And good evening.

You've got more than money.

You've got Gene Dickison, your host, your personal financial advisor.

Isn't it cool you got a personal financial adviser?

Tell all your friends.

Tell your family.

I got a personal financial advisor.

And you do?

And you have access to me, basically 24 seven because I'm on PBS all the time.

And of course, we have archives.

And you go to the PBS website and there's tons of great information there.

That's pretty cool stuff.

And you get all that low, low introductory price of free, although let's be honest, you're getting a lot of value here.

You should make a really generous contribution to the PBS and get a tax deduction for it.

Lots of ways to do it.

Send me your email.

I'll explain it to you.

Speaking of emails, if you are a loyal viewer of more than money, you already know we are the most relevant financial show on television.

Not because I am the most brilliant financial adviser ever invented, although people have said that it's a little embarrassing.

That's so kind of them.

No, it's because of you.

It's because you have the most interesting questions.

You have the most interesting lives.

You have the most interesting challenges and opportunities, and you share those with us.

And we add a little bit of our experience, 780 years.

That's a lot of experience.

A little bit of our team knowledge.

We have tons of folks working on our more than money team and great experts in so many different parts of the financial world that we blend all that together.

To serve you and serving you is so much in our eye.

Number one, it's so much fun.

Number two, it's what we're meant to do.

And number three, it makes us incredibly relevant.

We're not trying to preach to you.

We're not trying to instruct you.

We're not looking down our nose at you as we know stuff and you don't.

That's silliness.

There's tons of other shows on the air that do all that work.

But you come to us, we make you the star of the show.

It's a pretty remarkable thing and pretty exciting thing for us and and and joyful, great, great joy.

So if you are so inclined and you have a question you’s like to send to us, GENE AT ASK MTM DOT COM G-E-N-E AT ASK MTM DOT COM works very very well.

We have an entire team that answers all the questions.

Back to you.

One suggestion.

Make sure your email works and make sure you check your spam filter because sadly, about 10% of our emails, even though we respond back, we get a second email saying, Hey, never heard from you folks.

Yeah, you did.

You just didn't pay attention.

So pay attention.

Look for it.

Check your spam filter regularly.

I do it every day.

You should as well and hopefully you gain a lot of traction.

And lots of traction is what we're all about, Megs.

To whom do we offer our services this evening?

Well, our first question tonight says, I love watching your show and learning along with the other viewers.

I have an odd request.

Here's the situation.

My fabulous daughter is currently a medical student right up there in St Luke's Hospital.

She just got engaged to a resident doctor, which I am very excited about.

She already has $150,000 in medical student loans, and he has much more than that.

My best guess would be about 270,000.

How should they best manage that?

I would like them to get started on the right foot financially.

Here's the odd request part.

Are there any advisors who specialize in helping young young couples with huge debts?

I know most advisors take 1% of the assets as their fee, but in this case there are no asset assets.

I would like to set them up with a financial advisor who can help them make the sanest decisions about getting out of debt.

I can pay up to $750 for them to have some sessions with an advisor.

But is this a weird gift for a newly engaged couple?

If not, do you have any suggestions for who I could set them up with?

Thank you.

Well, goodness.

Fabulous daughter indeed.

Lots of folks listening are going.

you are so blessed.

And you're you truly are.

And teaming up with another doctor.

Goodness, what a bright future they actually have.

If they can overcome this financial drag.

$420,000 of debt so far.

So far.

So let's go right to the bottom line question.

Is it a a silly gift, an inappropriate gift to say I have secured for you three sessions with a financial adviser to help you get a handle on your your entire picture and get a plan in place for addressing your debt?

Is that a silly gift?

my gosh, no.

It's one of the most thoughtful gifts I can think of for this circumstance.

You have two young people that are goodness, As I understand this this training process.

They're overwhelmed.

They're working ridiculous hours and they're under a tremendous amount of stress.

Do they have the time, the talent, the energy to to address these things themselves?

In all likelihood, no.

In all likelihood.

So availing them of that opportunity.

What a what a thoughtful thing to do.

What a thoughtful thing to do.

Now, are there advisors who would decline that that that opportunity?

The answer is yes.

There are, sadly, lots of financial advisors.

Some of the biggest names, some of the names you may have heard Ken Fisher, Ric Edelman.

These are, yes.

Firms that are based on, hey, we invest money.

You have money to invest?

