How do you know if a corporate bond fund is a better investment than a treasury bond, or a municipal bond?
The answer depends on your income, your federal and state tax rates, and your state’s tax laws. We have built this tax equivalent yield calculator to help you quickly determine which type of fixed income investment will provide you with the highest after-tax return. [continue reading…]
How do different growth rates, investment durations, starting values and annual contributions effect your long term investment performance? Now you can find out! With our Interactive Compound Interest Calculator you can compare up to 3 investments, each with different initial values, annual contributions, compound growth rates and time horizons. Check it out: [continue reading…]
ETF.com is out with a really good interview with Meb Faber discussing topics from his new book: Global Asset Allocation: A Survey of the World’s Top Asset Allocation Strategies
But what really jumped out to me was his answer to the question:
ETF.com: Would ETFs change that equation if the best-performing portfolio were allocated primarily to low-cost ETFs?
The concept of owning rental property looks great on the surface. Borrow money to buy a home (or condo, or townhouse), rent out that property to someone else, and have them effectively pay your mortgage while you build up equity in the property and it (hopefully) appreciates in price.
Simple right?
Unfortunately as many rental property owners will tell you, there can be a fair amount of headaches in the process. Do you do all the work and maintenance, answer the 2 a.m. phone calls and market the property yourself? Or do you give up 10-15% of your rental income to have a property management company do the hard work?
Then there is the potential risks. There is a huge potential hidden liability in owning a rental house. When the roof needs work, do you have $5,000 ready to fix it? When the HVAC goes out, can you fork over another $5,000? The number of big ticket items that can break in a house is a bit scary.
And with the median home price at about $204,000, investing in rental property without taking out a mortgage is out of reach for most individual investors.
But Wall Street has made a much easier, and much less scary way of investing in rental properties. Today we look at one such exchange traded fund: iShares Residential Real Estate ETF – Ticker: REZ. – Then we show you a new, even better way to investing in rental property with Motif Investing. [continue reading…]
Bankrate.com is out this afternoon with results of their monthly financial survey. One of the questions Bankrate asks is: “What is your preferred method of investing money that you don’t need for at least 10 years.” [continue reading…]
Why is determining an Asset Allocation one of the most important decisions you will make when setting up and maintaining your portfolio? With our new interactive asset allocation calculator, you can find out. See how different allocations to stocks, bonds, REITs and gold would have affected your portfolio over the last 3 decades. [continue reading…]
