3.31.23: Audio automatically transcribed by Sonix

3.31.23: this mp3 audio file was automatically transcribed by Sonix with the best speech-to-text algorithms. This transcript may contain errors.

Producer:
Any examples used are for illustrative purposes only and do not take into account your particular investment objectives, financial situation or needs and may not be suitable for all investors. It is not intended to predict the performance of any specific investment and is not a solicitation or recommendation of any investment strategy.

Producer:
Welcome to the Active Wealth Show with your host, Ford Stokes. Ford is a fiduciary and licensed financial advisor who places your needs first. He'll help you protect and grow your wealth. The Active Wealth Show has grown because activators like you want to activate their retirement planning with sound tax-efficient investing. And now your host, Ford Stokes.

Ford Stokes:
And welcome to the Active Wealth Show Activators. I'm Ford Stokes, your chief financial advisor. I've got Sam Davis. With me on the board is our executive producer. Sam, say hello to everybody.

Producer:
Welcome to the weekend activators and welcome to the Active Wealth Show. Happy to have you here. We had a really great show last week. If you missed it, you can check it out on our podcast feed. Just search the Active Wealth Show wherever you listen to podcasts and Ford, we have another good one coming up today.

Ford Stokes:
Yeah, I'm pretty excited about it. We're going to talk about how you can fund your retirement dreams and also we're going to give you cost to consider and solutions to common retirement obstacles. We're specifically going to be talking about six major concerns for retirees and pre-retirees today. And here's what we've got going on with This Week, this week's show. So here's what we're going to do today. We're going to give you our quote of the week, which I think is a really good financial quote of the week to consider. Then we're going to talk about the six major concerns for retirees and pre-retirees. And we're going to also give you our problem solver for this week. And and also, we're going to share our This Week in history. If we have time, we're going to talk about ten costs to consider when planning for retirement as well. We're going to try to pack all of that in today on this week's Active Wealth Show. Sam, go ahead and share our financial wisdom quote of the Week.

Producer:
And now wholesome financial wisdom. It's time for the quote of the Week.

Producer:
This week's quote comes to us from Richard Bock, an author who became known in the 1970s for a couple of books, Jonathan Livingston Seagull and Illusions. And he once said that the worst lies are the lies we tell ourselves.

Ford Stokes:
I mean, amen. Isn't that the truth? I mean, one of the things that you might be telling yourself as you're driving around, heading to Home Depot or Lowes or Publix or Kroger, or you're going to a grandkids soccer game or baseball Little League baseball game, or you're heading to a cheer competition or a softball game. I'll just share this. The biggest lie that pre-retirees and retirees tell themselves is, well, all the money that's in my 401. K or all the money that's in my IRA or 43B or 457 or SEP. Ira or Simple Ira. All of the money that's in my IRA is 100% mine. That is a lie, you're telling yourself, because unfortunately, the you know, unfortunately, the IRS is going to be your partner in retirement with those accounts. And you need to consider what to do about deleting the IRS out of being your partner in at least a portion of those accounts. And you also probably need to have a retirement income plan, but also get more market efficient as well. So again, on this show, we always try to help the activators out there to get more market efficient, fee efficient and tax efficient and not necessarily in that order. A tax efficient is usually our number one goal because that's more of a guarantee. Also, if we can get you more fee efficient, that's another guarantee that we can do. We can have you spending less money for your financial planning and financial advising and portfolio management and all that kind of stuff.

Ford Stokes:
And we can also reduce your risk with what's going on with bond risk, with interest rate risk right now and reinvestment risk. And we can also help you plan tactically where you're rebalancing, at least on a monthly basis. We don't get paid on fees, on brokerage fees because we get paid for managing portfolios. We don't get paid on individual trades. So we don't try to do any churning of anybody's account because we don't make any money on that at all. And we also we're fiduciaries. We need to put your needs ahead of our own. Our goal is to make sure that you become market efficient with your at risk or what we would call smart risk money. And then we also want to make sure you've got a smart, safe piece to your portfolio. And finally, and probably most importantly is we want to make sure you've got that smart tax part of your investment portfolio as well, and we'll help you do all of those things today. But I just wanted to share the worst lies that or the or the lies that we tell ourselves. A lot of retirees and pre-retirees are saying, you know what, all that money I've got, it's mine. I've got this much money. You just don't understand the taxes you're going to have to pay. And if you think taxes are going to go up in the future, which is what we do on this show and also within our private wealth management practice, we do think the taxes are likely going to go up in the future.