No, we have debt.

Go away.

The stock brokerage firms, the major wire houses.

Very often in that circumstance as well.

Well, how much money do you have in invest?

We're actually -420,000 bucks.

Yeah, Not what we do.

You're not looking for an investment adviser.

You're looking for a financial adviser.

And good news.

There's lots of them.

And there's lots of really good ones.

Lots of really good ones.

And there are lots of really good ones who are bright enough, aware enough.

See the long game well enough that they would happily invest some time in a young couple with such a bright future that maybe for the first ten years of the relationship, yeah, they make 750 bucks a year.

They get paid almost nothing, but they are planting seeds, they're building a relationship, they're assisting these young folks in avoiding making poor financial choices so that in the end, their ultimate financial success is much better than they might have had on their own.

And in for a financial adviser, particularly a young financial advisor in our our firm, we have a half a dozen, much younger, much younger financial advisers for a financial advisor to build that relationship and invest some time over a number of years is a very wise thing in our world, in the MTM world, more than money world.

It is not only a wise thing, it's what we encourage.

It's what we encourage.

The immediate payoff, a modest or a loss may it may cost us more to serve these folks than than we're making.

But in the long run, particularly if you think long run in terms of 20 years, 30 years, 40 years.

My current longest running client will have been with me, will have given me the honor of serving them this coming year for 44 years.

That's pretty cool stuff.

Could your daughter and her fiance end up with a financial advisor that is with them side by side throughout their entire careers and beyond?

The answer?

Sure.

You're so thoughtful and know what do you have A fabulous daughter.

She's got a fabulous mom.

That's very, very cool.

Bless you.

Bless you all.

Megs, who can we at least have a chance to bless with our next question?

My next question is about Social Security.

It says, My wife and I are avid watchers of your show and enjoy all your great advice.

My question is when I should take Social Security.

I am retired and will be full retirement age in five months instead of taking it at my full retirement age, I could let it grow and take the funds from my pretax assets like my 401k and IRA I have roughly 1.4 million in these accounts.

I've heard this might be a good strategy to lessen future RMD payments, which I don't really understand.

My gut tells me to take Social Security now and let my pretax pretax assets recover from the past year or so.

But I would love to hear your thoughts.

Thank you.

Well, thank you for the very kind words.

And thank you, Megan, for not giggling.

Why, you said nice things about me.

Bottom line is, Social Security questions are very challenging for a very simple reason.

You will not know whether you made the exactly correct choice until the day you are ascending to a far, far better place.

That's the only time that you will be able to confirm or not that you made the right choice.

And here's why.

Let's pick the scenario that says this gentleman, soon to be 67, can wait until he's 70 wondering, maybe I should.

Maybe I should.

You know what?

I'm going to wait.

And then at 69 and 11 months above comes along and he's gone and he has collected nothing.

That's that's not a good result.

But how could we have predicted anticipated the bus?

The answer is we can.

Pretty simple stuff.

There are certain what characteristics, certain components of the decision.

Far better word, certain components.

Did you ever wonder if this was taped live?

You just had a real life demonstration.

It's live.

the components that we look at allow us to either increase the probability that we're making the right choice or decrease the probability.

I'll give you an example.

This gentleman has 1.4 million.

I think we can all agree that's a substantial sum of money.

I will.

Just as an aside, he notes, he maybe I should leave it.

Go to continue to recover.

If your investments have need to recover from 2022, you're probably not investing them correctly.

So the first thing I would look at, sitting with a financial advisor is are my funds correctly invested?

Because they should not have dropped dramatically.

They should have already recovered.

So that that's number one.

Number two, what's your health?

Are you in excellent health?

Which is going to tend to counsel us to push off Social Security?

Are you in relatively poor health?

That's a different story.

You're probably going to want to take it earlier rather than later to at least collect some benefit during your life expectancy.

Are you in a position where you could absolutely use the cash flow right now?

You'd rather leave that money, that 1.4 million for another six years until you are required to start taking distributions?

Required is a stiff word and for lots of folks, when they turn 73 and they find out that they must start taking distributions, they're not happy initial distributions four, four and a half percent.

If this money continues to grow, could very well be $2 million at age 73.

No guarantees, of course, but could be.

So $90,000, you've got to take and pay tax on the or not.

It could be the exact right thing to do.

The only way to get a good sense of now versus later is to have side by side projections.

