Category: best way to invest money

Your Money Revolution Video Clip: How Mutual Fund Fees are Devouring Your Savings

October 27th, 2014 by Pamela Yellen | Leave a Comment

For the past year, I’ve been working full-time on creating a comprehensive go-at-your-own-pace coaching program designed to eliminate your biggest money worries – and let you take back control of your financial destiny.

I call it “Your Money Revolution,” and initial response to the program has been terrific.

Today I’m excited to share a 5-minute excerpt from this new program with my loyal subscribers.

I want you to be able to see for yourself how truly life changing the information, tools and strategies that I’ve packed into this program can be.

This 5-minute video excerpt deals with how the fees you’re paying in the mutual funds or ETF’s you own in a retirement or investment account may be draining far more of your account value than you realize. [Read more…] “Your Money Revolution Video Clip: How Mutual Fund Fees are Devouring Your Savings”

End Your Biggest Money Worries in 90 Days

October 21st, 2014 by Pamela Yellen | 2 Comments

The top-secret project I’ve been working on for a year is now live!

As I mentioned in my previous emails, it has the potential to completely transform your finances and end your biggest money worries in short order. It’s a culmination of ten years of research… and the result of listening to the concerns of more than 92,000 subscribers to this ezine.

I can honestly say that watching this video I’ve put together for you could end up being the single most important thing you do for your finances – bar none. And as one of my loyal subscribers and supporters, I wanted you to know about it first.

Click here to watch it now.

Here’s a few of the things you’ll discover in this video presentation: [Read more…] “End Your Biggest Money Worries in 90 Days”

Why Your Retirement Account is Missing $186,000

October 16th, 2014 by Pamela Yellen | Leave a Comment

An eye-opening Report released last month by the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College reveals that the fees charged by mutual funds and 401(k) and IRA plans will slash the value of the typical person’s account by almost 37%!

That means if your account should have been worth $500,000, you end up with only $314,000 – all because of stealth fees that are draining your hard-earned savings! That’s $186,000(!) of your money that will end up in other people’s pockets, not yours.

These money-sucking fees often apply even to funds that track stock market indexes such as the S&P 500… as well as to the “Target Date” Funds that most employers now automatically put employees’ 401(k) money into.

Listen to John Bogle, the founder and former CEO of Vanguard, who many consider to be the father of the indexed mutual fund, quoted in MarketWatch:

Question: “If you pay a hefty fee to an active manager, what happens to your potential return?” [Read more…] “Why Your Retirement Account is Missing $186,000”

Fed says most Americans “extraordinarily vulnerable” to financial setbacks

October 9th, 2014 by Pamela Yellen | Leave a Comment

A comment last week by Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen (read Is Pamela Yellen Related to Janet Yellen?) sent my inquiring mind down an investigative rabbit hole. (Update: Janet Yellen was replaced by Jerome Powell in January, 2018.)

Janet stated that the Great Recession showed that a large number of American families are “extraordinarily vulnerable” to financial setbacks because they have few financial assets to fall back on when the you-know-what hits the fan.

She cited a new study showing that an unexpected expense of just $400 would force the majority of American families to borrow money or to have to sell something to cover it.

Just $400! Yikes! What is that? A minor car or appliance repair or a small medical or dental expense?

That stat came from a survey released by the Federal Reserve this summer that was so ignored by the media that it even escaped my notice.

When I finally tracked down that Federal Reserve survey (Report on the Economic Well-Being of U.S. Households in 2013), I could see why the media wanted to keep it under wraps.

Here are a few startling revelations from this Report…

Do you feel lucky?

September 19th, 2014 by Pamela Yellen | Leave a Comment

For two years before the dot-com stock market bubble crashed, my husband Larry and I studied “stock charting” with one of the country’s top technical analysts. It’s one of the 450+ financial strategies and vehicles I’ve investigated over the last 25 years.

Stock charting looks at patterns in the charts of stocks, indexes and various market indicators to determine the best times to buy or sell, based on the knowledge that history repeats itself. (Frankly, I don’t have the patience for that kind of analysis and found it excruciatingly boring.)

History repeats itself in the stock market We owned a lot of tech stocks, and we’d check our retirement account balance every day because it was growing so fast. Some weeks we’d see such an enormous jump that we’d high-five each other shouting, “We’re rich! We’re rich!”

