#1. Periodically solicit new price quotes from other vendors. In competitive times, you often can find other suppliers who will give you better service, lower prices, higher quality, or all three. That’s particularly true for items such as printing, delivery services, office supplies, etc. But be reasonable; soliciting bids on every item can be time…
Casualty and Theft Losses, Coinsurance Clause, Contents, and Umbrella Insurance #1. Casualty and theft losses. In planning your home insurance coverage, keep in mind that you cannot deduct the first $100 of each casualty and theft loss. In addition, casualty losses equal to the first 10% of your adjusted gross income (AGI) are not tax…
Fiduciary Obligations, Portability, Disclaimer Option, Contingent Executor, Costs A person with a simple estate can afford to name an executor or executrix for purely emotional reasons, e.g., a spouse or a friend. But, in today’s complex financial environment, it’s rare to have a simple estate and so the choice of an executor with good judgment…
Action alert: Understand the discount, imputed interest rate, and the phantom tax. Be aware that the market price of zero coupon bonds can be more volatile than regular bonds. The appeal of these bonds is their discounted purchase price and sometimes higher yields. On a zero coupon bond, the discount when you buy the bond…
For Existing and New Policies to Protect Against Personal Liability and Judgements Ask your insurance agent about umbrella insurance. It’s inexpensive insurance (around $300 annually for $1 million of coverage) that covers personal claims, lawsuits, and judgments against you that exceed the dollar limits of your existing property and casualty coverage (e.g., home and auto…
When buying new life insurance or changing existing policies, always consider two options: (a) the right to purchase additional paid-up life insurance with the dividends the policy generates, and (b) the right to automatically increase the face value of the life insurance based on an inflation index, e.g., the CPI. Reasons: It adds more sibutramine…
A living trust, which you set up and use during your lifetime, can be an attractive estate planning vehicle. The principal benefit is that you can control, change, or revoke a living trust at any time. It is popular because the assets in it do not pass through probate, thereby avoiding probate costs and also…
Three stockholders owned equal shares in a retail clothing store which generated annual sales of $4 million. The value placed on the company was $1.2 million, $400,000 for each stockholder. Problem #1. Two of the three stockholders, for undocumented reasons, did not like working with the third stockholder, who had founded the business 15 years…
Action alert: You want to be very careful of the IRS rules for Schedule A (Itemized Deductions), Form 1040, when you file your personal tax returns. It is a high IRS audit area. Question. This year I spent close to $2,500 for investment information to help me select stocks and monitor my personal investments. I…
If available, consider buying personal and business life insurance, including group insurance, from business associations. There are several reasons: Business associations have a variety of business and personal insurance products to meet many of their members’ needs, e.g., buy-sell, key executive, health, and disability insurance. The annual premium cost can be lower than on individual…
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