tax free retirement

How to Protect Your Retirement Savings

When it comes to financial planning, we all have one end goal in mind. That’s retirement. If you’re concerned about whether or not you’re going to be able to reach your retirement goals, no matter your age, this is for you. In this blog post, we will talk about the roadblocks that could be holding you back from reaching your retirement goals.

For the past thirty seven years as a financial services professional, when people come to us with their yet to be taxed IRA or 401K statements, they are generally shocked when they find out how much they have to pay in taxes.

Why is that so? It is because that’s not what they were told throughout their whole working career. They were told that during retirement, they would be in a lower tax bracket, but that’s not the case. You may be wondering why?

It was as if they were traveling down this road towards retirement with one foot on the gas pedal and one foot on the brake. They were setting aside as much money as they possibly could into their IRA or 401k or 403B, that’s the foot on the gas pedal. At the same time they were paying down their mortgage while watching their kids grow up and leave home. They lose those deductions by the time they reach retirement. They just can’t defer income into the future and eventually they lose those deductions. That’s the other foot on the brake.

If you’re traveling down a road with one foot on the gas pedal and the other on the brakes, are you making any progress?

Aside from losing all of your deductions, there is this ever changing tax code that we have to consider. There’s this old saying in Washington, “If you’re not at the table in Washington, you’re on the menu”. When’s the last time you were at the table in Washington? As for me, I’ve never been there.

Our country has $29 trillion in debt. Clearly we have a problem. But every time they meet in Washington and pass a new bill, it seems like they just keep on increasing spending like a drunken sailor. Now let me ask you this. If you have a spending problem or a debt problem, does it make sense to increase spending? If they’re not going to address the issue, then there’s only two ways the government could respond to try to fix this problem.

* Legislatively. They will increase taxes. How will this affect your retirement?
* Administratively. They can print more money and when they do, it results in inflation. What does inflation do to the value of your savings in retirement?

We call inflation the stealth tax. It subtly eats away the buying power of  money. You don’t even realize it most of the time but this is what inflation is doing to our cash value. Right now in 2022, it is blatant what inflation is doing to our money. But we don’t realize that the value of the dollar is decreasing little by little over time. The moment we get to retirement, it’s also very blatant that the buying power of our dollar is ever decreasing due to inflation.

When people come to us with their yet to be taxed retirement plans astounded as to how much they have to pay in taxes, when we haven’t even addressed the inflation issue, what are our options? Many don’t realize that after you earn your income and you pay your tax, whether or not you pay tax again on that money, the rest of your life is optional. It’s voluntary. The key is knowing what your choices are up front.

Whether you are in Gen Z or a Baby Boomer, or in any generation in between, you have two options on how to save for your retirement.

Strategy A
Take a tax deduction on a small amount of your cash value today and anticipate that it grows into a bigger amount in the future knowing that the government could tax at any rate when necessary just to solve the inflation issue.

Strategy B
Pay tax at a small amount of your cash value today and put it in a place where the government could never touch it ever again. So when you get to retirement you can be in control of how much tax you actually pay.

Which strategy would benefit you and your family more? Strategy A or Strategy B?

It is our mission to help as many families as possible, make the best financial decisions that would benefit them. That’s why we present you with these strategies because we believe that it is more beneficial to pay a small amount of tax on the small amount of income, rather than deferring it into the unknown future.

If you are ready to learn how to utilize these strategies to work for you in your specific situations, schedule your free strategy session today

Remember it’s not how much money you make, it’s how much you keep that really matters.

Qualified Plans: The Hidden Truth

These are not tax savings plans but
rather tax deferred savings plans. The government did not say that you don’t have to pay taxes…

 

For many people, the term 401k is synonymous with retirement preparation, and sometimes represents the full extent of
their preparedness. Such accounts are often included as part of a benefits package provided by employers, and chances
are if you have one, most of your retirement savings are being deposited into this account. Given that it can play such a
prominent role in our financial picture, it is imperative that you fully understand exactly how these plans work.

