two. Where if something were to happen, that you need access to those funds or the premiums or the basically the face value of your insurance, typically you have opportunity to take advantage of that. So those are the two ways Roth IRAs or permanent life insurance. Would there be whole life, universal life or indexed universal life? The life insurance offers death benefits just in case you die too soon. But it's also a great tool to build retirement savings and generate tax free income during your golden years. And if you're tired of worrying about your future and you're ready to chart a course for tax efficient retirement, simply pick up the phone, Give us a call at (813) 430-7100. Or email me personally at Greg A SafeMoneyMasters.com. We help pre-retirees and current retirees with with this situation all the time.

Producer:
Want to know where your hard earned money is going. It's time for an inflation demonstration.

Greg Castle:
Looks like inflation and high interest rates may be there to stay.

Producer:
Yeah, that's not the best news in the world. If you are, let's say, you know, in the market for buying a new home sometime in the future or maybe a car or something, you know, high interest rates do have a good side, which we can talk about here, but it looks like they are good or bad staying around for a while. According to this article in the Wall Street Journal, you know, central bankers across affluent countries, they're sharply lifting inflation forecasts going forward, pencilling in further interest rate increases, warning investors that interest rates are going to stay high for some time to come. So, yeah, not not necessarily what we all want to hear because the high interest rates mean that, you know, inflation has not been tamped down the way that they would like for it to be.

Greg Castle:
Right. But Jerome Powell and the Federal Reserve last week indicated or basically they held a meeting. They indicated that they were going to well, basically, they held rates steady during the meeting last week, but they signaled that two more increases this year you could expect, which would lift the US rates basically to a 22 year high. The Fed wrote in its monetary policy report last week that, you know, price inflation in core services, excluding housing, which is a closely watched gauge of underlying price pressures, remains elevated and is not shown signs of easing, which basically goes back to indicate that inflation not only here but around the globe is is on the increase, not the decrease. Some of the key takeaways from this Wall Street Journal article is basically underlying inflation in the US and Europe remains around 5% or higher with stable wage growth. You know, central banks are revising their inflation forecasts upward and they're signaling that further interest rate increases are more likely. Also, the impact of previous interest rate increases seems to be waning a bit, with signs of housing market stabilization and and unemployment decline. Central banks face the challenge of deciding whether inflation is temporarily high or if it requires more drastic measures to address.

Greg Castle:
And then overseas, across the big pond, lawmakers in the UK are calling for an independent review of inflation forecasts after the central bank's initial underestimation. As we all know, economies, including our own, are still recovering from the pandemic and delayed reopening in China could provide a boost with stimulus measures. So if any of our listeners would like to learn how they can get a retirement plan and can provide additional stream of income to keep up with inflation, then once again, please give us a call at Castle Financial Solutions Group at (813) 430-7100. Or you can shoot me an email at Greg@SafeMoneyMasters.com. You know, Matt, I want to thank all of our listeners who called or wrote into the show with questions. We've had such a positive response that we wanted to go back to the mailbag again this week. You know, we normally save questions for from our listeners for the end of our show. However, lately we've had so many good questions that we've decided to open our mailbag early once again and address them up front. So, Matt, what do we have this week? I love.

Producer:
It. It's almost like Christmas has come early again. You know, we don't have to wait until the end of the show to open up that mailbag. So this time around, we're going to start off with a question from Larry in Carrollwood. And Larry says, I'm curious about how much money I should save before I retire. Any tips or guidance would be appreciated. So what do you say there, too, Larry?

Greg Castle:
All you can. No, actually, you know, first, remember that retirement is all about income, not the size of your nest egg. So you want to make sure that you have the opportunity to to turn some of that big pile of money that you're saving or your savings in general into guaranteed lifetime income. Second. Um, determine your retirement goals and lifestyle expectations so that you've got a baseline to estimate your target income needs. That's one of the biggest things that people fail to do is, is take a look at at how much money they're actually going to need in retirement and what the gap is going to be between what they have coming in or the income they have coming in and what they have going out. And sometimes they very severely underestimate those expenses. Are they take a look at the obvious things like housing, utility cost, car payments, credit cards, those type of things, but they fail to add a lot of other things, such as, you know, gifts for grandkids, travel to see the kids or grandkids take a vacation periodically. All those things are basically money that you're going to spend Christmas presents. We just talked about Christmas coming early. So you just need to make sure that you do take a look at that. You set some expectations for for what your needs are going to be in retirement so you know what to save for and finally, contribute or continue contributing to your your retirement accounts.

