Shifting Into Reverse Blog
#226: Using housing wealth to fund a special needs trust
HELPING GRANDDAUGHTER SING AND DANCE With a granddaughter diagnosed as intellectually and developmentally disabled, you have been contributing annually to the special needs trust your son and daughter-in-law established for her benefit several years back. Until last year, while you had been officially retired for a decade, both of you were earning consulting income. Those […]
#225: Using housing wealth to super-fund 529 plans
REROUTING HOUSING WEALTH NOW TO HELP GRAND-NIECES LATER Your husband’s receipt of an inheritance, combined with the recent sale of a piece of commercial property on your part has started the two of you thinking about upping the amount you’ve been contributing towards your grand-nieces’ college fund. (With no grandchildren of your own, you have, […]
#224: Keeping housing wealth in ready reserve
HOUSING WEALTH AS A BACKUP FORCE For decades, your retirement planning was loosely based around the 4% Rule of withdrawals. Now, seven years in (two in full retirement), the two of you have been wondering about the long term sustainability of taking that 4% annually. Because a good deal of your money is in mutual […]
#223: Housing wealth keeps asset allocation in balance
IN ASSET ALLOCATION, HOUSING WEALTH STANDS IN FOR CASH Now about to enter your sixth year of retirement (for your wife it will be her third), you’re glad that after toying with the idea of moving to a nearby retirement community, the wisdom of your decision to “stay put” in your “big house” was confirmed […]
#222: Using housing wealth to preserve capital gains step-up on other assets
WAIT FOR IT…WAIT FOR IT…HOUSING WEALTH NOW HELPS CHILDREN LATER Having survived some serious post-COVID health challenges, the two of you are happy to be back to Plan A, involving the major home indoor and outdoor redesign you’d originally hoped to do right after retiring. With the newest estimates from contractors totaling some $120,000, you’ll […]
#221: Advisors increasing consider home equity as a wealth management tool
REVERSE MORTGAGES IN REVIEW For many years after the Deering Savings & Loan first issued a reverse mortgage to Nellie Young of Portland, Maine in 1961, CPA Joshua Wiesenfeld writes, the product was viewed with suspicion by CPAs and financial planners. Over the years, that view became outdated, he adds, with the Financial Industry Regulatory […]
#220: Using a reverse mortgage to finance home adaptation
USING REVERSE MORTGAGE FUNDING TO STAY ROOTED While the original plan was, once you’d both retired, to put your home on the market and join several former neighbors at a nearby independent living retirement community, you’ve changed your minds and decided to stay put. Rather than waiting months for just the right spot in that […]
#219: Using reverse mortgage funding to satisfy a divorce decree
FAIR-AND-SQUARE DIVORCE DIVVY-UP USING REVERSE MORTGAGE FUNDING If there is such a thing as an amicable divorce, that’s what the two of you are trying to accomplish. The one item about which there has been no dispute is the occupancy of your home – while your will be continuing to live in Indiana, your soon-to-be […]
#218: Using reverse mortgage funding for a franchise purchase
HOME EQUITY CAN HELP RETIREE GO FROM EMPLOYEE TO OWNER Although you’ve enjoyed success in your long career in sales, it’s always been as an employee rather than as an owner. In fact, your original idea was to take on sales training gigs after retirement (planned for the end of […]