Archive for July, 2007 Page 2 of 2

Newer Entries »

Reverse Mortgage Market Currently at $4.3 Trillion, Less than 1% of Potential

Posted on July 9, 2007 by Jason

Senior Journal.com, July 9th, 2007

Americans age 62 or older hold an
estimated $4.3 trillion of home equity according to the NRMLA/Hollister
Reverse Mortgage Market Index (RMMI). Although the reverse mortgage
industry has seen tremendous growth in the last five years, only a
little more than 300,000 reverse mortgages have been originated in its
short history, representing less than 1% of market penetration.

The index, launched June 28, 2007 by the National
Reverse Mortgage Lenders Association (NRMLA) and The Hollister Group is
the first market indicator to collect critical market, housing and
demographic data, and to track and project the market for reverse
mortgages.

“The idea of using home equity to finance
retirement is becoming increasingly main stream even among the current
generation of seniors who have traditionally been debt averse,” said
Peter Bell, President of National Reverse Mortgage Lenders Association (NRMLA). 
“The RMMI illustrates the significant opportunity for mortgage industry
participants as the home increasingly plays a role as a retirement
asset.”

In the first quarter 2007 alone, there was a $19
billion increase in senior home equity. This increase was reflected in a
0.4% increase in the RMMI to 205.6 from 204.7 in the prior quarter. The
index will reflect the current value of senior home equity on a
quarterly basis.

Read more of this article.

For Elderly Investors, Instant Experts Abound

Posted on July 9, 2007 by Jason

The New York Times,  July 8th, 2007

Elderly clients thought they had every reason to trust Michael
DelMonico as a financial counselor. After all, the Massachusetts
insurance agent had become a certified senior adviser in 2002, a
credential he made sure to advertise on fliers sent to retirees.

He did not mention how easy it had been to get that title.

He
had paid $1,095 for a correspondence course, then took a
multiple-choice exam with questions like, “Marketing can best be
described as:” (The answer: “The process or technique of promoting the
sale or distribution of a product or service.”) Like more than 18,700
other applicants since 1997, he passed.

Insurance companies,
eager for sales representatives, embraced Mr. DelMonico, as they have
thousands of other newly credentialed advisers.

The following year, insurers paid him commissions worth $720,000 as his business with retirees soared.

But
many of those sales came from steering older Americans into unwise
investments, Massachusetts regulators contend in a lawsuit.

Mr.
DelMonico denies all wrongdoing, but one of his clients — a 73-year-old
widow caring for a son with Down syndrome — said he tricked her into
buying complicated insurance contracts that left her unable to pay
dental and home-repair bills.

Read more of this article.

Bill for retiring Boomers derailed

Posted on July 6, 2007 by Jason

SFGate.com, July 6th, 2007

Insurance companies derailed a bill Tuesday that would have required
them to develop rules about selling annuities to persons over 65 years
old.

The measure by Sen. Jack Scott, D-Pasadena, was scheduled to be
debated by the Assembly Insurance Committee but the author of a rival
bill sponsored by the insurance industry made a motion to send Scott’s
bill to ”interim study” — a polite term for killing the measure for
the remainder of the legislative session.

The committee approved the motion. Scott said they could conduct the study without him.

”Yes, the insurers would like to send this bill to interim study
because that means continuation of the status quo,” Scott said in a
statement.

Scott has been trying for three years to create rules that would
prevent seniors from inadvertently buying annuities that do not pay off
for a long time or carry significant penalties for early withdrawal of
funds.

He wants to require the insurance industry to ask questions of
seniors about their financial situation and tax status before selling
them an annuity which might not be right for them.

Read more of this Article.

Ask Mrs. Riches: No Retirement for You!

Posted on July 6, 2007 by Jason

The Motley Fool, July 6th, 2007

Dear Mrs. Riches:
I’m a 45-year-old guy with
a wife and three kids, a stable job, and a retirement account that is
poised to allow us to retire comfortably someday. By contrast, my folks
(now in their early 70s) have next to nothing saved for theirs. On the
positive side, they collect a pension for my dad’s career as a
government employee and have good health care coverage, as well as
having a lot of equity in their home. The trouble is that there’s no
money for home maintenance, no funds set aside for anything “extra”
that may crop up, and no plan for what will happen to my mom if my dad
passes away first. They are my parents and so I feel it’s my duty to
help them if need be, but I have to say that I feel resentful when I
think of bailing them out from their lousy financial decisions. Is
there any advice you can offer?
–Grumbling Son

Dear Grumbling Son:
I’m afraid that I can’t
tell you how much you should help your parents. When emotion crosses
paths with money, it can be hard to sort out whom you “owe” from who
owes you.