Greg Castle:
So take advantage of employer matching programs of available but maximizing your savings now, shorten the length of time that you'll have to work and just make sure you contribute to your 401, 403, B TSP or whatever, contribute the amount that you're going to get a match for. I know TSP is 5%, many employers are 5%, some are six, some are for, some are three. But contribute to at least make sure you get that free money coming from your employer. Also since you're since you are in Carrollwood, if you like what you hear and you like the show, Castle Financial Solutions is going to be hosting a Safe Money Strategy seminar on Thursday, July 20th. Also, same workshop again or the same seminar again on Tuesdays, July 25th at Carrollwood Country Club. We're doing it two nights to make sure that if you can't make it the first night, you might be able to make it the second night. We'd love to see you, our listeners and also some of the folks around Carrollwood and the surrounding areas to come out and learn how you can keep your money safe, protect it, grow it, and improve wealth and retirement income.

Producer:
Yeah, we want to want to make sure that not only is Larry there, but anybody else who might be listening in and around the Carrollwood area, it would be worth going to that seminar definitely, and would really appreciate you being there, too. To learn more about a lot of the things that we talk about here on the show. So next up, Greg, we have Sharon. She's writing in from Palm Harbor to ask this. I want to explore different retirement savings options. Can you provide insights on the best ones available for baby boomers today? So what's the answer there for Sharon?

Greg Castle:
Needs to consider traditional IRAs for retirement income or Roth IRAs for tax advantages and flexibility. Always take advantage of those. Depending shared, depending on your age, your health, your financial situation. You may also want to invest in an index universal life insurance policy, too. That way you can basically be your own bank and Dela Rosa where you can generate tax free retirement income through policy loans. And another thing you can do is explore annuities as a way to secure guaranteed income streams during retirement. And you need to maximize your mission before you know, make sure you maximize contributions to workplace retirement plans like your 401. S 403 B's TSP. Especially if your employer offers a matching contribution. And if you have a 401. K and so forth from a former employer, you know, we at Castle Financial Solutions Group can help you roll these funds over into an IRA that allows for lower fees and also better investment options. So we encourage you to do that. All you have to do is just give us a call again at (813) 430-7100 or email me directly again at Greg SafeMoneyMasters.com.

Producer:
One more here to go, Greg. We have Steve in Land Lakes says I am a bit confused about social security. Steve you are. You're not alone there, I can tell you that. He wants you to explain how it works if you can and when he can start receiving his benefits. Greg.

Greg Castle:
Understanding your Social Security eligibility and how your benefits are calculated based on your earnings history. Create an account at tsa.gov. Everybody should start an tsa.gov. Account for yourself, your kids, your wife, your pets, whatever. Nothing else. Just to be able to monitor it for fraud and make sure someone else is not coming in and trying to collect your benefits against you. And that happens more frequently than you think. Um, another thing, Steve, is that you can the earliest age to start receiving benefits for retirement is 62. But if it possible you'd like to wait. You need to wait until your full retirement age. Typically, that's going to be somewhere between 66 and 67. If you do that, it'll result in higher monthly benefits because typically Social Security increases historically at a rate of 7 to 8% per year. And if at all possible, if you don't need the money. Uh, I would encourage you to wait to age 70. Now, the situations where it's not feasible to do that, even not recommended to do that. But if you can wait, it'll definitely benefit you down the road somewhere. Make the difference between actually make the difference of several hundred thousand dollars over the course of your life if you live the life expectancy or beyond. And also, you know, we would encourage you to schedule a complimentary financial and retirement consultation to receive your Social Security maximization report today. And again, with us, it's always free of charge. We never charge you a penny. We are a non fee based consultancy. If you want to learn more about how you can do that for free and maximize your Social Security, get a plan for that and for your particular situation and give us a call again or shoot me an email at Greg@SafeMoneyMasters.com. Remember looking. Think we have one more? We do have one more.

Producer:
And that's that's what I get for not looking ahead and getting one more.

Greg Castle:
This one came in late. This why?

Producer:
So okay. There we go. That's why. That's why. Well, this one is from Sally, who is in Newport Richie, and says this. This is this one. This one's a doozy here for you, Greg. Sally is 62, married, about to retire. She says, my husband has already retired. Together, we have about $600,000 in retirement accounts and not a lot of debt other than the house, which we still owe about 200,000 on. The interest rate is 2.25%. So a long way from where it is right now. I hear that you should always pay off your mortgage before retirement. But my question is, should we take money from our retirement savings to pay off the mortgage? That is a doozy of a question, Greg.

