The Realized Team’s Picks
What Is a Contingent Beneficiary and Do I Need One?
It is important to consider various wealth management strategies when accumulating your wealth. Financial planning for the future helps ensure your wealth makes its way to the people and organizations you prefer after you pass on.
How Are Volatility and Risk Related In an Investment?
Market volatility can be defined as the frequency and magnitude of price movements, up or down. The same can be applied to an individual investment; the more often the price swings and the more significant the change each time, the more volatile that investment is. High volatility can make a stock riskier, but it can increase the potential for gains as well as losses. That's because price changes can go in either direction. For example, a volatile stock could shoot up by 20% one day, drop 5% the next day, and increase by 10% the following day, followed by another 5% drop. That looks frightening, but the result is a considerable gain for the stock's owners. In contrast, a less volatile security might not gain 20% over several years.
Do Beneficiaries Pay Taxes on Estate Distributions?
Most people who quote Benjamin Franklin's famous words about the only sure things in the world being death and taxes are unaware that he was making a point about the prospective resilience of our then-newly established Constitution. Nonetheless, the Constitution held up, as have taxes, even those following death.
How Are Delaware Statutory Trusts Regulated?
A Delaware Statutory Trust, or DST, is a real estate investment option that provides investors with a route to fractional commercial property ownership. A DST is a corporation that uses Delaware trust laws to establish a trust. Each shareholder owns a beneficial interest in the trust, holding the properties the trust buys. The IRS states that investors (referred to as trust beneficiaries) are each direct owners of all the trust's assets. As a result, they are entitled to the tax benefits of owning real estate, including the ability to use a 1031 exchange to enter or leave the DST.
Real Estate as an Asset Class - Insights from the Realized Team
Realized was recently featured on the Retirement Repair Shop podcast with Mary Beth Franklin. During the episode, we shared our insights on using real estate as an asset class while planning for retirement. Many retirees don’t consider real estate when planning for the future, but it can be a way to diversify your portfolio.
What Are Pre-Tax Deductions?
Pre-tax deductions are one of two types of benefits deductions: pre-tax deductions and post-tax deductions. They can be difficult to navigate; however, they play a major role in how employers handle employee paycheck tax obligations. Here’s what you need to know to make the most out of pre-tax deductions.
Can An Attorney Act as a Qualified Intermediary for a 1031 Exchange?
Almost anyone can become a qualified intermediary. That’s because in most states, there aren’t any specific license requirements, tests, or other hurdles to becoming a qualified intermediary. While almost anyone can become a QI, certain conditions will disqualify a person, which we’ll discuss in this article.
What Is a 1099-R Tax Form and What Is it Used For?
The purpose behind most pensions plans, annuities, retirement plans, or profit-sharing plans is income flow, also known as “distributions.” If you are the beneficiary of such an investment/income strategy, the chances are excellent that you’ll receive what’s known as a Form 1099-R from the custodian, sponsor, or manager of the pension or plan from which you receive distributions. This is because the IRS considers those distributions to be income, which must be reported.
What Is an Estate Planning Attorney, and What Do They Do?
According to the American Bar Association, estate planning is a process covering the transfer of property at the time of death and other personal matters that may or may not include tax planning. The essential core of estate planning is often a will. A will is a legal document that explains and enforces how a person’s assets are to be allocated after their death and is thus a crucial piece of estate planning. The ABA notes that estate planning involves the advice and counsel of more than an attorney; it may also include your accountant, tax advisor, financial planner, banker, and broker.
What Is Form 8949 and What Is it Used For?
It’s that time of year during which things settle down after the holidays, life gets back to normal and yes—preparations for income tax season are underway. The deadline for filing Tax Day paperwork in 2022 is Monday, April 18 (or Tuesday, April 19 for those residing in Maine and Massachusetts).
