Haven Financial Group Radio - 2/2/25

make your nest egg last. Your tune to the Haven Financial Group Radio Show with your host Larry Kolvig and Kim Karrigan your guides to weekly retirement confidence. If you're interested in protecting and growing what you have, let us be your financial safe haven. The phone nines are always open at six point two five four eighty four hundred. Now get your financial questions ready because the Haven Financial Group Radio Show starts now.

and inflation and you know what, all this continues to happen. Anyways, We've had inflation, So inflation is nothing new. An all the listeners' pocketbooks have been affected by inflation. It's just a matter of what what do we do? You know, what is the plan? And now being at the beginning of the year, no better time to take a peek at it. Yeah.

of this next hour. We're going to talk more about keeping your retirement stable during these maybe trying times or uncertain time. We're going to start by talking about interest rates, which certainly, I mean, Larry, we've talked about interest rates in the FED, and you know just the different changes. I mean, that's always been sort of looming there. So we'll talk a little bit about what you guys are anticipating in the new year when it comes to the FED.

Then we'll chat about understanding and avoiding sequence of return risk. If you don't know what that is, certainly Kyle and Larry are going to walk you through it. Rethinking that four percent rule, that's sort of an interesting idea, the idea that each year you should draw about four percent off of your retirement savings. We'll talk about whether that's such a great idea, and then finally a primer on how to select a newity and what might work for you.

Our number is six one two five zero four eight four zero zero, or you can go to Havenfinancialgroup dot com. If you hear anything here that sort of resonates with you, please don't hesitate to make that call. So let's talk about first off here in the new year twenty twenty five. We've obviously established that there's a new administration, but let's talk about the FED for just a bit, and what

you guys are anticipating will happen with the Fed. We have seen, you know, some of those cuts after we saw high you know, interest rates go up very very quickly and very high. So what are you guys anticipating this year?

them or half a point. So now the expectation from the Fed is about one cut this year, and the markets responded accordingly to that. So that's where we're we're thinking right now. You know, maybe one but the Fed doesn't necessarily have to focus on jobs as much anymore as they were talking about last fall, because both jobs

and inflation are at a good spot. So potentially, you know, maybe they do try to get back to that target that they were talking about a couple of years ago, and maybe there's one or two more that we're not anticipating as of right now.

cautious in their approach to ongoing concerns of inflation. But we just want to make sure that we keep a long term perspective on what we're doing and make sure that we have a diversified portfolio so we can handle the market reactions.

very nice. If you're not getting that, I would shop it out for those shorter term investments. But it's why Kyle mentioned diversification and efficiency, the right asset class mix in that portfolio. And you say, wow, that's so compl and it can be for most people. But it's what we do at Haven. It's what our investment team does. It's what we do in helping people accomplish those goals, whether it's a big portfolio, a small one, non existent one that you just want to get started, or whatever

it is. With the ups and downs and the worries and the concerns, what I found is take you should be getting more communication. You should stay more informed about what's going on, because with that worry, more communication will give more confidence and sure confidence is what we really want to breathe into our retirees to make sure, hey, we're okay or rather than every night's not being able to sleep going, I don't know if we're going to be okay, honey, So that's what we want to avoid.

eight four zero zero. These are certainly some uncertain times. That doesn't necessarily mean it bad. It's just uncertain and that uncertainty, as Larry said, can sometimes lead to some sleepless nights. So let's do away with that. Six one two five zero four eight four zero zero. You can also check it out on Havenfinancialgroup dot com. That's their website.

All right, gentlemen, Cole's going to stay with us. When we come back, let's talk about the understanding and for that matter, the avoidance of sequence of return risk that's coming up right here on the Haven Financial Group Radio Show.

Financial Group Radio Show. I'm Larry Kulvig, founder and CEO of the Haven Financial Group, on today with Kyle Thomas, our certified financial planner, one of them on the investment team here at Haven, talking about the state of the economy, the risks involved timing of everything as we do every week, Kim, all the retirement stuff that goes with getting prepared for those golden years and trying to make the best decisions we can, and we want those to be educated decisions.