Greg Castle:
It is, Sally. You know, you've got a really low interest rate on your house. The interest rate is 2.25%. Interest rates, even in bank CDs, are running close to 4% or around there, a little bit more, a little bit less, depending on the bank. So if you take a look at the arbitrage, basically the difference between what you're paying an interest rate on your house and what you what you can get in your investments, it's normally not a good idea to take money out of a qualified account or even your savings and that you get more money on and pay off a very low interest loan. If your interest rate was going to be six 7% on your house, which if you, you know, mortgaged it recently or got a mortgage on it recently, that's highly likely. Well, then I would say that might make sense. But in most cases the answer is no. I think you should probably invest your money, even annuity. The fixed rate in a in some annuities are, you know, five and a half, 5.75% right now. And. I would just find a way to to bear it out. Because even if you pay off the house.

Greg Castle:
Cit You live in Newport? Richie It's not as bad as living in Tampa. As far as taxes go. But even once that you pay off the house, you're still going to have to pay. Taxes and assurances on the House and. Some cases that can be the bulk of your payment. If you take a look at the actual principal and interest you're paying on your house, it's probably not going to be all that much compared to your total payment. So, you know, again, that was a long answer to a short or actually a as an answer to a to a long question. But the short answer is basically, I would keep your house, pay it off over time. And. Take the other money and put it into some sort of an investment that you've got a higher interest rate return on than you're paying on your mortgage. So we have questions that you want to ask us here at SafeMoneyMasters.com. All you have to do is email them to us at Greg@SafeMoneyMasters.com and we will do our best to get them on the air.

Producer:
Was going to say that that question, by the way, from Sally It was it wasn't a short question, but the crux of it was should we take money from retirement savings to pay off our mortgage? And the very short answer was just no, no, no, not in her case. But that's what you do, Greg. You take everybody case by case and situation by situation. And and you you know, it's not a one size fits all deal that we're talking about here.

Greg Castle:
No, it's not. There is no one size fits all retirement. Regardless of what some of the gurus will tell you, they'll tell you this is the only way you can do things. You got to do this. You got to do this. You got to do this. And no matter what your situation is, you got to do this. You got to do this, you got to do this. It's always the same, you know, marching orders every time you do that and it's wrong. Now, will it help out a lot of people? Yeah, it will. But there is no one size fits all retirement plan. You have to take a look at your situation. I guarantee you that your situation is different than anybody else's situation. Maybe it's close to it, maybe it's similar, but everybody's situation is different. So we at Cashel Financial, a Castle Financial Solutions group, are retirement and income strategists. Basically, we provide comprehensive consultations at no cost to our listeners, and there's never an obligation. We only work with us. If it's best for you, we'll discover exactly how much you're paying in fees and help you cut unnecessary costs to your IRA or 401. K, four, three or any other retirement savings that you have. And we can also help you with a plan to maximize Social Security. So basically. We'll take a look at your current situation and then show you what's possible if you work with us so you can compare your options and make the best choice available for you. Remember, it's your money, and if it matters to you, it matters to us. So give us a call again at (813) 430-7100 or shoot me personally. An email at Greg@SafeMoneyMasters.com.

Producer:
Greg, we were in and I talked about this a little bit earlier. We're in Annuity Awareness Month, but it's it's about to wrap up here. We're in the last week of it. And so it's appropriate, I would think, to kind of recap a little bit of what we talked about earlier in the month in our first show in June. Some reasons to consider an annuity. So seven reasons to consider adding an annuity to your retirement plan. Number one here on this list, Greg, preparing for peak 65. What do we mean by that?

Greg Castle:
Yeah, 2024 Next year, US will have more than have more 65 year olds than ever before. And so it's dubbed peak 65 in the retirement industry. For those nearing retirement, you know, your needs are going to change as you transition from accumulating assets to protecting what you have. In my view, there's basically three phases of retirement savings or basically retirement planning. The first is accumulation where you go, go, go as fast as you can. You want to earn as much as you can. You can take some risks and you're trying to get as big a pile of money as you can possibly get in order to have a safe retirement or have a good retirement. And then the second phase is going to be a transition phase where you begin to become more conservative in your investment approach. Start taking a look at safe money options and you begin paying down debt to where you can enter retirement with no debt. Which brings up the last phase. Last phase is basically the distribution phase, also known as the accumulation phase. You take that big pile of money and start using it for retirement income. The bad part about that is. The big pile of money can deplete faster than you think it's going to deplete. So always ask my clients, you know, how much of what you got? Do you not want to lose? That's a part that we should basically take a look at safe money options on and get guaranteed income for life out of that particular portion. So, you know, you can never lose it. It can't be stolen. It can't be lost, can't be divorced, can't be anything. Just guaranteed income for life. Um, also fixed annuities offer protection for various risks and as I mentioned before, it provides predictable lifetime income. So we said seven reasons. Man What's number two?