Figuring out your obligation to your mom and dad is a job left to
you and your conscience, along with a consultation with your wife.
Choosing not to help doesn’t mean you’re a bad person, nor does helping
(but resenting it forever) make you good. Unfortunately, either choice
– helping or not helping — has the possibility to take its toll on
you. What I can say is that the tough times are your opportunity to
show what kind of person you are, based on what drives your
decision-making: revenge or duty, protectiveness of your wife and
children or loyalty to your parents (all of whom are family), and the
list of choices goes on.

Is it possible for you to set aside emotion to look at the situation
more objectively? I’d start by having a frank discussion with your
parents about their plans, provisions, hopes, and wishes. Find out the
specifics with regard to your dad’s pension.
Are there any benefits for spouses once the beneficiary has passed on?
You’ll also want to make sure they have a will, find out about any life
insurance and disability insurance policies they may have, and
determine what kind of social security benefits they each receive.
Given that the amount of equity in their home is substantial, you’ll
also want to explore the possibility of a reverse mortgage. These are just a few of the major questions you’ll want answered.

Read more of this article.

CHP searching for a few good retirees

Posted on July 5, 2007 by Jason

Inside Bay Area, July 5th, 2007

Retired college professor and helicopter pilot J.D. Perrizo was inspired after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

“I wanted to do something for the country,” he said.

So when the Dublin office of the California Highway Patrol was
recruiting seniors to join the department’s senior volunteer program,
the now-68-year-old applied.

Six years later, Perrizo is still a volunteer and calls his experience educational and rewarding.

The CHP is again looking for a few good seniors 55 or older who
can volunteer their time helping with tasks that will provide officers
more patrol time.

A recruitment fair and open house are scheduled for July 12.
The event is meant to answer any questions the public mayhave and to
distribute applications, Officer Steve Creel said.

“We’re looking for people who have time to donate to the
program and have an interest in giving back to the community,” Creel
said.

The Dublin CHP office has 13 volunteers right now. Due to the
number of community activities the office will be involved with in the
upcoming year, they are looking for about 20 more, volunteer Bill
Sliney said.

“Volunteers spend about half their time in the office … and
the other half outside,” he said. “We do seat belt (enforcement)
events, the CHiPs for Kids program, the (annual) Sobriety Challenge; we
do two golf tournaments. All of this is to support the public relations
activities of the CHP.”

Creel said the department matches volunteers’ interests
with their tasks. For example, someone who wants to spend more time
outside of the office would get to transport patrol cars to be worked
on or elsewhere — saving officers hours.

The goal for the volunteers is to take some of their administrative workload off of the officers.

Read more of this article.

Latest Capitol session good for senior citizens

Posted on July 3, 2007 by Jason

Orange County News,  July 3rd, 2007

The increasing senior population affects Texas in many ways and the
Texas legislature knows it and they passed a bevy of bills in answer to
the coming surge of seniors.

Two sessions ago, Texas faced a huge budget shortfall.

The Legislature scrambled to make ends meet, cutting budgets and
consolidating state agencies. Advocates for seniors worried that
services would be cut just as the baby boomers entered the ranks of
senior citizens.”

Two major factors came together this year.

Those factors were a budget surplus and a concerted advocacy effort by
the Texas Silver-Haired Legislature and other senior advocates to raise
legislators’ awareness of key senior issues.

That effort required the TSHL to track more than 200 bills and persistently advocate for and testify on the 33 bills passed.

TSHL members expressed early concerns about the impact of previous
sessions’ cuts on the lives of senior citizens and then we got busy
putting together ideas and suggestions for the 80th Texas Legislature
to address those senior issues.