So what do Qualified Plans do exactly?

Most people will be familiar with the fact that they defer taxes, which is true. But this term “defer” can often lead to a
misunderstanding about what is actually happening. Some people fall victim to the misconception that “deferred” taxes are
taxes they are “saving” because the taxes do not have to be paid; which is not true. These are not tax savings plans but
rather tax deferred savings plans. The government did not say that you don’t have to pay taxes on the dollars in your
Qualified Plan; they said that you don’t have to pay the taxes now.

If not now, then when?

Well, later obviously. The key difference between now and later though is relative to your tax
bracket. What bracket you are in now, and what bracket you will be in when you decide to take the money out of the
account. If you defer the tax and you are in a higher bracket later than you are in today your share of the account will be
less. If you are in a lower bracket when you take the money than when you put it in you will get more. The IRS is not
going to ask you what tax bracket you were in the day you made the contribution to your account. Their only concern is
going to be what tax bracket are you in at the time of withdrawal. Because this is true you will need to make an informed
decision about which option is best for you.

The Check Story

“Let’s assume that you call me one day and want to borrow $10,000. I hand you the check, but before you take it you are
going to ask me two questions. The first is how much interest am I going to charge you, and the second is when do you
have to pay it back?

Suppose I said to you, I am doing fine right now and do not need the money, but there will come a day when I need it, and
when I know how much I need we can figure out how much interest I need to charge you to get how much I need.”
Would you cash that check? Probably not, but you are standing in line to do exactly that with the federal government in
your qualified plan. They did not say that you don’t owe the tax; they said you can pay us later. At what rate? Now that is
a good question.

Understand that Qualified Plans do two things:

1. They defer the tax, AND
2. They defer the tax calculation

Ultimately, the impact these plans can have on your finances either positively or negatively, depends on a number of
factors. The first and most fundamental of these is your understanding of the rules of the game, and secondarily the
strategy you use to play the game.

Tic-Tac-Toe

You may not remember the first time you played tic-tac-toe, but you can probably guess who won. It was likely the person
who showed you how to play the game. The game has only a few simple rules, one is the X, the other O, three in a row
wins. As we first learned this game as children, we lost routinely until we learned the strategy of the game. If you have
dollars in a Qualified Plan, you are already playing the game. As an advisor, my job is is helping clients employ a winning
strategy by better understanding the rules of the game.

Becoming the beneficiary of your own life insurance policy: How to use the living benefits

 

“You see, instead of becoming a victim of market volatility, owning cash value life insurance allows you to access that money so that you could actually profit from market volatility.”

 

There are two main types of life insurance. The first is term insurance, which has one benefit and one benefit only, the death benefit. Then there’s cash value life insurance, which has a death benefit, but also has several other living benefits. By taking advantage of these living benefits, we’re able to overcome the five financial challenges that we all face. 

It has often been said that there are two certainties in life, death and taxes. So let me ask you a few questions. Number one, do you think taxes are going to be higher in the future? Number two, do you think that with all that’s going on in our country, and keep in mind that we’re nearly $28 trillion in debt, do you think there’s a potential for taxes to go up much higher in the future? Now here’s the most important question. Do you want to pay those taxes? You see, after you pay tax on your earned income, the choice of whether or not you pay taxes in the future on that money is completely voluntary. 

Which choice have you been making? And with that in mind, wouldn’t it make sense to build a pile of money that the government could never access ever again, as long as you live? You see, the living benefits of life insurance allow you to have that money grow on a tax deferred basis, and you could access it on a tax-favored basis via the loan provision. Finally, that money passes to a named beneficiary on an income tax free basis. Do you know of any other financial tool, financial product that could be that tax efficient and provide liquidity use and control of your money? 