Producer:
Yeah. So number two here is protecting your existing gains.

Greg Castle:
Your older individuals who've done well in the equity markets are looking for ways to lock in the gains they've already generated. Moving money from pure equity products into fixed annuities protects their principal, including the gains of that principal. With fixed indexed annuities, you can also have opportunity to earn interest based on market upside. In other words, you participate in the market gains without experiencing any of the market losses. It's a beautiful product. We all love it here, as you can tell from all of our previous radio shows.

Producer:
Well, number three on the list of reasons to consider an annuity is leveraging tax deferral.

Greg Castle:
An intrinsic value of an annuity products is the tax deferred buildup of accumulated interest and product gains as legislative talks continue. Income tax rates are expected to increase at the federal, state and local level. In other words, when I asked a client, do they think taxes are going to go up or down in the future, say the same? Never had anybody tell me they're going to go down. Most people are hopeful that it's going to stay the same. But the majority of folks I talked to tell me that they believe that the tax rates not only will go up, but they have to go up. Um, so a desire to utilize to utilize a tax deferral to help minimize your tax burden can be a valuable part of a holistic plan. So learn how to leverage that tax deferral. What's next map?

Producer:
Well, the next one is number four, and that is a good one, which we've alluded to a little bit before we started this particular part of our conversation, and that is managing risk.

Greg Castle:
You know, once again, you know, one of the best ways to manage risk, basically to eliminate risk is through a fixed indexed annuity because they're not investments. And so as such, they can protect you from a variety of risks, including market risk, inflation, risk, deflation, deflation, risk, sequence of returns and long term care risk. And one of the biggest risks of all is longevity risk. In other words, the longer you live, the more likely you are to experience any of these other risks. So longevity risk. Outliving your money is one of the biggest fears that people happen to have. Most importantly, they can mitigate that particular risk, longevity risk, which is the potential to outlive one's savings by creating a reliable income stream for life. And once again, you know, one of the recommended products. Now, again, it may not be for everyone's plan, but for the majority of folks out there, no matter what you ever heard about annuities in general of a fixed or fixed indexed annuity is one of the best ways that you can insure lifetime income streams for the future and also make sure that you can cover those income gaps.

Producer:
Well, number five is along those same lines and it is creating a personal pension.

Greg Castle:
Way back in 1980, you know, 60 I think I think it was 60% of private sector workers relied on income from an employer pension. Now, By contrast, only 4% could count on private employer employer pension in 2020. So it's decreased substantially by 56% or actually more than that. But only 4% of employees could count on private employer pension in 2020. Majority of those private pensions now are either federal employees, state employees, some firefighters and. Metro police officers. And if you're in a union, it's highly probable that you have some sort of pension set up there. Other than that, the majority of the public, they have to rely on their savings, such as 401, four, three. Um, also with the uncertainty of traditional forms of retirement income, you're going to need a way to to close any income gap in your retirement plan. And again, there's really no better product to do that in a guaranteed fashion than an annuity.

Producer:
Well, then as we move on here to our number six reason to consider an annuity as part of your retirement plan, it is avoiding hidden fees. That's number six. And boy, those you know, those hidden fees when the when they're in plain sight and they're, you know, waving their arms and saying, hey, I'm a fee, that's bad enough. But when they're hidden and you don't know they're there, that's even worse.

Greg Castle:
Yeah, you'd be surprised how. Mean, how much in fees that you're paying in your accounts. You know, because fixed annuities are insurance products, consumers benefit from a retirement vehicle that's that's been built to address the associated cost of ownership up front. You know, unless you make early withdrawals, terminate your contract or choose to pay for optional rider. Riders that deliver specific benefits, in most cases, you're not going to be charged any fees. You know, contrast that with A41K mutual fund. Some other things, even low cost mutual funds have substantial fees. You really don't know all the fees that you're having. And if you really took your if you took a look at your statement and added up all the fees you're paying, you'd be surprised how much that digs into your return. Well, then.

Producer:
Number seven is capitalizing on innovation. And I think this is one of the best ones here, because you mentioned a moment ago, Greg, that people may have heard things that weren't great in the past about annuities. It Well, one of two things is probably true is, is either a, the person saying that either didn't know what they were talking about or they were talking about one specific kind of annuity, which is not something that you would generally recommend.

Greg Castle:
The variable.

Producer:
Annuity. Yeah, exactly. And or they were talking about maybe an old annuity like something that may have been available several decades back on the market. But innovation this this is a big one right now.

