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To virtually no one's surprise, regulators have begun scrutinizing how 529 plans are peddled. In December, the SEC and NASD sent a letter of inquiry to Edward Jones and American Funds, requesting information on how those firms sell the college...
It's a rare event indeed when an IRS ruling is cause for celebration, but such was the case in April when the tax-meisters made some alternative deferred-compensation funding investments more tax friendly. Specifically, the IRS ruled that an...
He knew it wasn't going to be easy: A few years ago, William Bourke took a deep breath, looked his new client in the eye, and asked about succession plans for the small manufacturing business the man had started 20 years before. The owner waved...
College savings plans are getting the hairy eyeball from regulators: It's one of those things that was so easy to predict, it could hardly have surprised anyone. Indeed, the way scandals have piled up over the last year or so, it seems, at times...
The traditional family ain't what it used to be. According to the 2000 U.S. Census, there has been a sevenfold increase in the number of unmarried households in the United States over the past 30 years, including an estimated 14 million gay and...
Quick: Which advisor is more likely to win the inherited assets: The one who established the estate plan that channeled a client's money to the next generation, saving his heirs a fortune in estate taxes? Or the one whose actions consisted of...
If you think too many baby boomers are blissfully ignorant of their own financial future, just turn your attention to Washington, D.C. Peter G. Peterson, author of Gray Dawn: How the Coming Age Wave Will Transform America and the World and Running...
More clients are purchasing vacation homes a trend which can translate into more work, but also more opportunity, for full-service advisors. According to the National Association of Realtors, last year saw 445,000 purchases of second homes in the...
Investor misfortune is a good thing at least for financial advisors trolling for new clients. The industry now sits on the cusp of perhaps the best illustration of that statement, as the mythical $41 trillion wealth transfer to baby boomers from...
Ric Edelman, who runs Fairfax, Va.-based financial advisory firm Edelman Financial Services, received a call a while ago from a prospective client, who wanted to set up an appointment to talk about planning for his retirement. Fine, Edelman said...
