December Client Newsletter
It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas…at least around my office and home. I love the end of the year and the holiday season. The Christmas tree is up and the lights are a pleasant warm glow to the darkened days of late fall in Michigan. We have had our fist snowflakes fall and yet we still have some stubborn leaves hanging on to trees. If you are anything like me it feels like Christmas and Thanksgiving get closer together every year and that there is more to do in that shortened time with each passing year. However, I love all that this time of year has to offer: family, food, Christmas music (I might have started playing this in October), lights, friends, watching Great American Family (and some Hallmark) Christmas movies with my wife and daughter, snow (yes I love snow), and so much more!
Here at Silver Strand Financial Planning (SSFP) it is time to begin putting the bow on another year. So let’s take a minute to pause and run through a couple of things that may be important to you as 2022 comes to an end.
December Element Focus is….Real Estate (Rt)
For generations real estate has been touted as one of the best solutions to achieve financial independence. The reality is that few people truly understand the real implications that owning and maintaining physical real estate will have on their spending and overall financial health.
As a significant part of many clients’ net worth, real estate stands as a major consideration when determining if you are prepared for financial independence. Further, understanding the allocation of real estate assets (i.e. personal-use property vs. investment property) will have major implications on the success of your retirement plan.
Please take a minute to log in to your Elements app and take a look at your Real Estate (Rt) element. After you log in, you can find this information by clicking on Elements on the bottom of your screen, scrolling down to Assets, and then selecting Real Estate. Please review (and update if necessary) the value of each property that you have listed. This is also a good time to review the balance of any loans that you have for each property - if you have questions about this, please let me know.
I will be reviewing your Rt (Real Estate) score and reaching out to you if there are opportunities questions, or challenges that may need to be addressed. As always, if you would like to review this in greater detail, please schedule some time using this link https://calendly.com/ssfp/lets-talk.
December Planning Opportunities…Tax Planning & Charitable Giving
Tax Planning - It is not yet to late to do tax planning for 2022. Yes we are quickly running out of time and I know that we have spoken about this all year, but sometimes we procrastinate, right? As you have heard me say several times this year, if you have income, you should be doing tax planning. We may not be able to fully integrate tax planning for 2022 at this point but we can make sure that we are looking for and taking advantage of the tax planning opportunities that are available for 2023. If we have had a conversation about implementing some aspects of tax planning that still have actionable steps that need to be taken, I will be reaching out to you this week to schedule some time to finish things up. If you have questions or would like to explore tax planning more, give me a call or schedules some time using this link https://calendly.com/ssfp/lets-talk.
Charitable Giving - Hopefully by now you know that I believe that we have been blessed so that we can be a blessing. We have been blessed with time, talents, money, and so much more. For December we are looking at wrapping up the year and completing or maybe beginning charitable giving strategies. Based on conversations that I have had with you over the course of the year, you should know what steps need to be completed before the end of the year. However, we do not want to wait until the last week of December to make sure that our charitable giving strategies are complete. Many times, we add additional stress to already stressful weeks by putting off our charitable giving until the last week of the year. By doing this we may also inadvertently cause pieces of our strategy to no be completed for 2022 and roll into 2023. If you have questions or need help completing your charitable giving strategy for 2022, please reach out soon. You can schedule some time with me by using this link https://calendly.com/ssfp/lets-talk.
Client Actions…Credit Check
I know that time is precious as we approach the end of the year so I do not have a lot of actions for you to complete in December. Let’s keep it easy and simple. December brings us to the final Credit Check of the year. This shouldn’t take you long. As with the previous 2 credit checks, log into annualcreditreport.com and this time you will be reviewing your Experian credit report. This is important for each member of your family to run and review. This is free as long as you do not request your credit score or monitoring or any other add-on that Experian offers. Review your credit report for accuracy and for any loans, credit cards, or activity that you did not initiate. If you have questions, please let me know and we can login and/or review your report together.
Exciting News…new software
I am very excited to let you know that SSFP has brought on another software partner to help manage your loans. This is a step that I believe is very important to maintaining financial health and I also believe that this should help provide you with clarity and confidence around your lending needs. SSFP is now offering access to Sora Finance. Sora Finance (Sora) is an AI driven software that is designed to be your private banker for lending needs. Sora will enable me to provide you with up to the minute ideas and strategies to maintain the best possible solutions for your debt management. It will also keep an eye on your debt based on the objectives we set and will let us know if there are better opportunities available for you to accomplish your goals than how your current debt is structured. This will also eliminate the need for you to go to various websites or lenders to try to shop your debt and then end up on endless mailing lists. I will be reaching out to you to discuss how Sora will be implemented into your individual plan. If you want to get started sooner, please let me know and I will send you the information to get started.
Well, it has been quite a year and I want to thank you for allowing me into your life and for sharing your hopes, dreams, and even struggles with me. I know that it hasn’t always been easy, but you have put in the hard work and persevered through a tough year marked with high inflation, negative market returns and general unrest. It is my sincere hope that you find peace and joy in the time spent with your family and friends through this Christmas season. If you have any questions, or if there is anything that I can assist you with as we wrap up 2022, please do not hesitate to give me a call.
Merry Christmas!