Yup, back then we were part of the “dumb money” – following the crowd like lemmings blindly following each other off a cliff. But I’m getting a little ahead of myself…

We were paying this analyst a good chunk of change for his coaching. Just when the dot-com bubble was peaking (as we now know with 20/20 hindsight), the analyst sent us this urgent one-sentence message: [Read more…] “Do you feel lucky?”

Are we living in the United States of Amnesia?

August 27th, 2014 by Pamela Yellen | Leave a Comment

It was announced that more than $1 trillion has been added to the value of American equities since the stock market hit a two-month low on August 7th. Americans’ wealth has reached a record high, thanks to a surge in the value of stocks and homes.

I’m sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but here’s a news flash: You haven’t made a penny in the stock OR real estate market!

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We’ve been here before…

Just like those glowing reports about how much Americans’ wealth had ballooned prior to the last financial crash, the new reports are pure fiction. Until you sell your assets and lock in your (hopefully) gains, you have nothing more than a bunch of eye-popping numbers on paper. Those numbers repeatedly sucker many of us into believing we have real wealth and financial security when we do not. [Read more…] “Are we living in the United States of Amnesia?”

What does Financial Independence
mean to you?

June 27th, 2014 by Pamela Yellen | Leave a Comment

With Independence Day right around the corner, I got to thinking about the real meaning of financial independence.

(Take our survey now and tell us what financial independence means to you.)

For retired Navy Commander and Bank On Yourself revolutionary Bob Chambers, it means,

Spending time with family and friends and having a predictable, life-long income that provides a comfortable lifestyle.”

If you’ve been a subscriber for a little while, you may recall that Commander Bob agreed to share the booklet he wrote, which he called “Financial Independence Made Easy,” after we received an avalanche of requests for it when I posted an interview I did with him.

Commander Bob has been a student of money and finances for many years, and his 20-page booklet is full of profound insights, including:

Breaking news roundup from
Bank On Yourself

June 17th, 2014 by Pamela Yellen | Leave a Comment

Here are summaries of three important news stories affecting your money and finances…

1. Investment brokers fight rule to favor best interests of clients

Did you know that brokers are not necessarily required to act in your best interest – even if it’s your retirement savings at stake?

The investment industry – from large Wall Street firms to small independent advisors – is spending millions of dollars to fight a rule that would require a broader group of brokers and planners to put their clients’ interests ahead of their own.

The Labor Department said it would release the proposed rule in January, but has already indicated it may miss that deadline. That’s not the first delay on this, though. The rule was originally introduced in 2010 and was rescinded the following year after brokers and lawmakers protested. Wow!

Are you a predictably irrational investor?

June 4th, 2014 by Pamela Yellen | Leave a Comment

Nothing defines humans better than their willingness to do irrational things in the pursuit of phenomenally unlikely payoffs. This is the principle behind lotteries and dating…”
– Scott Adams, creator of the comic strip Dilbert

UPDATED May 2016: With full confidence, I can say that you are irrational when it comes to investing.

I know this not from talking to your broker or your mother-in-law, and I haven’t hacked into your portfolio statements. I know this because you’re human.

What will happen in the stock market isn’t predictable. But one thing is absolutely for sure and for certain: Investors are predictably irrational. We’re not talking smart or stupid, sophisticated or naïve. We’re talking across-the-board irrational.

So maybe you’re thinking that you’re the exception. You think you can handle the volatility of the market by just gritting your teeth and praying everything turns out all right as you roll the dice in the Wall Street Casino. Or maybe you think that at the first sign of trouble, you’ll be able to bail out of stocks and into bonds or money market funds to lock in your gains.

Researchers say, “Nope, that’s not what’s happening…”

Two New 401k Revelations

May 13th, 2014 by Pamela Yellen | 1 Comment

If you’ve been a subscriber for a while or you’ve read my new best-selling book, The Bank On Yourself Revolution, it’s no secret that at the end of the day, I’m not a big fan of the 401(k).

Or the IRA, 403(b), or any other government “blessed” and controlled retirement account. There are many reasons for that. This recent blog post I wrote reveals one big problem – mutual fund fees, which are likely devouring far more of your savings than you realize.

But in the last couple of weeks, there have been new studies revealing just how devastating to your financial health a 401(k) can be:

Recent 401(k) Wealth-Killing Revelation #1:

A new academic study by two Yale and University of Virginia professors argues that millions of workers have been ripped off by excessive fees charged by plan sponsors and advisors to these plans.

The study concluded that…

[Read more…] “Two New 401k Revelations”