Estate Planning Seminar Highlights
On May 9, we had special guest, attorney Kelly McHaffie, explaining why it is important to do Estate Planning. She explained the differences of what happens when a person does or does not have a living trust. Here are a few of the key takeaways from the seminar.
- When a person has a living trust, they can keep their affairs private and avoid the potentially longer settlement times and higher costs that occur when an estate goes through the Probate court due to not have a living trust.
- Estate planning includes planning for events before a person passes with a power of attorney and a health care directive for situations where a person becomes incapacitated.
- It is important to periodically update your trust as your situation changes and when your account numbers change.
Social Security Seminar Highlights
On April 25, 2019, we had an excellent Social Security Seminar with special guest speaker Jennifer Taboada, Vice President at BlackRock. We learned a lot to help our clients select the best time for them to start taking Social Security. A few key takeaways we had from the event included:
- After age 62, the amount a person gets for their Social Security payment goes up a small amount for each month they wait. You can get a higher payout by filing on the 2nd of the month or later and people should avoid filing on the first of the month.
- While the payout a person receives for Social Security goes up each month from at 62 to age 70, in some cases when a person considers their entire situation, they may be better off taking Social Security at a younger age. It is very important to look at each different scenario in your financial plan before making your final decision.
- The Social Security Administration can provide you with a matrix of your possible payouts. This is called an Informational Certified Earnings Record (ICER).
- You can find out a lot of information about Social Security System at their website, SSA.gov.
Elaine and Linda Attend the BlackRock Women's Summit
On April 3-4, 2019, Elaine and Linda attended the BlackRock Women's Summit in San Francisco. BlackRock manages $3T in assets and is one of the largest asset managers on the planet. They learned more about BlackRock's investment strategies, products and views of the market. They also heard presentations by other successful women advisors and women in the our industry. The conference provided ideas on new investment strategies to evaluate and ideas on how we can improve the ways we serve our clients. It also confirmed that the systems and processes we implemented in the past year have put us in a position that is among the top in our industry.
We've Moved
Our new address is 101 Metro Drive, Suite 264, San Jose, CA 95110.
Our direct phone numbers (408-963-XXXX) are the same, but our emails have changed. They are listed with our contact information below. Or you can call our office at 408-963-2858.