The next challenge we all face is lower benefits in the future, you know, higher premiums, higher deductibles, and more out of pocket expenses. But, doesn’t that mean a lower standard of living for you and your family? Are you okay with that? Because I’m not. If there was a way to replace those expenses, when would you want to know about it? Before or after the benefits are lost? By using the living benefits of life insurance, you’ll have access to money to supplement your income when those benefits are lost, and still have death benefit to pass onto your family. 

If there’s going to be higher taxes and lower benefits, will that be enough to fix all the problems that are about to happen in our country? So how will our government respond? Won’t they print more money? When they print more money, doesn’t that cause inflation? You see, inflation is the third financial challenge that we all face. So what’s your strategy to overcome the effects of inflation? More importantly, when you’re retired, how are you going to overcome inflation? The living benefits of a life insurance policy provides multiple duty dollars. What that means is, the money can be accessed to overcome a long-term care event, a chronic illness event. We know that it can be utilized to supplement your income for anything. Finally, it can do all of the above on a tax-favored basis. 

That’s multiple duty dollars, and that’s how the living benefits of cash value life insurance can help you overcome the effects of inflation. So if there’s higher taxes, lower benefits, and the government prints more money, won’t that cause more and more volatility in the markets? Higher volatility in the markets is the fourth financial challenge that we’re all going to face. If there’s higher volatility in the markets and you make a mistake, can you lose some money? If there’s higher volatility in the markets and you make four or five mistakes, can you lose it all? 

Wouldn’t you benefit from a strategy that allows you to lock in your money when the markets are high so that when the markets go down, you’re in a position to access that money because your money wasn’t correlated to the market and you can profit from all the mistakes, errors, and blunders that are made in the market. You see, instead of becoming a victim of market volatility, owning cash value life insurance allows you to access that money so that you could actually profit from market volatility. 

The next challenge we all face is the challenge of outliving our income. If we retire at age 65 and only live till age 72, would we have much trouble planning for that retirement? But what if we retire at 65 and live all the way till 95, but run out of money at age 72, what would the rest of our retirement look like? And by the way, isn’t 72 the new 52? Aren’t 72 year olds doing what 52 year olds used to do? Do you have a strategy in place that could provide you with an income that you can outlive? By taking advantage of the living benefits of life insurance, you could provide supplemental income when all your other streams have dried up. 

Do you realize that most people view these five issues, higher taxes, lower benefits, higher inflation, greater volatility in the market and longevity, outliving money, as challenges. Here’s what owning cash value life insurance can do for you. What if you never had to worry about these issues ever again for the rest of your life? What if any time any of these issues occurred, you’d be in a perfect position to take advantage of it. Wouldn’t that be a great benefit to have? 

Do you know of any other financial products that can provide these benefits with certainty? Can a CD savings account, money market, IRA, stocks, or bonds provide you with these benefits? You see, the living benefits of life insurance can help us overcome these five challenges, and in essence become the beneficiary of our own life insurance policy. But then we still have the death benefit that goes to our family. So if I can show you how to be in complete control of your money until you take your last breath, but instead of leaving that money to a nursing home hospital or the government, you can leave that money to your family for generations to come. Wouldn’t you want to know about it?

 

 

 

How much should you contribute to your retirement plan?

 

How much should I contribute to my retirement plan? Conventional wisdom tells us that from the day we start working, to the day we retire, we should maximize contributions to our qualified retirement plans. Traditional retirement plans leave your money inaccessible and out of your control. Your goal should be to save in a tool that you can control. This video provides a closer look at retirement plans, and whether or not they are suitable for you and your needs.

 

“Another thing to keep in mind with retirement plans is that they’re often invested in the stock market and there’s no guaranteed that when you go to retire, your savings is going to be intact. “

 

Have you ever wondered how much you should be contributing to your retirement plan or 401k? Traditional qualified retirement plans leave your money inaccessible and out of your control. If your goal is to regain control of your money, then perhaps you should consider saving money in a place that’s safe and allows you access to your cash for things like cars, vacation, tuition, home renovation, and any other purchases, whether planned or unexpected.

