Insights

By Matt Lewis, CLTC, Vice President, Insurance Life insurance is designed to provide for your loved ones after your death, giving you peace of mind that their financial needs will be met without your income. But life insurance can benefit your financial planning in many other ways.

Watch our webinar, “Life Goals: Understanding Life Insurance and How It Fits in Your Finances” with Carson Group’s Vice President, Insurance Matt Lewis, now available on-demand. 

Watch our webinar, “Exit Strategies for Business Owners” with Carson Group’s Director, Wealth Planning Kimberly Flynn and Mark Petersen, Vice President of Affluent Wealth Planning, now available on-demand. 

Sarah Duey   I once had clients with only one daughter. They created a living trust for only their grandchild without ever telling their daughter why.   As the trustees, we worked with this daughter, because her child was still a minor. There were hard feelings — a lot of wondering why her …

Kevin Oleszewski, Senior Wealth Planner ‘Tis the season to give. In fact, 37% of charitable giving occurs during the last quarter of the year — 20% of it in December alone, according to a survey conducted by the Blackbaud Institute. And while the holidays are traditionally a time to reflect …

Tom Fridrich, Senior Wealth Planner    Once upon a time, people would put money in their 401(k) or IRA accounts and know that – should their retirement savings outlive them – their loved ones would inherit the rest and all would essentially be well. 

Gifting to your loved ones now or posthumously each carries their own positives and negatives as they relate to your estate plan, taxes, your goals and your legacy. As you explore your options, refer to this guide. It offers a checklist, questions to ask your advisor and a conversation outl …

Retirement is far off until it isn’t. This chapter of life can sneak up on just about anyone, and we do ourselves a favor to be as prepared as we can. Like anything involving the government, finances can be confusing, with different tax treatments, contribution limits, beneficiary rules and more.

As a financial advisor who’s spent her career in the midwest, I’ve worked with more farm families than I can count. From buying new expensive equipment to riding out the drought years, there can be millions in play even on small family operations. Estate planning – splitting up the land bet …

Many of us think we don’t have enough assets for a will to be necessary, or we’ve simply put it in the “I’ll get to it” category. But planning carefully now can save your beneficiaries from legal fees, tax losses and the ugly relational stress that comes up all too often in the estate process. 

The so-called “Peanut Butter Manifesto” written by a Yahoo! Executive in 2006 gave us a term that hasn’t worn thin yet. The “Peanut Butter Approach” is a derisive term used in business to describe spreading anything – money, energy, time – too far and too thin to be effective or useful.