DeFreitas & Minsky Accounting Blog

Are you new to budgeting or searching for a money management solution to fit your lifestyle? Maybe, you should try the 50 30 20 budget. It’s a great way to develop a balance between the money you spend on obligations, goals and splurges.

Every working American dreams of a comfortable retirement. Unfortunately, far too many people fail to develop a strategic plan to make financial stability in their golden years a reality.

If you are like many Americans who are concerned about retirement but don’t know what to do about it, you should know it’s never too late to begin planning. These seven tips will give you a head start.

Too many senior citizens get caught in the same retirement jam: not enough money saved to sustain their standard of living. This happens because of retirement planning mistakes made well before the age of 65.

Thankfully, it’s never too late to make a change.

Social Security, which turned 80 years old this month, is still vital to the financial health of American seniors. With changes to the economy, such as the demise of pension plans, more retirees today rely on Social Security benefits as their chief source of income.

As you begin to think about planning for your retirement, you’ll need to choose a retirement vehicle that is right for you. Since there are pros and cons to every savings plan, our chart provides an analysis of 401k vs Roth IRA.

After tax day, we are rewarded with the fun task of deciding what to do with our income tax refund. Before buying anything this year, consider some of our smart strategies for investing your tax refund for retirement.

When talking about saving for retirement, plenty of questions come up. A pretty popular one is, "What is a Traditional IRA?" There are many ways that people can save money for retirement. One of the most popular is through the use of an Individual Retirement Account, or an IRA. The biggest draw for using a traditional IRA is the big tax break that it comes with, but it’s important to know all that you can about any savings method before making a decision. Retirement savings is often done through a series of investment choices, but an IRA is not actually an investment, it’s just the place where you keep all of your assets.

A few weeks ago, we started looking at Simplified Employee Pension plans, which are alternative retirement savings plans to traditional IRA or 401k accounts. These accounts are typically most beneficial to individuals who are self-employed or who own small businesses. Last time, we talked about how Simplified Employee Pension plans benefit the self-employed, so this post will look at how these plans help small business owners.

Last week we started looking into retirement plans such as 401ks and IRAs, and the different strategies that people use to manage their finances as they enter into retirement. Sometimes you don’t have to pay taxes on the money you invest into retirement plans, like IRAs, so one strategy is to hold off on withdrawing from your account until you’re in the lowest possible tax bracket.

Employee sponsored retirement plans, such as 401(k)s, are popular methods of saving for retirement for many working Americans. 401(k) contributions are made with pre-tax dollars, which means that tax payment on that money is deferred until the funds are removed from the account.