Greg Castle:
Yeah one of the seventh reason now for the possible reasons why you should consider an annuity this is a big one because the day annuity products are not your grandfather's annuities. They provide a lot more benefits, especially living benefits. Innovations can help provide more reliable accumulation, bigger income payouts and of course, other features like long term care benefits. Which one of those living benefits that we mentioned to you. Most of your older annuities do not have. These things included. And so it might be important to take a look at what you've got and compare it so you find out, is there something better out there that I can roll this over into to make sure I have the benefits that that today's annuity owners are actually entitled to? So when you combine the benefits like tax deferral, defined liquidity and payout guarantees, fixed annuities can address a variety of retirement needs. So if you really want to see how annuities might fit into your future, then give us a call at (813) 430-7100 or email me personally at Greg@SafeMoneyMasters.com.

Producer:
And Greg, you know, we've got a big holiday coming up next week. We talked about the end of the the month of June here as Annuity Awareness Month comes to a close. And that's why we just had that discussion about annuities and why you should consider them. But there is this big important holiday just around the corner and the whole country is going to be celebrating the the independence of this nation. And a lot of people are going to be on the roads and or in the skies traveling. Right.

Greg Castle:
It certainly will be. And, you know, according to the latest 4th of July travel forecast, more than 60% of surveyed Americans plan to travel for Independence Day this summer. And believe it or not, that's 155 million people. So if you plan to travel. Couple of points for you. Number one, hit the road early and or if you're flying. Arrive at the airport early with plenty of time to get to your gates and get through security. The getting to the gate, once you get through security is less of a problem than actually standing in the lines to get through security. The most recent weekend. Just for comparison, on the Friday of this past Memorial Day weekend, the Transportation Security Administration, TSA screened roughly 2.7 million people at US airports. That, of course, is the highest checkpoint that we've got as far as 2023 is concerned. And it looks like 4th of July might actually be right there with it. And that's a lot of people. So whatever you're going to do, whether you're driving, whether you're flying or if you're just going to be driving around your own neighborhood for a staycation or near occasion. Travel safe. There's a lot of folks can be on the road and some of those folks may not be as careful as you are.

Producer:
Yeah, exactly. Or they may have been, you know, celebrating a little too much or that kind of thing. So just be careful. Extra, extra careful. Don't let nobody.

Greg Castle:
Drinks your 4th of July. Come on.

Producer:
No, no, not at all.

Greg Castle:
Never. Just waiting for fireworks all day long. You need hot dogs.

Producer:
That's right. That's right. That's it. And you just choke them down because you have nothing to drink at all. But yeah, so just be extra careful, but make sure and have a lot of fun, too. So we're not we're not telling you not to have fun. Just be responsible when you have fun.

Greg Castle:
So fun to celebrate our independence.

Producer:
True. That's right. Well, you know, it's like it's almost like preparing for retirement a little bit. You want to be you want to make sure that you take your caution and care when you do that as well. Because when you retire, it's like every day is the 4th of July, a little bit. Every day is a Saturday or a holiday, Right? So. That's right. I mean, and a lot of people think more and more, you know, as a matter of fact, my sister was just able to do this, are wanting to retire early. And, you know, I mean, for for her, it was just, you know, she was a teacher and she had just kind of she had just kind of gotten to that point where she was she said, okay, almost, almost 30 years. This is this is enough. Love the kids and all, but I need time for myself, which she never really had before. So, you know, whatever the reason, I mean, if you want to do that, if that's your story as well, if you want to, you know, go sit on the beach, if you want to go to the mountains and and do outdoorsy things there, you want to travel, start a new business, any of those things that you want to do. There are some things that, at least according to a lot of the experts, that they say, you know, you should never buy these things in order to reach that goal. This was from a recent article in Yahoo! Finance, and they sort of narrowed it down to to five major things that you should never buy if you want to retire earlier. And number one on this list here, Greg, is luxury vehicles. And we're not just talking about, you know, the Lamborghini in the driveway. We're also talking about boats, RVs, the big fancy ones, all that stuff. They say if you want to retire early, avoid.