Ford Stokes:
If you look at if you look at between 1960 and 1963, the current 24% bracket was actually at 56%. So that's 8% higher than two X of where we are right now with our current 24% bracket. What that means to you if you're taking out $10,000 to go on a cruise and we go back to 56% rates for the current 24% bracket, then you're going to have to take out $5,600. You take out $10,000, give $5,600 to the IRS, and you're going to get $4,400 out of that ten grand. So you're going to have to take out another 10,000. So now you're up to 8800 and you're going to take out a few thousand more to get up to that $10,000 mark. And you're going to have the rest of it to the government. So you'll be taking out, you know, over 20 to $24,000 to pay for your $10,000 cruise in the future. If we go back to the tax rates that we've seen likely in your lifetime, between 1960 and 1963. Also, if you're wondering who an activator is, that's somebody who's trying to build a tax efficient, fee efficient and market efficient portfolio. It's someone who listens to this show. It's someone who's also saying they've made us the number one, listened to radio show on AM 920. The Answer. and you know, obviously we thank them.

Producer:
Absolutely. We've been on AM 920 the Answer. for years. We've grown from one show to two over the weekends, and we have many more listeners on the podcast. So many listeners have given us a call and become clients and have met with us here in the office and it's been fantastic doing the show for over three years now.

Ford Stokes:
Yeah, we've just tried to do everything we can to educate and give free advice and also just try to give you real value and share what's really going on out there in the marketplace. We also are going to talk even more about smart tax investing and smart risk investing as well with tactical asset allocation and and some strategic allocation going forward. In the coming weeks, we're going to talk about how you can have a managed portfolio, how you can reduce the bonds in your portfolio and also still get rates of return. We're going to try to better educate on kind of that smart risk and what's at risk in the financial markets, that portion of your assets. We're going to try to help you there in the coming weeks. But one of the next big things we want to talk about today is the six major concerns for retirees and pre-retirees. And we've got six of them. So we want people to enjoy retirement because they work so hard to get it and they worked hard to earn the money. It's also even harder to save for the money. So we want to congratulate each and every one of you for saving that nest egg, also building up your Social Security income portion so that way you've got Social Security income as well.

Ford Stokes:
But we also have a list of top concerns that we hear from people currently regarding retirement and or the. Planning for them to retire in the future or even the near future. We've got retirees and pre-retirees that are giving us all these different questions. They've got real concerns on these six areas, and I think you're going to want to hear them. So I want to go through the first one. The first one is Social Security getting cut. On last week's show, we discussed the possibility of Social Security benefits being reduced or cut in the future. If you missed the show, check out our podcast or listen online at Active wealth. Show.com that's Active Wealth Show.com. Also, if you want to book a free financial consultation with me, all you've got to do is click that schedule a consultation button in the upper right corner of Active Wealth Show.com or ActiveWealth.com. One other thing, we have our 23 retirement cost cutters for 2023 and if you want to get that free report, all you've got to do is visit Active Wealth Show.com that's Active Wealth Show.com/cost cutter that's Active Wealth Show.com/cost cutter. It's a free report. All you got to put is put your contact information in there and you'll get an immediate download of that report.

Ford Stokes:
Absolutely at no cost to you. And there's some really great cost cutters in there and great strategies for reducing your monthly expenses during retirement and. I want to kind of talk through how and when and what is going on with Social Security potentially getting cut no matter where lawmakers stand on the future of Social Security. There's almost a universal agreement that the program faces funding challenges that need to be addressed sometime by the middle of the next decade. A lot of people are saying it's 2032. One of the trust funds that helps pay for Social Security will run out of money, leaving more than 20% of the program unfunded. A report released by the Congressional Budget Office or CBO. They warned that the Social Security trust fund could run out of money by 2032, a year earlier than previously thought. If Congress doesn't make changes to bring in more revenue or reduce benefit payouts. So the cut that they're talking about is likely going to be a 32, 33% cut across the board. And there'll be a lot of, I'm sure, discussion on the House floor about that and the Senate floor. But that's probably where they're headed. So my question is, are you prepared to live on 32, 33% less money coming into the household from your Social Security income check? And that's not an additional Medicare surcharge.

