When you lived in America, you probably bought mutual funds through your U.S. brokerage firm. However, now that you live overseas, you might have some difficulties doing the same. Recently, many people contacted me after receiving a letter from their brokerage saying, “You can no longer purchase shares in U.S…. Read more
Personal Finance
Three Tips for a Successful Portfolio
When building your investment portfolio, keep the following three tips in mind:
Diversify your investments
It’s never a good idea to keep most of your money in a single stock or investment. Even if the firm is solid, you never know what the future may bring. If the company tumbled,… Read more
How to Find Opportunities in Today’s Low Yield World
Are you wondering what to do with your investments while interest rates and yields are low?
Perhaps the most important tool for investment success is your asset allocation. This means spreading out and diversifying your investments, rather than focusing on one type of investment, or putting money into a single sector,… Read more
Is Blogging a Good Business Model?
The internet gives stay-at-home moms many opportunities to run a business from the comfort of their living room.
Today, parents don’t have to give up an office job to be at home with their children. They can work through a direct online connection to the office or they can build up an internet-based business…. Read more
Why Forbes Magazine Got it Wrong
When planning your retirement, you may wonder what to do about your mortgage. In January, 2014, an article appeared in Forbes Magazine in which the author advised not paying off your mortgage before retirement. I disagree. In the long run, you’ll do better by paying off your mortgage before you’re living on a pension…. Read more
Seniors, Beware of Financial Fraud
One of the most heartbreaking phenomena among senior citizens is investment fraud. Unfortunately living in Israel is not an insurance policy against financial deception. Recently I met with several victims of financial deceit to see what damage control can be done and what they could do to protect themselves in the future…. Read more
How to Protect Yourself in a Volatile Market
As every investor knows, it’s hard to protect yourself in a volatile market. But what about crazy uncertainty, like when the media tells you that corona virus will shut down the economy for months – or maybe years? What is the best way to plan in a climate of uncertainty?
Asset allocation
Asset allocation means don’t put all your eggs into one basket…. Read more
What You Need to Know About Strategic Investing
Strategic thinking isn’t only useful in games, but can help increase your assets. Carefully applying the skills of a chess grandmaster to your finances can yield benefits.
Evaluate your current position
First things grandmasters do is evaluate their position. Look at the entire board before considering your next move…. Read more
The Most Important Thing to Do Before You Retire
One of the most important things you should do before you retire is pay off your mortgage. However, your ability to do so may be affected by how many years it has left.
Generally, if you want to pay off your mortgage faster, you either increase payments so that they finish over a shorter period,… Read more
The Dollar Cost Dilemma
Sometimes when you invest a dollar, you can gain more. Continuing our three-part series on investing strategies, this column focuses on dollar-cost averaging.
Dollar-cost averaging
Investors use dollar-cost averaging when they own a stock/fund and want to buy more. Followers of this strategy invest a fixed dollar amount at regular intervals to buy additional shares…. Read more