Greg Castle:
Luxury vehicles. Dave Ramsey would be ashamed of you if you bought one. You know, vehicles are already depreciate a depreciating asset and most people aren't using their car, truck or SUV to generate income. You know, one of the. Lessons learned a long, long time ago is that in most cases you should buy your dream car when it's at least two years old. At that point, it's still in great shape. A lot of cases usually have a warranty left on it, and the person who bought it before you has already taken care of the depreciation for you. And so take a look at that. New cars basically lose 20 to 30% of their value after only one year of ownership. Luxury vehicles, of course, come with big price tags, but they also come with more expensive ongoing costs such as insurance, maintenance, repairs, docking of its boat parking fees. Actually, if it's a boat or a slip rent for a boat or a parking fees for an automobile truck or SUV or RV for that matter. So there's an old saying that it's better to drive a Honda to the hills than than a Lamborghini to the office. It certainly cost you a lot less. But just just be careful of overspending, which was our one of our segments from last week's show. Be careful of overspending on items that you really don't need. And, you know, images and perceptions of those images, you know, might be important to you. But there's a lot of a lot of quality vehicles out there you can get for a lot cheaper than buying a brand new luxury vehicle. So buy something that's within your budget. Make sure you stay within your budget.

Producer:
Yeah. And those, you know, repair and maintenance costs and things like that or, as you say, are really going to also bite you, you know, where. And so you you don't necessarily want to and buy you know where I mean the wallet some you know.

Greg Castle:
What what were people thinking.

Producer:
I know I don't know I don't know where their brains were in the gut or somewhere wallet. That's right. But anyway so yeah, that's also, as you say, a big consideration as well. Also another thing that they say to not buy if you want to retire early holiday homes like a vacation home kind of a deal. And timeshares. Yeah, those are two things, especially the timeshare industry. I mean, there's there's a whole industry now around the timeshare industry helping people get out of their timeshares.

Greg Castle:
Yeah. Yeah, there's a whole number of articles on both of those. You know, the timeshare industry itself as well as there's also a lot of negative. Information out there about the companies that try and help you get out of it because timeshares are so hard to get out of that. Even those folks that are trying to help you, you're going to pay a whole lot of money to make that happen. It's never a quick process. Um, so, you know, unless your vacation home is producing enough income to offset the cost. Likely sitting empty and unused most of the year. So you're not going to make a lot of money on it. You know, timeshares offer limited flexibility in terms of travel plans. You may be limited to specific weeks or seasons if you if you want to access your property. We have personal experience here in the Castle household. Before I ever met my wife, she had bought a number of. Days, weeks, whatever in a timeshare. The timeshare she bought at is actually very popular and it's nice, but, um, you know, the problem is you're ready to travel and you want to get a place and normally they have a minimum night stay. In other words, you can't find a place just for a night or two. You normally have to have like a three day minimum so that that's out.

Greg Castle:
You can't stay there unless you want to, you know, have time to take the extra day. And maybe not all timeshares are like that, but we have a hard time unless we book like six months in advance for something we have a hard time getting the the dates that we actually want. And, you know, you might instead of that, take a look at, you know, renting a. Verbo verbo place. Or just something where you can get you have more access to and know what you're going to get instead. Consider contributing some extra money towards paying off the mortgage instead of buying a holiday home or timeshares. That way, when it's time to retire, you can sell the family home and relocate down to the beach if you want to or a lake or My preference would be actually the mountains where the kids and grandkids are going to be eager to visit. Um, but anyway, just. Unless you have tons of money sitting around with nothing to do with it, and you've got plenty of money to make sure that retirement is going to be what you want it to be, then I would suggest that you forego the holiday homes and timeshares and a lot of cases, even the second home, not just the holiday home.

Producer:
Yeah. Now, that's very true. And I'm with you on the on wanting to live in the mountains. That's would be my my preference as well. I inherited that trait from my dad. He loved the mountains, too.

Greg Castle:
Yeah. You know, I'm a I'm a University of Tennessee guy originally and born and raised in Nashville, but. The I used to go to the mountain to pick my wife. Again, here I used to go to the mountains. At least once a year all through my life. And I would go up and I would hike the trails and, you know, hype up the Clingmans Dome in Gatlinburg, and you'll enjoy the running water. The creeks that were up there, the small rivers that were there and a lot of hiking. And so I got married. And now every time we go to Gatlinburg, which is not nearly as often as I'd like to go. Over. The Smoky Mountains are still hike, but now it's around the outlet malls of my wife. And I'll walk around the entire outlet malls for like 3 or 4 times. By the time I get back to her, she's gone through like three stores. She's a very thorough shopper that I carry the bags to the car, come back and wait for her to go to the next shop.

Producer:
Anyway, so it sounds like going up there with my with my mom and my sister. Exact same way.

Greg Castle:
Love it. I mean, I love the love, the mountains, the beach growing up was a place you go to visit. You have one of the beach, great vacations, great water, great memories, you know, But you just something about that fresh mountain air, just nice and clean. Clear and just just really love it. So anyway, we move on now.