Ford Stokes:
That's not money coming out from Medicare or for your Medicare Advantage plan or any of that stuff. Your Medicare Part A, B and C. And or a, B or D, And then if you've got a medicare Advantage plan, that's the C plan. This is just straight up money that they're just going to cut and they're going to cut the income. You're used to getting cost of living adjustments. Those will likely go out the window. So my question is, what's your plan for that? And I'll tell you what will likely happen over the next 8 to 9 years. Regarding the legislative side and ways that they can fix it. I'm not sure they're going to fix it, but what they could do and we'll talk about that right when we come back from the break. But listen, if you haven't already gotten your Social Security statement, please go to tsa.gov and get your Social Security statement. We come right back. We're going to talk more about the potential of Social Security getting cut by 2032 and beyond. You're listening to Active Wealth Show Radio on AM 920. The Answer.? We're going to share what you can do about it.

Charlie Kirk:
Charlie Kirk here. If you're concerned about your investments, rising taxes from the Biden administration, then I encourage you to listen to the Active Wealth Show hosted by my good friend Ford Stokes right here on AM 980. The Answer.. Listen to the Active Wealth Show Saturdays at noon and Sundays at 11 a.m. The Active Wealth Show right here on AM 980. The Answer.

Producer:
Investment Advisory.Services offered through Brookstone Capital Management, LLC, BCM, a registered investment advisor, not an actual client of Active Wealth Management.

Ford Stokes:
We're talking about the six major concerns for retirees and pre-retirees out there regarding retirement. And the first one was Social Security getting cut. And again, want to just give a shout out and a and kind of just a request of all of you listeners out there. Do me a favor if you haven't already gotten your Social Security statement, go ahead and visit Ssa.gov and create an online account today. It only takes about five minutes. Sam, you actually did that last week to make sure. How long did it take you?

Producer:
Yeah, it was definitely about 4 or 5 minutes, and I was kind of multitasking, doing some other stuff at the same time. So I think five minutes or less, you punch in your information, they verify that it's you through your Social Security number and kind of a second factor authentication. Then you're into your account. You can see your taxable earnings all the way back to whenever you first started filing tax returns. And once you have that report, you can get in touch with us and get that Social Security maximization report.

Ford Stokes:
Yeah, and it only takes, like you said, it only takes five minutes. And once you have access to your account, you can reach out to us. So we can. Put a Social Security maximization report together for you. And here's what you get when you meet with us. By the way. I just want to go through these five things, if I could. Number one is you're going to get a portfolio analysis. You're going to understand the fees you're paying that don't necessarily show up in your statement. Those are called that's called an expense ratio. Some people would call it hidden fees, but it's just fees that they actually spell out in the prospectus for your mutual funds. But those fees come in the form of 12 V one fees which are marketing fees that the. Mutual fund companies charge. By the way, if you've got a lot of mutual funds in your portfolio, you should probably transition to exchange traded funds. That would be a really good idea. I think number two is you're going to get a. Retirement income gap analysis from us, and that will also include a Social Security maximization report. But we're going to understand, hey, are we getting more income during retirement than our expenses? Do we have a positive income surplus or do we have a negative income gap? Retirement gap. And so we're going to do that for you. That's number two. Number three is you're going to get a plan to your 95th birthday, a financial plan. We call this a results in advance. Retirement plan.

Ford Stokes:
We're going to do that for you. Absolutely. At no cost to you. And we're going to give you that with your current plan that has nothing to do with us. And that's number three. So you get an idea of how successful your current plan could be during retirement. Then the fourth thing we're going to give you is a financial plan to your 95th birthday with our recommended portfolios. See if you've got a lower standard deviation than you currently have now with us. See if you've got lower fees. See if you've got a lower expense ratio overall. Also, see if your advisory fees and portfolio fees are lower with us, which likely is the case. If you're working with a major wirehouse broker, things like that. Those folks are usually pretty proud of their services. And we are. Trying to be a little bit of a lower cost producer there. And then number five that you're going to get from us is. You're going to get. A financial plan to your 95th birthday with a custom designed Roth ladder conversion. And all you've got to do to schedule your free consultation with us. All you've got to do is reach out to us at (770) 685-1777. Again, that number is (770) 685-1777. Or you can visit ActiveWealth.com and click that schedule a consultation button or visit Active Wealth Show.com and click that same schedule consultation button in the upper right corner of either site. Also if you want to get. You know, access to more of our shows. You want to see more of a comprehensive overview? Good idea would be to go back and watch like the first 5 or 6 shows of this year so you can learn about how to plan for smart retirement plan for that entire series.

