Investment Perspectives

Quite a few financial advisors recommend that your top priority is to save for retirement rather than focus on buying a home or saving for your kid's college.  I have wondered about that recommendation.  It strikes me that it may make more sense to balance home, college and retirement savings.  If I don't save for my kids college expenses, then I could get stuck with a big bill. Of course, if I have not saved anything, perhaps I would luck out and my kid gets a scholarship or my kid can take out a loan and be in debt for the rest of their life.  Also by buying a home early, I reduce my overall living costs.  Given this dilemma, I asked Craig Israelsen for his thoughts.   He said: " w hat I’ve shared with my students over the years is that our financial life is much like conducting a symphony.  We can’t just focus on the strings, the brass and woodwinds need some love too.  In other words, we are called upon to do a lot of things at the sa...

In t he May Issue of Kiplinger magazine   is an article by the former editor, Janet Bodnar .  She is also a frequent guest on our major radio station WTOP.   The article is  entitled " How to Raise Money-Savy Girls."    The article cites my recommendation to her about my purchasing Disney stocks for my granddaughters.  https://www.kiplinger.com/ article/saving/T065-C034-S002- how-to-raise-money-savvy- girls.html    As many of you know, I have been an advocate for much increased financial literacy programs.  I think this is especially important for females and investor education.  I am very pleased that Janet Bodnar wrote this article.  I would encourage you all to share this article widely. I have placed it on my Investment Perspectives Facebook and Twitter pages, as well as my personal facebook and twitter pages. I would also encourage you to make comments on the article page so that Kiplinger and Janet Bodnar ...

Craig Israelsen on Rebalancing Craig Israelsen has published many important studies on asset allocation, including his 712 model which I have made great use of in my investments.  He has conducted a number of studies on rebalancing.  The bottom line is that it pays to rebalance every 3 months or 12 months if you do so for periods greater than 10 years. If have used such a process myself working with my financial advisor and it has worked well for me. Here are two articles by Craig in the following link.  One is a set of lecture slides and the second is an article he published in Financial Planning.  Many thanks to Craig for providing permission to share. https://tinyurl.com/IsraelsenRebalance This contrasts with the advice provided in the AAII Journal on rebalancing.  I recommend going with Craig's advice. https://www.aaii.com/journal/article/10368-rebalancing-update-the-markets-volatility-eliminated-the-need-to-adjust-allocations

Investment Perspectives Blog Volume 1 Issue 1 September 16, 2018 Tony Hausner Blog Introduction I have recently retired as a board member of the American Association of Individual Investors (AAII) Metro Area DC Chapter. I served on the board for 18 years, both as past president and for many years as Program Co-Chair.   This provided me an opportunity to meet many top investment experts who came to speak at our chapter.   I also served for 6 years as Chair of the Chapter Leaders Executive Committee. AAII has about 50 chapters in the larger cities in the U.S. I am still a lifetime member of AAII which has many valuable resources.   I have learned a lot via AAII.   I have just started a facebook page:  https://www.facebook.com/thausnerinvest/ on which several articles, etc have been posted.   I have also created a twitter account: https://twitter.com/thinvestmentpe1 (or @thinvestmentpe1) I will post more frequently on twitter as i...