So you can also go to our website if you're looking at getting educated in the classes that we offer. Havenfinancialgroup dot com. We've got some great classes, very well attended classes, by the way, truth about annuities, RMD and taxes, maximize social Security and taxes, wills, trust and legacy planning. All these and other events again Havenfinancialgroup, dot Com, any and all are invited. There's certainly no cost for your participation.

to talk about sequence of return risk. Some people may not know exactly what that is, so can you explain exactly what it is and why it matters to retirees?

from your portfolio when they're down. So we have sequence of returns history that goes back, you know, one hundred years or so, and it's important to look at that and plan for different sequence of returns when you're doing your financial planning because there are times, you know, like eight and nine that can happen inside of the next thirty years that you're planning for in retirement, and we

need to be prepared for that. And there are other ways that we can prepare for that and strategize for when those times do come, if they do come. So it's just important to know that that is something to look out for.

are generally a stable investment. The fixed index annuity provides complete stability with some a little bit of.

they've been with us several years now. They both retired John specifically the end of twenty twenty one. Great plan, worked hard, saved, delayed, gratificaated, did exactly throughout all these working years to prepare for the retirement years. Then all of a sudden, December twenty twenty two started and if anybody remembers January, all of a sudden, the market is going down, down, down, and naturally worry sets in. And these guys were well positioned, but it took several additional meetings.

Ay with the concerned, I got to go back to work, or what's going on here? The timing of retirement and the market in what it does in the early years. Is it a major decline or is it major ups is it bullish in those first five to ten years and latter years. It's all about the timing. And we can show computations and numbers that go if two people retired at the same time with the same amount of money, the same withdrawal rate, the same growth rate, yet it

was inverted. It was opposite the first thirty years compared to the other one. Whatever the market was, they ended up, they ended up in completely different spots. So it's all about the timing. And again I agree with you, diversification is extremely important.

can make some realistic predictions. But we know it's going to be bullish, and we know it's gonna be barish, and there's gonna be certain things that we planned on and certain things that we didn't plan on, and we're going to factor that into our projections. And we're basing this on many, many years of history. This isn't the short term, you know. This is a long term retirement projection thirty thirty five years out for many of the

folks that we work with. And the other thing is taking the emotions, trying to take the emotions out of the equation. It's the psychology behind money can be so difficult. It's real. But as we walk people and talk through things with people, it does it comes back to the confidence level that we can give them.

I have conversations on a weekly basis where people come in and actually, just the other day here, you know, someone had over ten percent of commodities of an asset class inside their portfolio, and they didn't think that that was at risk, when in reality that is, you know,

almost higher risk than stocks. So it's important to just have the conversations and know what you're invested in because there's thousands and thousands of investments out there and there's a good chance that maybe you know, not everyone knows what you're actually invested in. So it's just important to talk with a professional and make sure that you're in an allocation and risk model that fits your needs and.

hundred grand liquid. Now listeners might say, well, why in the world would you have so much, because there's always something that comes up and the timing and I think Kyle would agree that we see all the time people come in and they have very little liquid I mean very little for whatever reason, and everything at risk in the stock market, and we're big fans of it. We manage a lot of wealth in the market with Fidelity

and Charles Schwab. We're not against it, but an awareness and understanding becomes that much whuch more important as we get closer to those retirement years. The timing comes back to the timing again.

You can also check out Havenfinancialgroup dot com and learn a little bit more about some of those educational seminars that are coming up in twenty twenty five when we come back rethinking the four percent rule. Right here on the Haven Financial Group Radio.

It might transform your financial future. It might answer questions six one two five zero four eight four zero zero or online at Havenfinancialgroup dot com.

today we're talking about rethinking that. Why would we rethink that idea?

changed compared to what they were in the nineties. As well, so the four percent rule, I like to say, is kind of a good guideline if for someone who's not working with a planner or professional advisor of some sort. It's kind of a similar generic idea as age based risk profiles, right, I mean, if you're not working with

someone who can help you along the way. Yeah, those are good guidelines to use, but it is completely situation dependent, and it should be a discussion point that you figure out with a professional through a financial plan.

it did maybe several years ago. Another one that comes to mind that I've heard over the years, and I think in the industry, we've done a disservice because you hear that do I need one million to retire or four million or ten million, or they throw numbers around like they're going out of style. But sure you know it's not a number. It's not a number at all, because we can We could show you clients that don't have big portfolios that are going to be just fine.

