Ask Liz Weston

Get smart with your money

Liz Weston

Windfall in your 50s? Don’t blow it

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Dear Liz: I am 56 and will be receiving $175,000 from the sale of a home I inherited. I do not know what to do with this money. I have been underemployed or unemployed for six years, have no retirement savings and am terrified this money will get chipped away for day-to-day expenses so that I’ll have nothing to show for it. Should I invest? If so, what is relatively safe? Should I try to buy another house as an investment?

Answer: You’re right to worry about wasting this windfall, because that’s what often happens. A few thousand dollars here, a few thousand dollars there, and suddenly what once seemed like a vast amount of money is gone.

First, you need to talk to a tax pro to make sure there won’t be a tax bill from your home sale. Then you need to use a small portion of your inheritance to hire a fee-only financial planner who can review your situation and suggest some options. You can get referrals for fee-only planners who charge by the hour from the Garrett Planning Network at http://www.garrettplanningnetwork.com.

You’re closing in quickly on retirement age, and you should know that typically Social Security doesn’t pay much. The average check is around $1,000 a month. This windfall can’t make up for all the years you didn’t save, but it could help you live a little better in retirement if properly invested.

You should read a good book on investing, such as Kathy Kristof’s “Investing 101,” so you can better understand the relationship between risk and reward. It’s understandable that you want to keep your money safe, but investments that promise no loss of principal don’t yield very much. In other words, keeping your money safe means it won’t be able to grow, which in turn means your buying power will be eroded over time.

Spreading the wealth: the number of millionaires grows

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More people have achieved a net worth of at least $1 million, not including their primary residences. The Spectrum Group, which keeps track of these things, said the number of millionaires climbed for the third straight year to 8.6 million in 2011 (or 7.5% of all U.S. households). The growth in millionaires follows a 27% decline in 2008. But we’re still not back to the 2007 peak of 9.2 million.

Spectrum said the ranks of all affluent investors increased in 2011:

  • Those with $100,000 or more in net worth sans primary residence reached 36.7 million from 36.2 million in 2010 (about 32% of U.S. households)
  • Those with $500,000 or more in net worth climbed to 13.8 million from 13.5 million in 2010 (about 12% of U.S. households)
  • Those with $5 million or more in net worth rose to 1.078 million from 1.061 million in 2010 (slightly less than 1% of U.S. households)
  • Those with $25 million or more in net worth grew to 107,000 from 105,000 in 2010 (slightly less than .1% of households)

Retire in style: What you need to know

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Reuters has a nice package of retirement stories that are worth checking out:

Ecuador seen as new retirement hot spot
I mentioned Ecuador in my column “Retire overseas on $1,200 a month,” and now it’s been named a top spot for bargain-seeking retirees, according to International Living magazine’s 2012 Global Retirement Index.

What retirees wish they’d done differently
Reuters asked several retirees what they would tell their 40-year-old selves if they could go back in time. Interestingly, the answers aren’t all about money–they’re about quality of life. (A great book on this topic is Ralph Warner’s “Get a Life: You Don’t Need $1 Million to Retire Well.”)

How low must retirement withdrawals go?
Linda Stern tackles the tricky math of how much you can afford to take from your retirement savings to have a reasonable chance of making your money last as long as you do.

Growing numbers work into retirement
I’ve written about “When only one of you can retire” and the huge numbers of people forced into early retirement by layoffs, but this article picks up the flip side: people who keep working because they want to. If that’s you, you might also want to read “Retire without quitting your job.”

Is an annuity in your future?
One solution to the risk of outliving your money is the income annuity (also known as the fixed annuity). Learn more about it here.

When to start tapping Social Security
Some people have little choice but to take Social Security benefits early. But if you can wait, you probably should.

Moonjar winners: check your email!

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All 12 winners of the Moonjar Money Boxes have been notified, but I’ve only heard back from 8 of you. If I don’t hear back from the other four, the prizes will be awarded to other entrants. So: SUZY, JENNIFER S., EMILY B. and KATHY L., check your email (and your spam filter) and get back to me soonest!

Could son’s unpaid bills harm parents’ credit? Maybe

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Dear Liz: Our 24-year-old son lives with us. He failed out of college, has been fired from two restaurant jobs and is working part time at a grocery warehouse. He has neglected to pay his credit card for several months. He also waits until his cellphone carrier threatens to turn off his phone before he pays half of that bill. We are concerned that his poor payment history may start to reflect on our good credit histories. We are retired and may want to build a new house. His bills are sent to our address, and creditors call our home phone number looking for him.

Answer: His debts shouldn’t affect your credit reports and scores unless you cosigned loans or other credit accounts or added him as a joint user to your credit cards.

Note the word “shouldn’t.” It’s possible that an unethical collection agency would try to get you to pay these bills by posting the overdue accounts on your credit reports. That could negatively affect your scores. Check your credit reports at least once a year at http://www.annualcreditreport.com. You also may want to consider ongoing credit monitoring, which can alert you if any collections or other suspicious activity shows up on your reports.

Speaking of unethical actions, you need to consider the possibility that your son could steal your financial identity. He probably has access to the information he would need to open new accounts in your name, including your Social Security numbers. His failure to pay his bills, even though it appears he can, indicates some moral shortcomings. He may not be low enough to rip off his parents, but if you have any suspicions about his trustworthiness, consider putting a credit freeze (also known as a security freeze) on your credit reports. This freeze should prevent anyone from opening credit accounts in your name.

Finally, you can write letters to creditors telling them to stop contacting you. You run the risk that such a letter could lead a creditor to sue your son. But his creditors may sue him anyway if he doesn’t respond to their requests for payment.

Stepdaughter wants “everything”: what does she deserve?

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Dear Liz: Your column from the person who wanted “heirlooms” from her stepfather is applicable to my situation. My husband’s daughter wants literally everything in my house, even though he and I commingled our assets 23 years ago and have been married more than 10 years. How do I access public records to see if her mother did have a will?

Answer: It’s interesting that your husband can’t clear up this mystery. Presumably he would know whether his late wife had a will and what it said.

You can check with probate court of the county where she died to determine if a will was filed. If she had a living trust, that would be private and probably not filed with the court, but your husband should know what it said.

If she had no will or living trust, then your husband was supposed to follow state law in dividing up her possessions. In community property states, without a will or trust he typically would inherit stuff acquired during their marriage, plus a share of any separately held assets — possessions she brought to the marriage, said Burton Mitchell, an estate planning attorney with Jeffer Mangels Butler & Mitchell in Los Angeles. In other states, your husband might inherit half of her assets, with the other half divided among her children, Burton said.

State laws vary widely and there are all kinds of exceptions to the general rules, so you may need a lawyer’s help in sorting out what belongs to whom.

In any case, you’d be smart to hire an estate-planning attorney at this point. Your stepdaughter may not be able to pursue a legal case after all this time, but she could cause trouble when you or your husband dies. Any time a relative creates a real fuss about an estate division, it’s good to get a qualified attorney’s advice as you craft your own wills or living trusts that spell out who gets what.

As you make your plans, try to be guided by kindness and compassion. Your stepdaughter may not have a legal right to lay claim to every item in your home, but letting her have items of strong sentimental value may be the right thing to do. Just think how you would feel if your father’s second wife gave your mother’s special jewelry or your grandmother’s treasured antiques to your step-siblings. Lifelong rifts and family feuds have started over less.

Then again, all parties need to remember that stuff is just stuff. What’s a precious heirloom to one generation may wind up in the next generation’s garage sale. Resolving to put relationships first, instead of possessions, can really help all sides avoid painful battles.