Ford Stokes:
And that series is available at Active Wealth Show.com and that's just on the episodes page. And again, I want to reset here. I want to go back and say, hey, we're talking about the six major concerns for retirees and pre-retirees. And then the next thing is we're talking about Social Security getting cuts. Let me tell you what I think Congress can do to better fund the trust funds or one of the the multiple trust funds for Social Security so it won't run out of money they're likely going to take out. The maximum earnings. There are subject to Social Security payroll tax. But here's what they're already doing. Starting January 1st, 2023, the maximum earnings subject to Social Security payroll tax will increase by nearly 9%, up to $160,200, which is up from $147,000 maximum for 2022. The Social Security Administration announced that change on October 13th. They also posted a fact sheet summarizing the 2023 cost of living adjustments as well. So they gave you a cost of living adjustment last year for 2023 of 8.7%. And it's likely showing up in your checks. But you also are seeing the cost of chicken, the cost of beef, the cost of of fish and everything going up, cost of bread, milk, eggs, etcetera, going up well beyond 8.7% year over year. So for folks who are living on fixed income, it's harder and harder, right? Well, what else is interesting is the US government, they may have given an 8.7% COLA adjustment, but guess what they did? They went up 9% on the earnings limit.

Ford Stokes:
So the wage earners and there's 2.6 wage earners for every Social Security recipient these days. And by 2030, that's going to go down to 2.3. The only thing that's saving us is the echo of the baby boomers going to the Millennials. Believe it or not, millennials, there's a great amount of those. The the Gen Xers, there's less of of us, Gen X people. And what is likely going to save us are the millennials, if you can believe it or not. And and so their their work is going to help fund the retirement of the the stragglers of the baby boomers and also Gen Xers as well because millennials are far outnumber the generation X generation. So. But here's how they're going to fix it. They're likely going to take that maximum earnings off and they're just going to make it all year. So let's say you're making over $200,000 a year. And once you've hit 160,200, which is likely by August or September of this year, you'll get a 6.2% raise in your W-2 paycheck. So that's a big deal. But I think that's how they're going to fund it going forward. Hopefully they'll make that decision. And I'm not for more taxes. I'll just tell you. But I am for making sure that all the folks that came before us and helped keep us free were those people that were obviously fought in World War Two or fought in the Korean War or fought in Vietnam or fought in Afghanistan or in Iraq and Desert Storm, 1 or 2 and all those things.

Ford Stokes:
I'm for all making sure that those generation of folks are there to be taken care of. That's what I am for, for sure. So, again, if you're concerned about Social Security being cut, then I would encourage you to do everything you can to get an income plan to make up for it. Also, you need a plan for a 33% loss of Social Security income coming into the household when one spouse passes away. And if you don't have a plan for that, I would encourage you to go ahead and reach out to us at ActiveWealth.com and click that schedule a consultation button in the upper right corner. We only had a couple of minutes left here in segment two and we've really covered a lot on that Social Security front. But number two is portfolio balance is going down as the second major concern for pre-retirees and retirees since the year 2000. There have been seven years where the S&P 500 saw declines, 2000, it went down 10%, 2001, it went down 13%. That's the.com bubble bursting. 2002 is 23.4% down. Again, those three years in a row was a difficult deal. 2008 was a 38.5% loss in the S&P 520 15 was a 0.75% loss. 2018 was a 6.25% loss and 2022 was a 19.4% loss.

Ford Stokes:
American investor John C Bogle. Once said, if you have trouble imagining a 20% loss in the stock market, you shouldn't be in stocks. Many retirees and pre-retirees are understandably concerned. About how market volatility could impact their ability to meet their expenses during retirement. That's probably not. There's a lot of you that feel that exact same way that you are understandably concerned about how market volatility could impact your ability to meet your expenses during retirement. What I would encourage you to do is do a bond replacement strategy, invest in a fixed indexed annuity, get an income you can never outlive for about 20 to 40% of your assets, live off that income and then let the rest grow over time and also do a Roth ladder conversion with some or all of your IRA money. That's what I would encourage you to really consider doing. And believe it or not, you can implement a Roth ladder conversion within an IRA, I mean within a fixed indexed annuity. Or you can also come back and just simply invest Roth money into a fixed indexed annuity. By the way, if you have here's a really cool hint. If you have Roth money, go ahead and consider putting that into a fixed indexed annuity because you can get a 20%, 10 to 20% bonus on that money, which would be tax free money. When we come back, we're going to be talking more about the six major concerns for retirees and pre-retirees or the Active Wealth Show right here on AM 920. The Answer.