Producer:
But we can yes, we can can move on here to another thing that you should not buy. According to some of the experts here at this Yahoo! News article, this is where we got this info, the latest and greatest technology. They say avoid that if you want to retire early and yeah mean that can be pretty expensive.

Greg Castle:
It is so easy to become caught up in the in the shiny object syndrome. You know the new features of the latest smartphone think iPhone comes out with a you know they'll tout the the new camera they got laptops televisions you know but if you wait an extra year or two, it'll help you save some cash. Don't be so caught up in having to have the latest and greatest thing. It'll cost you a lot of money. It'll take away money that you could have had for savings and long. Way down the road. It can hurt you when it comes time for retirement. So consider buying models from the previous year. Hold off on upgrades until devices go on sale. Black Friday or Cyber Monday are good days for deals if you can wait that long. Don't be like some people where patience is not your virtue. And it's like, I know what I want and I want it now. So I think it's a song. As a matter of fact, I know what I want and I want it now, but I know a lot of people like that. And they're they're close in proximity to me as I speak.

Producer:
Are you getting into dangerous territory there now?

Greg Castle:
Yeah.

Producer:
So so moving on from that, then, before you get into any more trouble, excessive daily conveniences, those are some things that they say to avoid as well. So what are some of those examples of excessive daily conveniences?

Greg Castle:
So then let me go back and get out of trouble. I was talking about my neighbors. So anyway. Sure, sure. That's my story. I'm sticking to it anyway. So excessive daily conveniences, you know, consider making coffee at home instead of buying from Starbucks. It'd be a whole lot cheaper in the long run. You may have to go out and find a recipe online for something for a latte. Ba ba da ba da ba da. Whatever it is you drink. I'm not a coffee drinker, so I'm okay. Even just a you know, if you if you make coffee at home and avoid having to go out somewhere to get it, you can save you a lot of money as a matter of fact, the average couple over the course of a year spends $2,000 a year at Starbucks Dunkin's or Cafe around the corner on just coffee, not counting the donuts and other stuff you get when you're there. Now got to be Dunkin's got some good donuts. Not as good as Krispy Kreme, but good donuts. There's concur do I now.

Producer:
I concur with that.

Greg Castle:
Anyway. So specialty drinks often cost you like $5 or more and it's easy to become tempted to purchase that bagel, donut or pastry behind the glass. You know, just. Just be careful. A lot of times, you know, not that sodas are good for you, but if you don't drink sodas, drink water or tea, in most cases water or tea, if you go to a restaurant, refills are free. And if you get that specialty drink or a drink in general, you know, every time that one comes to your table, you know, it's going to cost you, you know, 5 to $15 depending on where you're eating or whatever. And that can really raise the price of of your your bill when it comes out.

Producer:
That's definitely true. You don't want sticker shock when you get the when you get the check there. Last one, last item not to buy if you want to retire early on this list, high fee financial products and investments.

Greg Castle:
You know, as I said earlier, you know, many mutual funds come with excessive fees such as 12 be one fees, speculative investments tout potential gains, but they carry risk and sometimes well, not sometimes. But as you get closer to retirement within that retirement red zone, five years before, five years after the last thing that you want, unless you got tons of money set aside, you can afford to lose a good bit. The last thing you want is investments that carry high risk. There are safer, structured ways to take smart, smart risk and grow your wealth in an efficient manner. Get in touch with us to learn about your options if you're determined to purchase any of the items we just talked about above and just you want help in developing a plan for retirement that gives you balance and perhaps the ability to make one of these purchases. Then give us a call at (813) 430-7100. Or once again, email me personally at Greg@SafeMoneyMasters.com. Now, you might also consider attending the Safe Money Strategy seminar that that my company, Castle Castle Financial Solutions Group will be hosting on two nights. To me the same seminar twice. Give you options for the dates. It'll be Thursday, July 20th and Tuesdays July 25th. At Carrollwood Country Club. We'd love to see you there.

Producer:
It's this Week in History.

Greg Castle:
June 20th. You know, filmmaker and screenwriter J.J. Abrams turns 57 today. He's been a master of a number of TV shows. Lost a couple more aliens. Some more. Yeah, and a couple of movies, too. Actually, he contributed to Mission Impossible, not contribute. He actually, I think, directed Mission Impossible three, uh, 2 or 3 and a couple of others. So he's, you know, great, great filmmaker and screenwriter. Go back in history. And we've got a birthday for Helen Keller. Helen Keller was the first deaf and blind individual to earn a bachelor's degree, and she was born on this day in 1880. She would have been 143 years old today. They'll. She also wrote 12 books. And one of them was a story of my life. So she's, you know, great, great, great role model, not only for the deaf and blind community, you know, but for people to to take a look and see how easily they could overcome certain challenges. Um, country artist and singer Lorrie Morgan. I know Lorrie Morgan from Nashville. You know, I've run into her many, many times. We've spoken a few times. She turns 64 today, and, you know, she has actually left the Nashville area. And right before we moved to Tampa, actually lived in Panama City Beach. And that's where she lives now. So I run into her a few times there as well. She's down to earth person. Love her to death. She's You've also got.

