What's the difference between Qualified and Non-Qualified money?

Qualified Money is the label given to money set aside pre-taxation for Tax-deferred Retirement Programs (TDRPs) such as 401(k), 403(b), and IRA accounts.  People often choose to divert a portion of their earned income into these accounts to put off paying income taxes until they are in a lower tax bracket in retirement; at least, that's what has been promoted to them.

While deferring taxation sounds like a good option, that stance comes with some of its own problems and hoops through which a person must jump.  The main draw for diverting your earnings into this system is often the employer match that may offer an instant 100% gain as your employer matches every dollar you contribute with another dollar (1:1, or a percentage) of employer benefit into your account.  It can be very tempting to "take the free money".  The strings attached to this system are outlined in my TDRP video.

Non-Qualified Money is money that a person has already paid income taxes upon and is therefore free of any governmental restrictions, fees, penalties, and further involvement; except for sales taxes applied as you may choose to spend this money.

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Don't I need money to invest to get started?

To get started you need information.  You may need to learn a skill set or augment your current skill set to better manage your cash flow and expenses to create some money.  Waiting until you have money to invest will almost always guarantee that you never will have money to invest.  Simply put, 'People who have money have planned to have money'.

What's your plan?

You need information so that you know where you want to go.  Step one: invest in yourself, invest in your education.  There are many choices.  When should you start?  How should you start?  What goals do you have?  What investment ideas or financial vehicles are right for you?  Having a pile of money without a plan can guarantee failure with absolute certainty.  To gather those answers you must begin gathering information and see what expands your understanding, your skill set, and your earning potential.

Time is your most valuable ally on this journey.  Procrastination is your most underhanded foe.  Make a decision and get started.  Then do something everyday to take steps toward your first goal; read an article, listen to a podcast, watch a video... While you take a break from doing that, focus your thoughts on the 2nd and 3rd goals!  So, what are you going to do right now to take your first step?

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Are the options for 401(K) & IRA for "rich people"?

No, not always.  While the strategies I review with my clients and prospective clients were developed by and for those with high cash flows or vast wealth, they can be easily used by people of modest means.  It's one of the reasons that your average blue collar worker or upper middle class family have not been told about them.  The people pushing the 401(k) and IRA systems sponsored by government and engineered by Wall Street brokerage houses make more money by keeping these ideas quiet.

What's the best application for these strategies?

Any financial investment or business venture grows quicker and more effectively with higher amounts of cash flow or capital to fund the venture.  This is news?

If you're working early enough and give your plan more time to grow, you take advantage of compound interest over time.  Of the three attributes in the "time value of money" that allow investments to grow, time is the most powerful.  If you plan ahead and start as early as possible, that's now, this allows you to use time with more modest amounts of capital to energize the vehicle that takes you to your goals.

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Aren't 401(k) and IRA accounts the preferred retirement option?

401(k), IRA, and other Tax-Deferred Retirement Programs are the options that are most often promoted to the populous through employment, government, Wall Street, and advertising channels.  One might stop and ask "why are these promoted so heavily?"

Back in the 1970's these programs were heavily lobbied to the representatives in Congress by Wall Street.  It's certainly no mystery when you consider the results.

At the time of this writing, there are approximately 167-Million working US citizens.  Of those, approximately 40%, or 66.8-million participate in their employer-sponsored 401(k) tax-deferred retirement programs.  For each participant paycheck, whether weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly, a significant number of dollars is channeled to Wall Street into shares of mutual funds (to a large degree).  That value cannot be accessed by the account holder by law until they are age 59-1/2.

How long until you are 59-1/2?

If they access the fund early, the government levies taxes that year, which may bounce the employee into the next tax bracket, as well as levying a 10% penalty for accessing funds prior to 59-1/2.  The result?  ...More money for Wall Street and more money for government.

Wall Street stands to benefit.  The government stands to benefit.  Your broker stands to benefit.  Your employer, to a much lesser degree but still, stands to benefit.

Ask yourself "how much money is channeled to Wall Street through these programs" and you'll have a good explanation of why these programs are promoted to the working populace and why highly effective options to these programs are so rarely discussed or even mentioned by anyone selling the tax-deferred options.

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Is your tax-free strategy a Roth IRA?

No, it is not.  If you already have a Roth IRA and would like to apply a risk-free strategy away from a market that has you nervous, we can help with that.  However...

Our tax-free strategy focuses on obscure areas of the tax code most often taken advantage of by corporate leaders, presidents, CEO's, entrepreneurs, and the wealthy who have a financial capacity to hire a team of attorneys, accountants, insurance, and tax specialists that find the 'juicy bits' in the 70,000 page tax code.

The good news is, if its in the tax code for them to use, its in the tax code for you to use.  You just need someone to make that information understandable, and help you to implement it.  That's the help I offer to my clients.

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Why is there a disclaimer on all your materials?

Financial information and strategy can be complex and difficult to understand.  I do my utmost to make ideas that I discuss understandable, but there are always two parties present in education: the presenter and the learner.

Those of us who seek to educate others can't be present to consult or guide every person who wishes to discuss, review, or consider the ideas and concepts which we discuss in print, online, or in person.  Therefore, we can't be fully responsible for either an implemented idea's failure or success.  We won't be held responsible or liable for what the viewer thinks, understands, or manages while pursuing an implementation strategy.