Producer:
We have Ford Stokes, author of two important personal finance books, Annuity 360 and taxes are on sale here on AM 980. The Answer., as the host of the Active Wealth Show Saturdays at 12 noon and Sundays at 11 a.m..

Ford Stokes:
And welcome back Activators the Active Wealth Show. I'm Ford Stokes, your chief financial advisor. And I've got Sam Davis with me on the board. Here is our executive producer. So we're talking about the six major concerns that pre-retirees and retirees have. The first two that we've already covered is Social Security getting cut. And number two was portfolio balances potentially going down. And number three is a potential market crash. Who can forget what happened to the economy in 2008 and 2009? There were 8.8 million jobs lost. Unemployment spiked to 10%. By October of 2009, there were 8 million home foreclosures, 8 million of them, $19.2 trillion in household wealth evaporated. Home price declines of 40% on average, even more in some cities. The S&P 500 declined 38.5% in 2008 and was $7.4 trillion in stock wealth lost between 2008 and 2009. That's a lot of losses. And a lot of folks really don't want to see a market correction and a market crash of 30 plus percent again. And they don't feel like they can actually make it through retirement if that happens again. So if that's the case, and that's you and you've listened to our show for a long time, we've we've we've had several folks that have said, hey, you know what, Ford, I've been listening to you for about two years. Or three years. Some of them, most of them are between a year and two years.

Ford Stokes:
And like I listen to every single mid day Saturday or at 11 a.m. on Sunday. And. I'm just. I don't know what to do. I finally just had to call you. And if that's you, I would encourage you to just go ahead and pick the phone up and give us a call at (770) 685-1777. Again, that number is (770) 685-1777. You can also visit ActiveWealth.com and just click that schedule a consultation button in the upper right corner and we're happy to help you. And we're going to give you all the five things we talked about portfolio analysis, retirement income plan with Social Security maximization report and financial plans to your 95th birthday with a Roth ladder conversion. We'll do all of that. That can get you prepared better prepared for what could happen. You kind of got to plan your work and work your plan a little bit with retirement. And we want to do whatever we can to help you inspect what you expect about what's going on with your current investments and then help you make an informed financial decision about what you're going to do next. What Sam and I kind of talk about all the time. It's really it really is time for you to call active wealth to protect and grow your wealth. Let me say it one more time. It really is time for you to call active wealth to protect and grow your hard earned and hard saved wealth.

Ford Stokes:
All right. And here's number four of the six major concerns for pre-retirees and retirees. Number four is tax increases. With the national debt nearing $31.7 trillion in climbing, the government spending is just continues to rise without any stopping in the future. Many are concerned about future tax increases. Most people believe that taxes are likely to go up in the future, and if you don't think taxes are going to go up in the future, I would beg you to reconsider. And my question to you is, here in Atlanta, if you're driving around or you're listening to us on on active show.com or you're listening to us wherever you get your podcasts, whether that's iTunes or Google Play or Stitcher or Spotify or iHeart, all these others. And we're happy to be a radio show on Salem Media Station. We love those folks. And thank you. Shout out to the Salem media folks and everybody over at AM 920 The Answer. We love you guys and gals. Do you have a plan to kick Uncle Sam and the IRS out of your retirement? If you don't, then I would encourage you to call us and give us a call at (770) 685-1777. You can also again visit ActiveWealth.com and click that schedule consult button In the upper right corner.

Ford Stokes:
You can schedule a complimentary meeting with us to discuss how we can help you reduce your future tax risk through proper tax planning and a Roth ladder conversion. Listen. And we're getting close to Tax day. It's not enough to just do tax preparation. You need to do tax planning and we do that. Every day. Every weekday and at active wealth, we help our clients tax plan for their retirement. All right. The number five. Of the six major concerns for pre-retirees and retirees during retirement is inflation. Anybody seeing inflation spike up in the last couple of years? Likely that's the case. We're seeing supply chain issues. We're seeing, you know, potential tax increases. We're seeing inflation just going rampant. We're seeing, you know, the US government printing a whole lot of money and doing a lot of quantitative easement, as the Barack Obama administration called it. It's just not the right strategy. They're trying to manage it through monetary policy. That's extremely difficult to do. So with inflation, we talk about inflation a lot on this show because you need to be prepared for an ever increasing cost of living. Through smart, safe and smart risk investing strategies, we can help cushion the blow of rising costs throughout retirement. And if you want to look at we've even got a chart here from 2013 to 2023. The United States annual inflation rates in 2013, it was 1.5%.

