How Staying Fit and Healthy Can Slash Your Retirement Costs
We believe a financial plan should factor in every aspect of your life. If you’ve read our other blog posts, you’ll see that one of the primary concerns of a firefighter’s financial plan is how to pay for healthcare in retirement. As a firefighter, you sacrifice your body to save others, and that directly translates […]
Understanding the Benefits of a 457(b) Plan for Firefighters
As a firefighter, securing the retirement you deserve involves exploring every available option. If your state or local government offers a 457(b) Deferred Compensation plan, consider yourself lucky. This plan provides an excellent opportunity to potentially increase your retirement savings, a benefit not all firefighters have access to. The 457(b) Deferred Compensation Plan The 457(b) […]
How Inflation Affects Your Firefighter Retirement
We’ve discussed at great length the kinds of risks firefighters face in retirement, with medical costs often being the primary concern. We also need to consider taxes, as that will be a consistent cost that you simply can’t avoid. However, there’s something else a bit more subtle that can have nearly an equal impact as […]
Is an IRA Right for Me as a Firefighter?
If you’ve ever dipped your toes into retirement planning and investing, you’ve surely come across the Individual Retirement Account, more commonly known as the IRA. If you’re unsure exactly what it is, it’s an investment account that allows you to deduct contributions from your taxable income in exchange for tax-deferred growth. Barring any non-qualifying withdrawals, […]
Investing 101 for Firefighters
Investing can be thrilling, right? Watching your favorite stock drop in value just to shoot up is like watching your favorite team come back from being way down to win the Super Bowl. However, this excitement isn’t exactly your ally, as those emotional highs and lows that come with the rise and fall of your […]
Secure Your Future with a GOALs Based Plan
Imagine you’ve been investing your savings for major milestones like buying a new home, taking the family on that dream vacation, or funding your kids’ college education. But when the time comes to use your savings, you discover they’re not as ready as you thought—maybe your assets have lost value, the taxes involved would derail […]
The Importance of Starting a Retirement Plan Today
When is the best time to start planning for retirement? After the kids are born? Buying a house? Getting married? In our professional opinion, the best time was yesterday. Because the younger you start, the more ready you will be in the event of an accident or early retirement. If you do have a long, […]
Indexed vs. Variable Annuities: Which Are Best for Firefighters?
Carefully planning your finances is crucial in helping you reach your goals, keep your expenses under control, and make the most out of your money. For firefighters, it’s doubly important, if not more so: Younger retirement ages, insufficient pensions, and higher medical expenses can form a whirlwind of financial problems that could become insurmountable – […]
Four Financial Tips for Firefighters
In our opinion, firefighters are overworked and underpaid, especially considering the risks involved in the profession—both immediate and long-term risks to health, like higher cancer rates. With average salaries of about $53,000, higher medical expenses, and generally earlier retirements, firefighters have to be acutely aware of their finances to achieve long-term financial success. In this […]
Your Firefighter Investing Journey: Accumulation, Preservation, & Decumulation
When you think of your investing journey, the part that sticks out in most people’s minds is the accumulation stage—buying stocks, plugging money into your savings, and watching your investments grow. While this is true, it ignores two other just as essential sections of the investment lifecycle – the preservation cycle and the decumulation cycle. […]