The Silver-Haired Legislature’s top priority this session was to
advocate for legislation to extend last year’s property tax break to
included senior’s homesteads and we did it. It passed.”

Read more of this article.

Senior citizens often targeted by identity theft scams

Posted on July 3, 2007 by Jason

Danville Register & Bee, July 3rd, 2007

Amy
Smithers sat beside her mother-in-law Sunday getting angrier and
angrier at what she was hearing on the speakerphone beside her.

“It
was a man with an accent, like he was from India,” Smithers said. “And
he was asking my mother-in-law for her bank information. When she told
him the name of her bank and he asked her how to spell ‘American,’ we
pretty much knew it was a scam.”

Scams
targeting senior citizens and the public at large are on the increase
and thieves are getting bolder, according to law enforcement officials.

“I
think with the technology today, with e-mails and so forth, lists of
names of people and so forth, that fraud is easier for people to do,”
Maj. Gary Goodson of the Pittsylvania County Sheriff’s Office said
Monday.

“If
you haven’t solicited someone for information and you’ve received
something anonymously or unsolicited, then 99 percent of the time it’s
going to be a scam or a fraud. If you have to pay anything to get
something free, it’s definitely going to be a scam,” he said.

The call to Smithers’ mother-in-law was unsolicited, Smithers said.

She
and her husband, Randolph, just happened to be there and questioned the
man calling. He wasn’t intimidated by their questions, she said. And he
was persistent.

Read more of this article.

When it comes to retirement, a million doesn’t go very far anymore

Posted on July 2, 2007 by Jason

The Wall Street Journal,  June 30th, 2007

A million dollars isn’t what it used to be.

Sure, it’s still enough to pay for a comfortable retirement, and it will put you among the richest 2 percent of American adults.

But
it won’t put you in the lap of luxury — and for that you can thank
inflation, the current decade’s housing boom, and the long rise in
stock and bond prices.

Don’t get me wrong: I am not claiming $1 million isn’t a huge sum.

Indeed, it’s beyond the wildest dreams of most Americans.

Still,
notching seven figures has lost some of its luster. Thanks to 20 years
of inflation, $1 million today has just 54 percent of the purchasing
power of $1 million in 1987.

Moreover, many folks have become
millionaires simply because of home prices. The recent median selling
price for an existing single-family home was $590,000 in Los Angeles,
$521,000 in New York and $748,000 in San Francisco.

If you have a
heap of home equity, you could tap into this wealth by, say, trading
down to a smaller place. But you need to live somewhere, so not all of
your equity can be lavished on caviar and champagne.

What if you
have $1 million in stocks and bonds? Financial markets have been
booming since the early 1980s, catapulting many investors into the
millionaires club.

But there’s a downside to this long bull market: You now get less income for every dollar invested.

Read more of this article.

Is retirement within reach? It’s time to take stock of your nest egg

Posted on July 2, 2007 by Jason

Kansas City Star,  June 30th, 2007

If you’re one of the millions of baby boomers turning 59½ this year, 2007 will be a financial milestone of sorts.

This
is the year you’ll be old enough to start spending, without penalty,
the money you’ve faithfully stashed away in your IRAs and other
retirement savings accounts through the years.

It may not feel
like cause for a huge celebration, but it is a good time to take stock
of savings, pensions, Social Security and all the other financial
issues that seemed totally meaningless just a few years ago when
retirement was an eon away. Now you are only a handful of years from
65, and they will go by faster than you think.

Take this opportunity to examine these seven financial issues while you’re still in a good position to do something about them:

1.The gold watch and other benefits. Ask
the human resource or accounting departments to figure out what, if
any, money or insurance you’ll be entitled to when you retire. If part
of it is in the form of company stock or options, ask what can be done
to ensure that you’ll be eligible to sell the stock and pay taxes at
the 15 percent capital gains rate instead of regular income tax rates.

2. Hunt for missing money. Make
a list of all the past employers for which you worked for more than a
year. Call the human resource departments and ask whether you are
entitled to any retirement benefits. If you are, make sure that the
employer has your current address and marital status — unless you
really want your ex-spouse to have a claim. If the plan calls for
naming a beneficiary, update that information.

Read more of this article.

Newer Entries »
NewRetirement Blogs Home