Retirement Investments

I am not an expert in retirement planning. Not by a long shot.  But I’ve rounded up some of the best, non-biased information out there for you so you can start having better conversations with your financial planner.

There are a lot of strategies out there about which retirement vehicles are the best and it’s easy to get lost in the details.  But everyone agrees that the biggest mistakes are not starting investing early and not investing often.  Whichever strategy you ultimately use, start it as soon as you can and maximize your annual contributions.

Here are my favorite resources on building wealth for your retirement:

(1) Reddit has a great collection of experts at r/personalfinance. You can find very specific questions with thoughtful answers.  Thanks to Reddit’s upvoting system, the best answers are usually at the top of the page.  They also will create summary pages on topics that get a lot of traffic.  For example, here’s possibly the best online summary of traditional and ROTH IRAs.  You’ll also find great advice on other personal finance topics like budgeting and debt management.

(2) Bogleheads is a community of conservative investors named after one of the founders of Vanguard.  You might expect some bias towards Vanguard on the site but alternatives are typically given.  As a sample, check out their guide to index funds and the three-fund portfolio.

(3) Brian Hufford’s column in Dental Economics.  Brian is a CPA and a CFA and he’s been a long time columnist for DE.  His articles are short and sweet musings on trends in wealth creation specifically for dentists.

(4) John Oliver helped publicize the controversy with fees in retirement accounts.

(5) If all of this terminology is overwhelming, Khan Academy has excellent, free courses on the basics of investing, stocks and bonds, etc.