They have income every month, they have income, they don't have big portfolios, and they're never going to run out of money. And we can show you somebody that has a big portfolio and spending out of control and they're going to run out of money. So there is no one glove fits all whatsoever. It's your situation, looking at it one on one, making sure you're considering all income streams, because income is the name of the game. It just

is where is it going to come from? Maybe it's so security, maybe it's pensions, Maybe it's is your investments, So are you going to utilize annuities and then plan for the long haul? Like I said, we project out ten, twenty, thirty, thirty five years, because the biggest questions are am I

going to run out of money? If so, is it at ninety five or seventy five, we'd kind of like to know, and we'd kind of like to tell to tell you whether it's good news or bad news, but you should somebody should deliver the news, so there's no surprises.

higher than four percent also and vice versa. In twenty twenty two, maybe we would have tried to formulate a way to not have the withdrawal rate be at you know, whatever their their long term withdrawal rate would have.

whatever their situation is. And it's important to realize that four percent isn't just what you need to go into. And I've had people come in and say, how how do I get to that four percent? And you know, then we have a conversation about, well, that's that's not really what you need, right, Everything that we have a discussion about regarding your investments, withdrawal rates, retirement planning, all that stuff is about what you need and how can we get there.

We add that up and we get that total number and then we take a look at what are their fixed income sources like social security and pensions, and then we subtract those from that total goal number, and then we get to the net amount that they need to withdraw from their portfolio. It's actually pretty simple math, but it's nice to see it on a chart page where you can see it all added up and takes taxes

into consideration and all that. So then we get to that net number that they need to take out of their portfolio and we send that out to them, net of taxes and all of that, and we could figure out what that percentage is based on that. But that's how we get to the number, just some simple addition and subtractions and all that to get to what they need to live their lives and what their goals were for that year.

the year was, but we want to make sure that we're staying consistent, Luri.

these retirement puzzle pieces, that's just odd enough. And what Kyle just walked you through is part of our proprietary Haven process of getting to know you through the discovery and listening and taking notes and coming up with strategies and hearing about your goals and getting to the implementation process whatever that may look like based upon the plan and then monitoring and adjusting it, making sure you know,

whether that's once a year, four times a year. Everybody wants different, but the key is they should be getting the attention. So if you're listening and this sounds overwhelming, again, you don't have to do this alone. You know, as we talked about the financial landscape has changed. You know, what's the right approach for you and your unique situation, whatever that might be. You know, whether it's coming up with an income plan, talking about the current market conditions,

stress testing your portfolio. You know, give us a call and let's work together to create a retirement strategy, no matter what your situation is, to help protect the savings and your investments and your interest through the years and gain that confidence that maybe you haven't had up until this point.

classes schedule again, everybody's invited. Attendance has been very good to start the new year, which tells me that people are seeking out education and that's important because education is the potential for power. Of course, it's what we do with it that really matters.

Brokerage Act that people might have. They always come out a little bit later and people get a little bit impatience, So just know that those sometimes don't come until the middle to latter part of February, sometimes even a little later. But Lance is our CPA in house, and him and his assistant we help a lot of people through the planning process, which then will leave to successful tax preparation. He is a CPA, he's got years of experience, just

like all of us do. There's no additional costs for tax planning. He does charge for tax prep but I do find a lot of retirees are paying way too much just for preparation from it. One of those maybe those big box preparers, which is fine, but they're not getting any planning. There's no discussions. They miss opportunities of roth conversions because or filling the twelve percent bracket up or which types of accounts to draw off of, and

that's why it's so important. So yeah, I get on our calendar, Lance's calendar to talk about taxes because it is season and we want to not only do our taxes but prepare for next season. Again, you should be getting that attention, and a lot of people are missing out well.