When all your money is tied up in retirement plans, you’re at the mercy of the government, wall street and the banks. Let me give you an example. We were introduced to a client who had $1.4 million in a 401k plan. He wanted to take his family on vacation to Disney, but he couldn’t put his hands on $13,000 in order to do so. On paper, this man was a millionaire, but the reality of it was he couldn’t put his hands on $13,000 to take his family on vacation because he didn’t have access to his cash.

The point of the story is it’s not a bad idea to save for retirement. In fact, it’s a very good idea. However, it’s also important to save in a tool that you control, somewhere that’s flexible and allows you access to cash. Another thing to keep in mind with retirement plans is that they’re often invested in the stock market and there’s no guaranteed that when you go to retire, your savings is going to be intact.

People view their retirement plans as savings, but there’s a big difference between savings and investing. Savings should be money that’s accessible and safe. Conventional wisdom tells us that we’ll be in a lower tax bracket when we retire, but taxes is another area in regards to retirement plans that we don’t control. We may be in a lower tax bracket; we may be in a higher tax bracket. The fact of the matter is nobody knows but think about this. You’re deferring taxes into the future of the unknown. It’s like driving a car off the lot, not knowing what the final purchase price is. Would you do that? Most people wouldn’t, but yet every day we fund our retirement plans not knowing what the future cost is going to be to get our own money.In conclusion by maximizing our retirement plan contributions, our money is inaccessible and because our money in accessible, we have to go to banks and credit companies to finance the things of life. Additionally, we’re deferring taxes into an unknown future.

 

Are you too old to start using the infinite banking concept?

 

 

“The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second-best time is now.”     – Chinese Proverb

Do you find yourself wondering if you’re too old to start using the infinite banking concept? Well, unless you’re done buying things, you’re not too old to start. What you’re really wondering is whether or not the cost of insurance is going to be too high for you. While this is inevitable once you reach a certain age, this video will analyze just what that means and why it isn’t a bad thing.

You can’t regain control of your cash flow unless you control the banking function.”

 

Are you too old to start a policy to use for the infinite banking concept? We get asked this question every day and it’s really relative. People in their forties say, I should have started this 20 years ago. People in their sixties say, I should have started this 30-40 years ago. Well, the fact of the matter is, unless you’re done buying things, you’re not too old to start using the infinite banking concept. Why? Because the infinite banking concept puts you in control of your money. It eliminates the banks and puts you in control, meaning that you make the profits that the banks would have made. It’s like the old ancient Chinese proverb. The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago, but the second-best time is today, so therefore you’re never too old to start the infinite banking concept.

When someone comes to us and asks if they’re too old to start an IBC policy, what they’re really asking is, is the cost of insurance too high for me? They associate being older with a higher cost of insurance, which is absolutely correct. Understand this, yes, the older person is going to pay more per thousand of life insurance coverage than the younger person. There’s no way around that. However, because that person is older, the insurance company has to reserve more money sooner in order to make sure that they’re able to pay the claim. So those two issues cancel each other out. The higher premium is canceled out with a higher reserve, which by the way, infinite banking is all about the reserve or the cash value.

There’s a third piece going on that makes infinite banking actually more attractive for older people and that is the fact that they’re more likely to die. Because they’re more likely to die, there’s a probability that the cashflow management tool that you use to buy things is now going to pay off in a tax-free death benefit. Think of it this way, the life insurance company reserves more for an older person. They’re willing to pay more to the older person to surrender their policy. Let’s look at a practical example that’s comparing insurance policy’s on Olivia and me. So, Olivia’s 29 and I’m 57, let’s say we wanted to buy $50,000 of insurance paid up at age 100. The premium for Olivia is going to be much lower than the premium for me, but the amount that the insurance company has to reserve for every annual that’s paid is going to be greater for me than it will be for her. Why? Because they have 71 years to reserve for Olivia and only 43 years to reserve for me.