Ford Stokes:
In 14 it was 0.8%. 2015, it was 0.7. 2016 it was 2.1. 2017 it was 2.1. 2018 it was 1.9. 2019 it was 2.3. 2020 was 1.4% inflation rate. And then Joe Biden or let's go Brandon got in the White House and our inflation went up 7% in 2021. The inflation rate was 7%. And in 2022 it was 6.5%. And that's what the government is saying the inflation rate was and what the CPI was. The Consumer Pricing index, which is the CPI Dash U, which stands for urban and by the way, the CPI Dash E, which stands for elderly, that's 5% higher than what they call the headline Consumer pricing Index. Which is CPI. You. I got to tell you, I think all of us believe that in 2023, so far, the inflation rate is higher than 6%. And we're confident that in 2022 it was higher than 6.5 because they wouldn't have given us an 8.7% cost of living adjustment for 2023. And had that not been the case. I mean, it's definitely higher in my opinion. And we come back from the break, we're going to talk about the number six major concern. And it is a major concern of pre-retirees and retirees. And right now, I want to send it to one of our retirement radio reports with Matt McClure.

Producer:
Even with inflation, eating at home is often cheaper than dining out. I'm Matt McClure with the Retirement.Radio Network Powered by AmeriLife. Food costs are up for everyone these days and when you get sticker shock at the grocery store, you may be tempted to consider dining out more often. But think again. Prices are up at restaurants too. Chef David Burke recently told CNBC some of the reasons why not.

David Burke:
Changing the menu Not one menu, but printing menus every day. Paper goods are through the roof to gloves that we wear in the kitchen are through the roof, so there's a lot of deep fryer oil. The oil that goes into the deep fryers, which we don't really look at, we always look at the protein prices that all of those little all of those ancillary things are through the roof with pricing.

Producer:
Energy costs are also having an impact on restaurants. Not only have they driven up the price of shipping food from producers, but gas prices are driving up labor costs as well. Burke said employees who live farther away from restaurants are asking for pay increases to offset the increased cost of driving in every day. So cooking at home will still be cheaper than dining out. In most cases. Many large and local grocery stores offer discounts for seniors, but if you're not able to drive, you can also order groceries online and have them delivered directly to you. If you do decide to dine out, save for a special occasion, try to find a restaurant that offers senior discounts. So have you thought about cutting back on dining out? It's a key question to consider, and it's one of the 23 retirement cost cutters for 2023 with the Retirement.Radio Network powered by Emeril Live, I'm Matt McClure. To get your.

Producer:
Free copy of 23 retirement cost cutters for 2023 give for a call today at (770) 685-1777 or go online to ActiveWealth.com.

Producer:
With age comes wisdom and senior discounts. I'm Matt McClure with the Retirement.Radio Network powered by AmeriLife as the old saying goes everything gets better with age. It's true of a fine wine, a happy marriage and opportunities to save money. People of a certain age can get discounts ranging from 5 or 10% to 25% or more at restaurants, shops and other businesses. Many times they'll promote those extra savings. But Jim Miller, senior editor of Savvy, told Oklahoma's News four, Sometimes you have to be proactive. So the first thing.

Jim Miller:
Is, is you always need to ask because a lot of businesses and organizations offer senior discounts, but they don't advertise them. So don't be shy about asking to save time.

Producer:
You can search online for lists of up to date senior deals at large retailers like Amazon, Kohl's and more. If you're willing to dive a little deeper, you can find more discounts in a variety of other places. And if you're looking to stay healthy, Silver Sneakers is a program that provides fitness classes for those on Medicare at no cost. That's right. You don't get a bigger discount than free. So are you taking advantage of the big senior discounts you're eligible for? That's a key question to consider. And it's one of the 23 retirement cost cutters for 2023 with the Retirement.Radio Network powered by a mirror Life. I'm Matt McClure.

Charlie Kirk:
Are you concerned about the Biden administration, how rising taxes could negatively impact your retirement? Then I encourage you to talk to Ford Stokes and his team at Active Wealth Management. Ford and his team of experienced financial advisors will help you understand the fees and risks involved with your current portfolio. Simply visit ActiveWealth.com to book your free financial consultation and tell them Charlie Kirk sent you.

Producer:
Investment Advisory Services offered through Brookstone Capital Management, LLC BCM a registered investment advisor, not an actual client of Active Wealth Management.