Producer:
She following you or are you following her? That's you.

Greg Castle:
Know, I would love to say she's following me, but unfortunately, it's probably the other way around. Um, and former CEO and presidential candidate, you know, Ross Perot, he would have been 93 today. He was actually an independent candidate who actually forgot the party actually started the reform.

Producer:
The Reform Party.

Greg Castle:
Reform Party is exactly right. Thanks. Started the Reform Party. And as far as history goes, in 1940, Germany began using the Enigma machine to encode messages during World War Two. They thought it was invincible, and at some point the Allies were able to break the code. Germany was not aware of that, and that was really considered to be one of the turning points of the war. 2003. We're all really appreciate this day. This was the beginning of the registration for the do not call list. And, you know, we all appreciate being on that particular list. Unfortunately, apparently some of the callers don't adhere to it. But it's great to be there. And then as far as today goes, there's a number of special days. Number one, it's National PTSD Awareness Day. It's very, very important, you know, especially for our veterans coming back. Many veterans come back and they have it. It's also National Bingo Day, National Onion Day. One of my favorites is National Ice Cream Cake Day. They may go have some after the show. And then finally, we've got National Sunglasses Day.

Producer:
Well, well, here we go. I'm to going to celebrate right now my sunglasses on.

Greg Castle:
That's my finger. Sunglasses. Mine's downstairs to join you in that, But. Anyway, I think that's that's going to wrap it up for today. Matt.

Producer:
Yeah, that's that's going to do it. I'll take my cool shades off now so we can wrap up the show. But yeah, that'll just about do it here for this week. Greg I really appreciate it, sir. We've gotten some great stuff in for the listeners and we'll talk again next week.

Greg Castle:
Next week is 4th of July and we're we're on Tuesday, so we'll have some special items to help celebrate our day. And we look forward to being with you then. So until next Tuesday, we'll see you at same bat time.

Producer:
Same bat channel.

Greg Castle:
So long, folks.

Producer:
Thanks for listening to Safe Money Masters with Greg Castle. You deserve to work with a financial expert who has a track record of helping clients exceed their financial goals by implementing safe and proven strategies to schedule your free No obligation consultation with Greg. Visit SafeMoneyMasters.com.

Producer:
Not affiliated with the United States government. Greg Castle does not offer tax, legal or investment advice. Consult with your tax advisor or attorney regarding specific situations. Opinions expressed are subject to change without notice. These opinions are not intended as investment advice, nor do they predict future performance of any product. All information provided is believed to be from reliable sources. However, we make no representation or warranty as to the accuracy of any statement. This information is intended to be educational in nature and does not provide a guarantee or specific result. All copyrights and trademarks are the property of their respective owners. Amateur life assumes no responsibility or liability for the content of this message. The information contained herein is provided on an as is basis with no guarantees of completeness, accuracy, usefulness, timeliness or the results obtained from the use of this information.

Producer:
Fixed annuities, including multiyear guaranteed rate annuities, are not designed for short term investments and may be subject to restrictions, fees and surrender charges as described in the annuity contract. Guarantees are backed by the financial strength and claims paying ability of the issuer.

Producer:
Any bonuses mentioned may be subject to additional restrictions and regulations based on the offering annuity company. You may not receive the bonus if the contract is fully surrendered or if traditional annuitization payments are taken and if the policy is partially surrendered, it could result in a partial loss of bonuses because these are bonus annuities. They may include higher surrender charges, longer surrender charge periods, lower caps, higher spreads, and other restrictions that are not included in similar annuities that don't offer a bonus feature.

Producer:
Registered investment Advisors and Investment Advisor representatives act as fiduciaries for all of our investment management clients, we have an obligation to act in the best interests of our clients and to make full disclosures of any conflicts of interest. If any exist. Refer to our firm brochure the ADV to a page four for additional information. Any comments regarding safe and secure products and guaranteed income streams refer only to fixed insurance products. They do not refer in any way to securities or investment advisory products. Fixed insurance and annuity product guarantees are subject to the claims paying ability of the issuing company and are not offered by BWR.

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