Let’s take a look at how Nelson Nash, the author of Becoming Your Own Banker, addressed the very question. Am I too old to start this? Nelson Nash was 52 years old when he discovered this concept and his situation was such that he was buried in debt and he was looking for a solution to the problem that he had created for himself with the banks at that time. He also knew that he was paying state farm insurance company about $400 per year on a whole life insurance policy. His cash value was growing by over $800 per year. It was then that he realized the solution to his problem. He needed to get his premiums as large as his mortgage. If he did, he’d be in a great position financially. It was at that point that he started to get as much insurance as he can on himself, his family members and anybody else whom he had an insurable interest. At one point he had over 44 life insurance policies.

You see, Nelson knew that owning cash value in those policies was as close as he could get to owning his own bank. Life insurance is not an investment, but it is a vehicle that you can use to become your own bank. It is a vehicle that you can use to manage your cash flows and pay the profits that you would a bank back to yourself. It took 14 years to get rid of the need for a bank in his life. After those 14 years, he borrowed against the cash value in his life insurance policies and never needed to borrow from a bank again.

Remember, life insurance is not an investment, but it is a great tool to be used to become your own bank. It is a great cash management tool where you can manage your cash flows to rid yourself of the need and the control that banks put on us. Basically the question is, do you want to be controlled by the banks or do you want to be in control of the banking function? You can’t regain control of your cash flow unless you control the banking function. Either you control the banking or the banks control you.Whole life insurance is the ideal cashflow management tool.

Let me give you a practical example. We have clients that started a business 20 years ago. At that time, they borrowed $2 million to capitalize their business. They use that capital to generate profits. They used the profits to pay back the loan. 10 years after they started the business, the loan was paid off and they decided to expand their business. They went back to the bank to borrow another $2 million, but the question becomes, whose money did the bank give them for the second loan? The bank gave them back their $2 million and charged them interest and a fee to do so.

They were not in control of the process, but understand with infinite banking, you are in control of the process and therefore in control of the profits. They broke the debt cycle which was borrow from a bank, capitalize their business, generate profits, and then use those profits to pay back loans. Now they’re borrowing against their cash value, capitalizing their business, generating profits and using those profits to pay back to their policy, their bank to generate profits for themselves.

In conclusion, you’re never too old to start using the infinite banking concept. You may not be able to get a policy on yourself, but there are certainly people in your life who you could insure, and you could own that policy and control the cash flow in that policy.

Middle Class Family

Meet George and Beth: A Middle Class Family With No Way to Pay for Their Children’s College

Meet George and Beth: A Middle Class Family With No Way to Pay for Their Children’s College

George and Beth purchased a lovely home in a safe and quiet neighborhood shortly after they wed.  As a two family income, both worked 9 to 5 jobs and made a decent living.  This afforded them the opportunity to live within their means and save to start a family.  Their bills were covered, they were able to pay down their debts, and they were even able to put away money for retirement.

After having their first child, the two remained steadfast in saving for retirement as well as beefing up their rainy day fund.   Once their second child was born the family still continued to put away savings and afford their lifestyle without compromise.

They dreamed of a cabin in the mountains after retirement.  A nice quiet place to relax after working hard for their whole lives.  Beth longed to sit in front of a big window to read with a warm cup of tea, while George was hoping for a lot of acreage and big porch to enjoy it from.  They were on track with their retirement savings to be able to start building their cabin – after their kids were grown up and moved away, in about 15 years.

 

By conventional standards, George and Beth were living the dream and doing everything right financially.

As they approached their late 30’s, the couple began to see that even though their salaries were continuing to increase, it wasn’t keeping up with the increasing costs of their family. Sitting at the dinner table, bills and statements scattered about, the two faced a big dilemma.  Their current financial situation wasn’t as bright as they had hoped.

