Roger Wohlner

When buying a new home or refinancing your existing home mortgage, one of the decisions that most homebuyers need to make is the type of mortgage loan to take out. While some buyers do pay cash for their home, this is not an option for most homebuyers. Choosing the best mortgage option for your situation is an important financial decision and can make your home purchase or refinance more affordable.
Buying a home is the largest financial purchase most of us will ever make. How you finance thi...

What You Need to Know
Donating appreciated stocks, ETFs, mutual funds and other securities offers a double tax advantage.
Capital losses in excess of realized capital gains can be used to offset up to $3,000 of other taxable income.
As always, do what's best for the client's overall financial situation.
With the prospect of higher capital gains taxes under the Biden tax proposal, financial advisors will want to look for ways to help their clients avoid these higher taxes on stocks, inherited ...

What You Need to Know
The Biden proposal would raise the capital gains tax rate on those earning more than $1 million.
It would also eliminate the step-up in basis for larger estates, potentially causing heirs to incur significant capital gains taxes
Ordinary Americans could see an impact from the proposed changes in the capital gains tax as well.
President Joe Biden’s American Families Plan includes some significant overall tax increases to fund its costs. A key part of his tax plan includes...

A reverse stock split occurs when a publicly traded company divides the number of outstanding shares by a certain amount. This serves to decrease the number of outstanding shares and increase the price per share of those outstanding shares. This differs from a forward stock split where the number of shares increases, and the share price declines post-split.
Reverse stock split: What that means
With a forward stock split, a company increases the number of shares outstanding and lowers the pric...

What You Need to Know
The proposed rules to raise the RMD age will provide more time to build assets in a Roth IRA via contributions, rollovers or Roth conversions.
Roth IRAs are a key estate planning tool under the Secure Act.
Roth conversions make sense now, while tax rates are relatively low.
Roth IRAs offer an excellent planning tool for many of your clients. The “Secure Act 2.0” retirement bill, which is widely expected to pass, would open a wider window for Roth IRA planning.
Meanwhile,...

An IRA or individual retirement account is a tax-advantaged retirement account designed to help individuals save for retirement. IRAs were first authorized by Congress in 1974 and were limited to those without pension coverage. The eligibility was later expanded to all individuals including those covered by a workplace retirement plan.
How does an IRA work?
There are two types of IRA accounts, Roth and traditional. The annual contribution limit for IRAs is $6,000 with an additional $1,000 cat...

A SIMPLE (Savings Incentive Match Plan for Employees) IRA is a retirement plan that was established by the IRS a number of years ago to provide a low cost, relatively simple option for small businesses. The goal was to make it easier for these smaller companies to offer a retirement plan option for their employees.
These plans are easy to establish, and they are easy to administer.
Who can establish a SIMPLE IRA plan?
A SIMPLE IRA plan is available to any employer with 100 or fewer employees....

Savings accounts can be a good place to keep money that you will need in the near future and want to keep in a safe account. It can also be a good spot for your emergency fund or for saving for a goal like a downpayment on a house.
There are a number of varieties that fall under the savings account umbrella. These accounts all have their pros and cons. The best type of savings account for you will depend upon your situation. What are you saving for? What is the time horizon until you will nee...

Asset allocation is the process of allocating your investments among various asset classes. At the highest level, the three main asset classes are stocks, bonds and cash. Within these asset classes there are sub-asset classes such as small cap stocks, international stocks, short-term bonds and many, many others. Sub-asset classes may be designated by traits such as a growth or value strategy, where the investments are domiciled (U.S. or non-U.S.), the duration of the bond holdings and the typ...

Capital gains are incurred when investments like stocks, bonds, mutual funds, ETFs, real estate and others are sold for more than the cost of the investment asset. Capital gains can be realized on the sale of other assets such as real estate as well.
Capital gains on most investments are taxed at either long or short-term rates. In order to qualify for preferential long-term capital gains rates, the investment must have been held for at least a year.
Short-term capital gains are taxed at the ...

The ranks of the self-employed had been growing prior to the onset of the COVID pandemic. The pandemic has served to accelerate the growth in the number of self-employed individuals.
Being self-employed means that you are responsible for saving for your own retirement. There is no company retirement plan to contribute to unless you put one in place. Funding an IRA is a start, but IRAs have relatively low annual contribution limits.
The two main self-employed retirement plans are the Solo 401(...

Buying and selling shares of stocks is pretty straightforward. Owning stock means that you are buying an equity position in the company. Investors buy stock in the hopes that the price will appreciate and perhaps to earn any dividends the stock might distribute. Stocks can be sold at either a gain or a loss depending upon the price activity while you own it.
Options on the other hand represent a contract that gives you the right, but not the obligation, to buy or sell shares of a stock, an ET...

Imagine that you are out for a nice dinner and you come out to the restaurant’s parking lot only to find out that another car has hit your car. Certainly this is a frustrating experience. However you will want to remain composed to be sure you deal with this situation properly.
Steps to take
If you come out of a store and find that someone has hit your parked car in the store’s parking lot, or if you are leaving a friend’s house and find that someone has hit your car while parked on the stree...

Hitting a parked car with your vehicle happens probably more than you might expect. Perhaps you are trying to back out of a tight parking space and hit the fender of another car in the lot. Maybe you are going down a narrow street and you scrape the side of a parked car. What should you do if you hit a parked car?
Five steps to take if you hit a parked car
If you should accidently hit a parked car, here are five steps to take:
Do not leave the scene. Wait for the other car’s driver to show up...

Private health insurance refers to health insurance that is not offered by the federal or a state government. Health insurance offered by an employer is the most common example of private health insurance coverage for Americans.
Private vs. Public Health Insurance
Private health insurance can be purchased in a variety of ways. This might be through your employer, a state of federal health insurance marketplace or privately from an insurance company.
Public health insurance is coverage offered...