McLean Asset Management

The Current Market’s Effect On Retirement Spending

By McLean Asset Management / January 9, 2017 /

Last time, we compared retirement spending rules using historical data, but I believe we can arrive at a much more realistic picture for today’s retirees using Monte Carlo simulations. To that end, today I want to simulate these strategies with Monte Carlo simulations for stock and bond returns using current market environment as a starting point.…

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Review: Why Dow 20,000 Is a Meaningless Milestone

By McLean Asset Management / January 6, 2017 /

People like round numbers. Investors really like round numbers. But just because a number has a lot of zeroes at the end doesn’t mean anything. We’re seeing this all over again because the Dow Jones Industrial Average is closing in on 20,000 (by the time you read this, it may very well have already surpassed…

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Review: Most investors didn’t come close to beating the S&P 500

By McLean Asset Management / January 6, 2017 /

Shockingly, the average investor lost to the market. It happens most years, yet the financial media acts like it’s Truman defeating Dewey every time. Looking at the data from Openfolio, a platform for individual investors, their average investor was up about 5% on the year. That’s around 7% worse than the S&P 500 Index. On…

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4 Areas Where Government Policy Could Have A Big Impact On Your Retirement Plan

By McLean Asset Management / January 3, 2017 /

No matter how much your employer matches your 401(k) contributions or the government provides assistance, you are the one who will determine how successful your retirement will be. How you prepare will determine how your retirement looks. But your retirement plan will undoubtedly be affected by external factors, many of which will be driven by…

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Should Legacy Goals Be Part of Your Retirement Plan?

By McLean Asset Management / December 1, 2016 /

Figuring out how to plan for your legacy goals is a nice problem to have. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t worry about it. Whether or not legacy goals are part of your plan can seriously impact what your retirement will look like. Including them means you’ll have less to spend on yourself (and you’ll…

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Understanding Fixed and Variable Expenses in Retirement

By McLean Asset Management / November 18, 2016 /

Not all retirement expenses are created equal. You can break them up in all sorts of different ways, but one of the most important ways is to look at fixed and variable expenses. By looking at your expenses in this way you can get a sense of just how flexible your spending can be. If…

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A Simple Way to Keep Your Portfolio in Line

By McLean Asset Management / October 27, 2016 /

Investing isn’t simply picking the best funds or building your perfect portfolio. Keeping your portfolio in line over the long term is just as important (if not more so). Markets move. That’s what they do. If they didn’t, they wouldn’t reflect our ever-changing world. As a result, your portfolio will drift over time from being…

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When Tax-Loss Harvesting Makes Sense (And When It Doesn’t)

By McLean Asset Management / October 25, 2016 / Comments Off on When Tax-Loss Harvesting Makes Sense (And When It Doesn’t)

The investing world is comprised primarily of uncontrollable factors like stock prices and tomorrow’s market movements. That’s why it’s so important to be aware of the areas you can control that can potentially put more money in your pocket. We often talk about controlling risk with tools like diversification and an evidence-based, or “passive,” investing…

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Three questions to evaluate longevity risk for retirees

By McLean Asset Management / August 23, 2016 /

Longevity risk—the risk of running out of assets before running out of time—is fundamental to retirement. We know about the distribution of longevity for the overall population, but an individual cannot know in advance precisely where he or she will fall in the distribution. The length of your retirement could be much shorter or longer…

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