With their first born turning 11, they had begun to think about the cost of a college education.  Luckily, the couple started to look at a way to save for their kid’s education before it was too late – but even with 7 years to put money away, at their current level of income, it wasn’t possible to save enough cash to cover the classes for their first child, let alone a degree for the second.

Tapping her fingers on a calculator, Beth hung her head.  “Even if we stop saving for our retirement, there won’t be enough to cover the college tuition for the kids,” she said.  George felt sadness seep into his strong and stoic expression.  He felt like he couldn’t provide for his family, even though he had a college education and a good paying job.  The two held each other’s hands, unsure where to go from there.

 

The following day, Beth began to find other ways to get out of debt and save for retirement.

After searching all day, Beth scheduled a few consult appointments with “experts” at how to get out of the situation her family was in.  The first 3 appointments didn’t prove to be worth the time or effort, but the fourth appointment left Beth and George much more hopeful than that night at the kitchen table.

As they sat in the office at Tier 1 Capital, the man behind the desk said, “If you could send your children to college, save for retirement, and begin building your retirement home several years sooner, would you do it?”  “Absolutely?” replied George, preparing for another plan that was obviously too good to be true.  “Good. Let’s get a plan together,” said the man.

 

 

The plan was about redirecting money the couple was losing unknowingly and unnecessarily into a cash pool they could access when they needed it.

After an evaluation the couple found they were giving money away in various places, including with interest on their debt.  They also were surprised to learn that they didn’t have to pay banks for the privilege of using their money and that taking control of their money could increase their cash flow and easily accomplish all of their goals.

 

Elated and a bit skeptical, the couple agreed to create and implement a plan that would:

  1. Enable them to pay for both kid’s college educations
  2. Continue to live at the lifestyle they were accustomed to
  3. Have enough saved for retirement so that they may live comfortably
  4. Build a cabin in the woods for their retirement NOW

 

The plan they enacted worked by redirecting their cash flow and gave them access to money they were willfully making inaccessible.  Traditional tactics keep money inaccessible in times when it’s needed – even when it’s your money.  Beth and George felt privileged to finally learn there was a better way.  A way that would keep their money at their fingertips for when they really needed it, without extra taxes and penalties.

Using a cash pool created with their own money, Beth and George were able accelerate the payments on their mortgage, while saving for retirement and having the comfort of knowing that college tuition also wouldn’t be a problem for them to afford.   As they used their funds to build up their cash pool and aggressively pay down their debts, the two did not sacrifice saving for retirement.  In fact, it was just the opposite.

2 years after implementing their plan, the couple began construction on their cabin in the woods.  Something they thought they wouldn’t have been able to afford for another 15 years.  A few years after the cabin was built, their first son went off to college.  When the $60,000 per year tuition bill arrived, George and Beth cut the check without a worry about dipping into savings or retirement.  Later, they overheard their friends, who had always had higher paying jobs than them, lament over taking away from their retirement accounts to pay for their kid’s college education.

 

Today – Beth and George are pleased they found a better way to handle their long term finances.

As George sits on the front porch of their cabin discussing college choices with their second child, he smiles and says, “Cost isn’t a concern, choose which education you feel like will best serve you.”  He looks down at the boards that his father helped him nail there under their feet and was filled with gratitude.  His father, who recently passed, was able to help him build this cabin because he was able to afford to build it sooner – and finally he could provide for his family without question.

It isn’t good to be true. It’s an effective solution to retirement savings and debt accumulation.

Tier 1 was founded out of the frustration we all experience with trying to get ahead.  Our founder spent nearly a decade in financial services doing things the conventional way.  Paying down his debts and maxing out his 401K every year didn’t get him anywhere when he needed the funds to buy his first home.

Furious with the system, he began to find additional ways to secure his financial future.  Since 1993, he’s used this method to help small business owners and families save for retirement while simultaneously having access to those assets to purchase a home, a car or send their kid to college.