Producer:
Are you concerned about US tax rates being raised by the Biden administration and how that will affect your retirement? Tune in to the Active Wealth Show with Ford Stokes, your chief financial advisor, to learn how you can reduce the taxes you pay before and during retirement. The Active Wealth Show Saturdays at noon and Sundays at 11 a.m..

Ford Stokes:
Fixed. And welcome back. Activators The active guaranteed rate annuities are not designed.

Producer:
For short term.

Ford Stokes:
Investments. Sam Davis, subject to.

Producer:
Restrictions.

Ford Stokes:
And surrender.

Producer:
Charges as described in the contract guarantees, are backed.

Ford Stokes:
By retirees and pre-retirees.

Producer:
Paying.

Ford Stokes:
For retirement. But I wanted to quickly cover what Matt talked about in that report. If you want to get our free 23 retirement cost cutters report for 2023, all you've got to do is reach out to us at (770) 685-1777 again (770) 685-1777. The other is i would encourage you to visit Active Wealth Show.com slash cost cutter again. Active Wealth Show.com/cost cutter. And that report will be right there on that page for you. And it's an immediate download. All you have to do is put your contact information in there and we'll email you the 23 cost cutters for 2023. It's a great way to reduce expenses during retirement. It's a good thing to follow. So we're talking about the six major concerns that retirees and pre-retirees have. And just to recap, the first five are kind of where we are right now. Number one, is Social Security getting cut. Number two is portfolio balances going down. Number three is a market crash. Number four is tax increases. And number five was inflation. And I think those are all real concerns. And this last one is one that everybody's got real concerns on, but it's kind of hidden in the background because when we're making decisions, we're healthy. Our retirees pre-retirees are healthy. The number six one is is literally. The cost of long term care expenses. They're really concerned about it. There used to be 150 insurance carriers for long term care insurance. Today there's only 12. We know because we've got relationships with all 12. And if you think long term care insurance is expensive, just wait til you find out how expensive long term care is. Also, there's about 6.9. Out of ten people. So 69% of the folks out there are going to require some sort of long term care. Are you part of the 3.1 out of ten people that are not going to need long term care? Are you willing to roll the dice and make that gamble? If not, and you want to get a real plan whether you're going to self-insure or you're going to get some long term care insurance, I would encourage you to give us a call at (770) 685-1777 and we can help you with your long term care plans.

Ford Stokes:
Let's just talk about what long term care is and how much does it cost. At least 70% of the people or 69% of the people, as we talked about, of people 65 years and older, will need long term care services at some point in their lives. The cost of long term care depends on three main factors the kind and length of care needed. That's one. Two is the provider chosen and three is the location. Here's a breakdown that we've got of some long term care services in the United States. So you've got nursing home care is about $60,600 a month. An assisted living facility, just the cost of the assisted living facility is $3,600. Non-medical home care is $3,520 a month. Home health care is $3,520 a month. An adult day health care is $1,518 a month. Those are some average monthly costs for long term care services. And you're going to need if you need long term care, it's likely you're going to need multiple ones. You'll need assisted living in nursing home care and or non-medical home care. That stuff starts adding up and it generally looks right now it's between 8 and $10,000 plus a month. If you want to get a private room with folks looking after you and in some level of care. Plus your your home health care costs and or your pharmaceutical costs and all that stuff.

Producer:
It's this week in history.

Producer:
Okay. Ford on This Week in History. April 1st, 1976. Apple Computers Company, later known as Apple Inc., was founded. Of course, people know Steve Jobs and Wozniak as well. Apple later became the first publicly traded company to be valued at over $1 trillion. They reached that mark in 2018. Their products have changed how we live our lives today, of course, the Mac computer, the iPod, later the iPhone, the iPad, the Apple Watch, and they seem to be innovating in new ways every few years that put more devices in our pockets. It's the final.

Producer:
Countdown. So let's recap what you may have missed. It's the final countdown.

Ford Stokes:
So in this week's show, we gave you the quote of the week, which came from Richard Bach, which says The worst lies are the lies that we tell ourselves, and we related it back to your own retirement. And so many folks are saying, hey, you know what? The IRS actually isn't my partner in retirement. All the money that's in my 401. K or IRA, all that money is mine. And it actually isn't. Unfortunately, the IRS is your partner in retirement and they're not the kind of partner that you want during retirement. We also talked about the six major concerns that pre-retirees and retirees have and what to do about it. Number one, was Social Security getting cut. Number two was portfolio balances going down. Number three is a market crash. Number four is tax increases. Number five is inflation. And number six was concerns about long term care expenses. And we've got plans to be able to deal with all of this. So you can keep pace with inflation. You can also have a good plan for planning for your end of life and and long term care as well. And we want to do some smart risk investing and smart, safe investing as well. And in addition, we want to do everything we can to reduce the taxes that you're going to pay during retirement with a Roth ladder conversion or life insurance or both. So we're so glad you've been with us here on this week's show. We hope you learned quite a bit this week about what you can do about these six major concerns and what we can do to help you. So glad you've been with us. Have a great week, everybody.