times that we're in. We have a new administration in Washington, the House and the Senate have changed leadership, and certainly some questions still related to what the Fed will do in twenty twenty five. This leaves a lot of people uncertain and maybe a little uncomfortable. One of the things that we've heard from Larry for a long time, and certainly we've heard from you again today, is the idea that number one, it could be overwhelming and you you

do not need to do this alone. You can have a partner in trying to navigate these waters that we're in. You also talk a lot about the fact that income, income, income is what it's all about when you're in retirement. It is so important. So I thought we would talk a little bit about one of the possibilities when it comes to income, and that being annuities. We talk about it pretty frequently here, but I don't think we can talk about it enough because I think people have different

reactions to the term annuity. So I thought maybe you could talk to us a little bit about why annuity annuities can help to stabilize your retirement.

offer guarantees in some of these contracts. Because all annuities are contracts, I think it'd be quite important, very important to understand contracts and what kind of a contract you're entering into. So all annuities are through insurance companies. They can be used for income guarantees, and they can be used very successfully to guarantee income for life, for your life, maybe your spouse's life if you're married. But understanding what you may give up or may not give up is important.

There's four types of annuities. There's immediate annuities, which you can turn over to money to an insurance company. Immediate or deferred annuities, which are both income products designed for income and a certain amount of payout years. There's fixed, indexed and fixed annuities. They're both start with the word fixed, which tells you they are fixed, not the other one,

which is a variable annuity. Understanding the differences. They all can be used for income guarantees, but please understand what you're giving up. They also can be used for Kyle alluded to it earlier. I have it many times before as a bond replacement on the fixed income side of the portfolio. Meaning they kind of work in different directions as bonds were down the fifty year lows a couple of years ago. Many of are the fixed index annuities made two three, four, five percent, so it fits into

a portfolio potentially for income and or accumulation purposes. But understand the contract, understand the fees. Some don't have any fees, others can have up to five percent in fees. Well, the problem is most people don't know which one of the four they have. And what you don't know can hurt you. Well, it might not hurt you, but it could affect the payout. It could affect your money. And

that's why I teach classes on this. I just want to make sure people sure today understand they don't have to. There's some that only do annuities. Be careful. It's not for all your money. It may not be for any of your money. But guess what how do you find out? Come on in and visit with us.

a set amount of dollars. It could have a set amount, it could have an accelerated income. Again, there's lots of nuances with these, and so for income guarantees. For myself, but my wife and I will never have a pension. It can be a good way to do a self directed pension by utilizing one of these. And then I'll take the other side of the equation. Those that maybe have big portfolios that don't want to have all in bonds or stocks. They want some guarantee as far as

their principle. They can use a fixed their fixed indextinuity just for a bond replacement to capture some of that growth. Just don't be confuse the variable annuity, which I think is probably the most popular, if people just don't understand it. It's variable, it's in the market. It can go up and down, yes it can. They tend to have higher fees, and the problem is many people don't know again which one of the four they have until maybe three years you get into it and they go, which one of

these four do I have? Why has mine gone down twenty percent? Well, if it went down twenty percent, that tells me you didn't have the fixed or fixed index because that's fixed. And I'll throw another caveat that they throw out there is for these income features. They'll maybe market this as maybe a six or seven percent guarantee, and people hear that and they think that's on the

return on their investment. That is a return on an income value, which I don't want to get any further in the leads, But that income value is not money you can go to Tahiti with. It's a number used to determine what the amount they're going to guarantee on a monthly or annual basis is going to be that is not a guarantee on their investments, So confusion sets in with annuities. I believe in they can be used effectively, but they don't have to be right well.

Larry and I talk about them pretty frequently. So if an annuity sounds like something you'd be interested in, or maybe someone's been trying to sell you an annuity and you'd like to learn more about it, because Larry, I feel confident that happens pretty frequently too.

I just had a couple in. They just put their their parents into a nursing home, and now they got to think about long term care because now they see what's happened. You know, I think, I see, I think of a couple different couples that now have just retired, a couple of them unexpectedly for a variety of reasons, and now they have to think about menshure or Medicare medica. If that's the case, you should really start three months prior to you leaving the workforce. We help lots of

people in those areas. Taxes. We already talked about social Security. You know, there's all kinds of rumors out there, highly politicized. When do I take it, well, we can. We can give you a report based off on your circumstances and walk you through and make it very very easy for you. So all of these things are so important. Yes, it gets overwhelming complicated. Our job is to make it simpler.