I just recently ran across a new blog, The Attorney’s Therapist, by Debra Taylor-McGee, that had a post regarding money psychology. Don’t Regress Under Financial Stress. Of course, I am honored with her recommendation of The Financial Wisdom of Ebenezer Scrooge as a reference!

You may want to read an interesting post today in a WSJ blog, The Wealth Report, by Robert Frank. In the post, Frank reports that a survey of 400 wealthier Americans finds them satisfied with their investments in hedge funds, which account for about 9% of their average portfolio. The average return to July 24th, according to Hedge Fund Research, on the hedge fund asset class is a loss of 3.2%.

The good news is that you don’t need to have a multi-million dollar portfolio to add this asset class to your portfolio. Even a portfolio of $100,000 can add a 10% position in hedge funds (we call this asset class “market neutral” to avoid the stigma and misrepresentation of the term “hedge fund”) by adding mutual funds that engage in merger and convertible arbitrage, long/short strategies, and even a fund of funds.

Our most popular portfolios have maintained a 10% market neutral allocation for over 10 years. Interestingly, our mutual funds in this asset class are performing similarly with the average loss of 3.2% found by Hedge Fund Research.

“It’s wise to mortgage your future.” This was the headline in the July 13 “Insider Q&A” column in the Rapid City Journal financial section. The column featured Ian Ayres, a Yale professor who is an attorney and an economist. He recommends that young investors should save for retirement with borrowed money. He thinks, when you’re in your 20’s, it’s a good idea to buy stock index funds with margin accounts or options. As you get older, you should phase out your borrowing. Continue Reading »

Rick was thrilled to learn this month that he was one of the winners of the 2008 Financial Frontiers Awards. This competition, sponsored by the Financial Planning Association® (FPA®) and Janus (NYSE: JNS), invites financial industry professionals to submit papers that present new ideas and practical solutions for the financial planning industry.

Rick’s paper, “Who Is Planning for the Planner? Becoming Consumers of Our Profession,” was the winner in the Financial Concepts category. He examined why financial planners typically don’t have their own financial planners, and found that the reasons aren’t really any different from those given by people outside of the profession. Continue Reading »

Do you need a Living Will? Do you have a Health Power of Attorney? Or maybe you’ve wondered what the difference is between the two.

An upcoming teleclass with attorney Tom Simmons will answer those questions and more. Please join us on Thursday, August 21, at 4:00 p.m. MDT to find out more about these important topics. To register, click here.

It wasn’t a heart attack.

A few nights ago, I woke up about 3:00 a.m. because of pain in my chest. It hurt to breathe. Sitting up or shifting my position didn’t seem to help. Twisting from side to side made the pain worse. I couldn’t isolate the pain to a specific set of muscles, which seemed like a bad sign. I didn’t have pain or numbness in my arms, which seemed like a good sign.

I debated. Was I having a heart attack, or wasn’t I? I tried to convince myself that it was muscle soreness from a change in my weight lifting routine two days earlier. But why would that have taken so long to make itself felt? Maybe it was stupid not to go to the emergency room to make sure. But an ER visit would easily cost $1000 or more. Should I, or shouldn’t I? Continue Reading »

The good news? You exercise regularly, eat wisely, keep your weight down, wear your seatbelt, and don’t go bungee jumping or ride a motorcycle without a helmet. Your doctor says you’ll probably live to be 100.

The bad news? Your financial adviser says you’ll probably run out of money by the time you’re 90.

One of the current buzzwords in the financial industry is “longevity risk.” The term describes the possible problem of people outliving their retirement savings. Continue Reading »

In the August 2008 issue of Wealth Manager magazine, Kahler Financial Group was honored as one of the top financial planning firms in the nation. This is the fourth year we’ve received this honor.

The survey, which ranks firms by the size of the average client’s assets, ranked Kahler Financial Group as the largest financial planning firm in a six-state area. Those states include: South Dakota, North Dakota, Montana, Utah, Wyoming, and Nebraska. Add the states of Minnesota and shockingly, KFG is the second largest firm in the surrounding seven-state area. Including Kansas, Iowa, and Utah makes KFG fifth in a ten-state area. Continue Reading »

Facilitating Financial Health (NUC, 2008) is the title of the latest book I’ve co-authored with Drs. Ted and Brad Klontz. The release date is July 9th, this Wednesday. The book originally shipped around June 1, but a flaw in the printing (the covers curled up like a pill-bug under attack) resulted in a reprint, pushing the release date back about 40 days.

Before you rush to Amazon.com to order your copy, Facilitating Financial Health isn’t for everyone. The book is specifically written for financial professionals, coaches, and therapists. The tools provided in Facilitating Financial Health allow these professionals to more effectively help clients build healthy relationships with money. This book incorporates the latest research to help professionals understand the roots of clients’ destructive financial behavior, and it provides specific techniques to help clients change.

These techniques are valuable for both professionals trained in “exterior finance”—the nuts and bolts of managing money—and those who focus on “interior finance”—the beliefs and emotions about money. Facilitating Financial Health integrates the fields of psychotherapy, coaching, and financial planning, equipping financial professionals with techniques to enhance their effectiveness by working with both the exterior and interior aspects of a client’s financial health. Continue Reading »

You know gas prices are soaring. What you may not know is why.

As with most problems, there are no easy answers or quick solutions. Yet in our society, we don’t want to hear that. We want easy answers and quick solutions.

Pandering politicians and the sensationalists in the media are quick to give us what we want—someone to blame and a quick fix for the oil problem. The blame? Greedy speculators. The fix? More regulation.

Recent headlines read: “Obama Vows Crackdown on Oil Speculators” and “McCain Calls for Federal Probe on Oil Speculation.” Even Fox’s Bill O’Reilly has called for the regulation of the evil oil speculators who are hurting “the folks.”

In recent months, I’ve wondered exactly who are these greedy and evil oil speculators who are single-handedly driving up oil prices. It finally dawned on me who Obama, McCain, and O’Reilly are referring to. These evil speculators are my clients! Continue Reading »