Producer:
Thanks for listening to the Active Wealth Show. You deserve to work with a private wealth management firm that will strategically work to protect your hard earned assets. To schedule your free consultation, call your chief financial advisor, Fort Stokes at (770) 685-1777 or visit ActiveWealth.com Investment Advisory services offered through Brookstone Capital Management, LLC BCM a registered investment Advisor. Bcm and Active Wealth Management are independent of each other. Insurance products and services are not offered through BCM but are offered and sold through individually licensed and appointed agents. Investments involve risk and unless otherwise stated, are not guaranteed. Past performance cannot be used as an indicator to determine future results.

Ford Stokes:
Chapter nine, you can create your own personal pension. Big idea Using an annuity to create a personal pension helps you create a lifetime income stream, but it also helps you leave a legacy for your beneficiaries. All annuities can create annuity income to supplement the income you need before or during retirement. Those who are approaching retirement are afraid that they will run out of money. But an annuity can help make sure you have income you can never outlive. An annuity can be a great investment for your portfolio, but encourage you to be careful that you don't overpay for your annuity. When you put your money into an annuity, the annuity company will pay you your money back at a date. You specify you don't want an annuity company to charge you too much to simply pay your money back to you. I'm confident that leaving a remarkable family legacy is important to you. You likely want to have money left over when you pass away to leave your beneficiaries. The goal of a personal pension is to generate lifetime income with no risk that grows your money and allows penalty free withdrawals. An annuity can create a lifetime income with market like gains and no market risk, while also allowing you to build enough wealth to leave for your beneficiaries when you pass away. Don't give the annuity company fees for doing nothing. We prefer fixed index annuities for our clients that do not have an income rider fee, but you can still create a personal pension without an income rider on your annuity.

Ford Stokes:
If you get an annuity with an income rider, but don't utilize the features of that income rider, then you are not getting what you paid for. You are literally just paying the annuity company 1 to 2% each year. You defer annuity using your annuity without receiving a single benefit for that annual fee. This income rider fee will also draw down your account value or principal, depending on how that index is performing. The growth on your entire account value could be significantly and negatively impacted. Some accumulation focused annuities are built to deliver increasing payments. Without an income rider, you should consider the features your income rider is providing you before deciding to purchase it. As an add on. Make sure you utilize the features you are paying for more ways to get the most out of your annuity. The longer you wait to turn on the annuity, the more you'll receive an annual payments. This is because your annuity will spend a longer time in the accumulation phase, meaning it will spend more time building up your account value. Your annual payments will grow as your account value grows. Believe it or not, you can generate your own personal pension by distributing no more than 5% a year with penalty free withdrawals from your accumulation based annuity policy. Many accumulation annuities are set up to be RMD friendly so you won't suffer a penalty when you have to take your RMD. It would be silly for you to be penalized for something you are required to do. Annuity companies take this into account by creating products that make taking your RMDs easier.

Ford Stokes:
Inspect what you expect with any annuity. Don't just go with what the annuity agent or advisor tells you. Read it for yourself Specifically, you should read the annuity illustration guaranteed and non-guaranteed tables included within the annuity illustration. Also, please remember that annuity policy is a contract between you and the annuity company. So caveat emptor or buyer beware applies here. Be aware of the annuity you are buying and choose an annuity that works best for you that will help you build a successful retirement and they'll offer you peace of mind. Whether you choose to generate income through penalty free withdrawals or invest annually in an income rider know the consequences of both. This is a decision you will make at the beginning of the investment process. One poor decision here can cost you 1 to 1.5% of annual growth over a 30 year retirement. This could come out to be a significant loss. Educate yourself on your options and the specifics of each option you are considering. Making the right decision up front will save you a lot of frustration in the long run. Also, please remember that if you withdraw too much annually, say 10%, you will run out of money in 10 to 12 years. Make sure that you are working with an advisor who can help you choose the appropriate withdrawal amount so that your money lasts for your entire lifetime. As discussed above, we recommend no more than 5% be withdrawn each year from your account.

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