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    Is Your 401(k) a Trap?
    Is Your 401(k) a Trap?
    Is Your 401(k) a Trap?
    Ebook51 pages39 minutes

    Is Your 401(k) a Trap?

    By Samuel N Asare

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    About this ebook

    Upon starting a new job, one of the first "benefits" you learn about is often the company's 401(k) plan. This retirement plan is such a norm in our culture, few people question the validity or soundness of signing up - we just do it automatically. In "Is You 401(k) a Trap? Don't Let Your Retirement Plan Harm Your Retirement!" noted financial expert Sameul N. Asare again dispels the status quo financial myths that are accepted as fact.

    This quick-read educational book presents the actual facts about the best (as in proven) retirement strategies in an easy-to-understand format. It helps investors assess their retirement options by focusing on the complete retirement cycle: before, during, and after.

    From learning "Why Most Financial Advisors Neglect to Put ALL Your Options on the Table" to "Alternatives: Can You Get Tax Advantages Without the Strings?" Asare's book will fill you in on practical, up-to-date retirement planning options your advisor may not even be aware of.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherSamuel N Asare
    Release dateJun 22, 2012
    ISBN9781452483252
    Is Your 401(k) a Trap?
    Author

    Samuel N Asare

    Samuel N. Asare is an accomplished retirement advisor who has authored several publications covering a wide range of personal finance topics. He holds an MBA as well as the coveted advanced designation of Chartered Financial Consultant (ChFC). Samuel is also a Chartered Retirement Planning Counselor (CRPC), Chartered Mutual Fund Counselor (CMFC), Chartered Advisor for Senior Living (CASL), Chartered Life Underwriter (CLU), Certified Treasury Professional (CTP), and Certified Business Manager (CBM).

    Read more from Samuel N Asare

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      Book preview

      Is Your 401(k) a Trap? - Samuel N Asare

      Chapter 6.

      5 Retirement Planning Success Nuggets

      Chapter 7.

      Alternatives to 401(k)s

      Conclusion

      Acknowledgments

      About the Author

      Additional Works by Samuel N. Asare

      Introduction

      Read This First

      Thank you for picking up my book. I really appreciate your interest. I intend to give you some valuable information about 401(k)s and tax-qualified retirement accounts in general to help you get the most out of your money and years of hard work. But before we get down to the nitty-gritty, let me take the next few moments to give you some insight into what motivated me to take on this project.

      As someone who has regularly and directly interacted with retirees as part of my normal course of work for nearly two decades, I can tell you without a doubt that many folks have little to no idea about some of the most basic things they should have been made aware of before they chose a particular savings program to fund their retirements. I have come to this conclusion because virtually every time I sit down with someone to review their retirement portfolio, their reaction can be summed up as: Why don’t they tell you all this stuff when you’re signing up? I wish I had known this years ago.

      Frankly, hardly a day goes by that I don’t hear these words or something similar as folks get the details about how their employer-sponsored tax qualified retirement accounts (e.g., 401(k)s, 403(b)s, and the likes of them) are supposed to work. In my humble opinion, this should never happen. No one deserves to find out that they’ve spent the last 30 or 40+ years planning for their retirement based on, of all things, the wrong premise.

      By the way and just to be clear, I am not blaming you, as an investor, for not knowing the correct information. Not at all. I lay all of the responsibility at the doorstep of the financial planning community.

      Just pick up one of those 401(k) information packets and brace yourself for vagueness galore. You’ll generally see a rosy picture in bold print and walk away thinking you’re going to ride into the sunset on a golden horse simply by jumping onboard with that program. Meanwhile, some of what I consider to be the most crucial pieces of information that one needs to know in order to make better choices are usually buried in tiny print in the footnotes, for all practical purposes in complete and utter gibberish. I don’t think it’s surprising that what the overwhelming majority of people expect from their retirement accounts turns out to be far removed from the reality.

      While this book is not intended to turn you, or anyone for that matter, into an expert on retirement plans, what I hope to accomplish is to give you some very basic facts that I believe every investor needs to know about how these plans actually work, not just when you are employed and contributing money into them, but also when you retire and begin withdrawing your money to live on. It’s also important to know what will happen to the remainder that you might leave behind to your heirs when all is said and done. Most importantly, I intend to do so without using any overly complex financial jargon. We are going to keep things

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