That reality, however, hasn't stopped big government from implementing laws that holds one person legally responsible for what they have said even when that person is neither present nor consulted when a second party chooses a course of action.  This type of nanny-state overprotective legislation also allows unscrupulous persons and their parasitic legal representation [1] to attempt to exploit any small chink in another person's armor solely for whatever blood they think they can drink in the process.

Imagine that you had a gun to your head and were judged moment by moment on every word you spoke.  My ideas here are immortalized in print, in video, and forever embedded on the internet (where nothing ever dies).  I may have changed my mind on an issue, yet a video from ten years ago seems to document that "you obviously believe...[whatever I happened to say 10 years ago]", whether taken in context or not.

I do my utmost to be clear and to point out risk that I can foresee, but the choice to implement ideas or strategies is enacted at the sole discretion of the viewer.  Otherwise, those of us who have an interest in helping others say nothing, keep all our ideas to ourselves, and refuse to risk helping anyone with things that we've learned.

It's an utterly counter-productive cultural construct, yet, we are forced to deal with it.  I don't like where lawyers and politicians have lead our culture, but, here we are.

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I listen to Dave Ramsey and/or Suze Orman, can they help me too?

I've listened to each of these financial coaches and both of them have good ideas and valuable advice for people looking to reign in out-of-balance budgets and get a handle on out-of-control debt.  To their credit, both have helped millions get out of debt.  Bear in mind, these speakers and authors make a great deal of their profits marketing to the negative-net-worth masses.  Why?  Because it's a very, very large audience!

They have good things to say in general, and while I don't have issues with their general content, each has some shortcomings once they've helped you escape oppressive debt.  For instance, Ramsey’s system does help people tunnel out of debt onto an improved financial footing, but his total disregard for the ability to use credit to leverage your financial opportunities is very shortsighted.  His outspoken disdain for assets that are not soaked with third-party-risk is another highly suspect perspective.

Keep in mind who their audience is and don't just look only at their proprietary materials for all your answers.  Get curious and look elsewhere and compare what you learn from one person to what you learn from the next.  The truth usually surfaces through a little compare and contrast effort!

I found the Google Search on "Is Dave Ramsey's advice accurate?" quite interesting.  You might do the same for Suze Orman and Robert Kiyosaki.  Each is popular and well marketed, while I'm still building a business and a following.

I take my clients beyond getting out of debt and focus on building and passing wealth over generations.  If you aren't quite ready for wealth building, you'll find the skill set to get you there in my MoneySmart Solutions book.

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Isn't your level of assistance expensive?

Through my Wealth Strategy services, no; not to my clients.  My clients don't pay for my financial services.  The companies that issue the contracts to the clients pay me as an agent that:

  1. produces potential clients through personal marketing,
  2. educates potential clients as to the features, advantages, and benefits,
  3. helps the clients through the application process, and
  4. makes themselves available to coach the client as needed.

You don't get one of these accounts just because you want one!  We're not a bank... A potential client has to make an application and be approved before being issued an account.  I help clients with that process and also teach them how to take maximum advantage of the account features that they have available to them.

My Publications:

My MoneySmart Personal Financial Solutions, 2nd Ed. is roughly $25.00 USD plus tax and shipping.  The price of a nice lunch that can change your relationship with money forever.

The online courses for MoneySmart Chapter Walk-throughs and Personal Finance Education are reasonably priced considering the magnitude of the problems they help to solve and student understanding gleaned from them.

Most financial education out in the market is organized or sponsored by the banking industry.  That's like seeing your local drug dealer for his associated 12-step program!  The banking industry will instruct you in accordance with their banking industry agenda.  That hasn't worked out well for most people's net worth.

Clients and patrons who use my materials and attend my online courses tell me the information is useful and effective.  No, not expensive at all.

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Can I order your books in quantity at a discount?

Yes, I have the ability to order larger print runs and can discount them in accordance with the volume you are seeking to purchase for your family, group, or organization.

There should be an email address either at the top of the home page or on the Contact Us page under the About menu where you can submit an inquiry to that end.  Try to provide as much detail about your needs as possible.

NOTE: Expect to outlay a down payment to start larger print runs and payment in full will be expected to clear prior to having your order shipped.  Once printed, down payments are forfeit.  Once shipped, books returned will incur a restocking fee; return shipping fees paid by the shipper.

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Is it ever too late to start planning for retirement?

It's only too late to start planning to achieve the level of success that you would like.  Given that time is your most effective component of the time value of money, leaving yourself any less time than starting right now can limit your success.

A better way to phrase that idea might be, "Is it ever too early to start planning for retirement?"  The answer to that is a definitive "no".

When you are working to grow your wealth with compound interest, time is your most effective component.  Given a fixed interest rate and amount of capital, more time to allow earning interest on interest will help you earn a higher return on your money.

Planning for retirement is building your wealth so that you have both it and its annual earnings as cash flow to work with later in life.  Locking your wealth into government-sponsored tax-deferred programs that limit your liquidity and investment options has serious issues, from my perspective.  Qualified government programs are not the only answer for retirement, however, especially when safer, more liquid, less restrictive, and less expensive options exist.

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Ready to find out more?

Help me understand your situation by providing some very general information.  I'll respond within 72 hours (2 to 3 days) by email or by phone and put you on track to the information that you need to get where you want to go.

The most powerful factor in the time-value of money is time.  Don't waste anymore time wondering, let's get started!

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