Most quality financial advisers can do that for you very easily.

In short order, less than an hour, you load into the program.

All the current information that you have and have it solve for taking Social Security at 67 and you use the same information, but toggle over to taking it at 70 and see which one finds.

Find you more pleasing in the first one?

Yes.

You're going to be drawing against your your 1.4 million.

And what if you need 50,000 a year for three years?

Well, your 1.4 million could very well end up at 1.25, 150000 dollars lower.

It shouldn't.

It should make a decent rate of return.

But assuming it doesn't.

Worst case, you're at a million and a quarter and you've maximized your lifetime Social Security benefits.

Now, one more piece of advice for everyone thinking about when to take Social Security.

There is absolutely a component that's non-financial, and that component is the government.

Are they going to screw it up or should I said, are they going to screw it up?

I don't know that screwed up.

Are they going to change it?

Guaranteed.

It's unsustainable.

Choices that have been made by our elected representatives have not been in our favor.

They have done just litany, the list of egregious mistakes they have made in terms of managing Social Security and Medicare.

It goes on and on and on for generations.

So will it be the same in ten years?

I don't think so.

Will, we'll be gone?

I don't think so.

I just think it'll be very different.

People go.

They can't change it because politicians don't want to anger people.

Are you serious?

They already reduce your distributions if you go too early.

They already tax your distributions if you make too much other money.

They already increase your Medicare premiums dramatically, basically whenever they want.

So could they make changes?

Of course they could.

Will they make changes?

I can almost assure you.

When and how?

No clue.

Nothing psychic about this guy.

All right.

Psychotic, but not psychic.

Speaking of nuts, psychic, smooth segway.

Megs, what's next?

Well, hopefully I'm also not psychotic.

You could have added that part.

Our next question says my aging mother has a significant annual income.

I have power of attorney for her and have been helping to manage her estate for several years.

She does not have full cognitive dementia, but she does become easily confused.

As power of attorney.

I encouraged her for the past two years to give gifts to her children and grandchildren.

She gave each of her children an amount close to the annual limit and the grandchildren a lesser amount.

My brother, who has been deceased for some time, left three adult children behind.

This year, she decided to split what would have been my deceased brother's gift among his children.

Now the children are saying that they should get that should get that in addition to what they would receive as grandchildren.

I am curious as to your thoughts, Gene.

Cut them off.

Don't give them anything.

What?

it's.

It's wearisome.

It truly is.

We.

We sadly and it's not a large portion of the population.

5%, I think, tops.

But the word entitlement is everywhere for those 5%.

95%.

Did you hear the question from this lady with the fabulous daughter working hard, willing to take on debt, studying to become a doctor, helping to save lives, marrying a doctor, helping to save lives in just doing it, digging in and making a difference.

And then they write, I think you should give me more money from Granny.

Seriously?

Yeah.

How about if I cut you off for the next three years and maybe over the next three years, you demonstrate to me that you're worthy of getting a gift.

Or maybe better.

I take the gift I was going to give you.

I'll give it to the other grandkids.

Wow.

Since when is gratitude just a lost art?

Since when?

Grown children make your own money.

Look at it.

If Granny gives you a dollar.

By the way, do you remember?

Does anybody out there remember when you were a kid?

Birthday card from Grammy?

There was a dollar.

And if and if you were out of your mind, you get $2.

My Grammy was.

I don't know how she got it.

She always had brand new bills.

There were.

We never spent those.

I think I still has like I still have those.

It's been a couple of years, but I think I still have that.

Fantastic.

If the gift is not received as it was intended, as a an act of generosity on the part of your mom, their grandmother, I see no reason to reward that bad behavior.

None whatsoever.

Now, I'm harsh, I'm confrontational.

I cut them off.

I maybe not, but maybe you start with an explanation.

This is what your grandmother wanted.

I'm acting on her wishes.

Now, brace yourself, because I guarantee you that if they are this self-centered and entitled, they will lean on your mom.

And she's not cognitively impaired, but she can be.

What was the the phrase?

Easily distracted, easily confused.

And undoubtedly they will attempt to do that.

You are the power of attorney.

You're there for a reason.

You're there not only to protect your mom, but to uphold her values.

And I strongly suspect that she would be ashamed of grandchildren, grown people who theoretically should be making their own way.

Can you imagine?

Three grandchildren?

I'd say that they're each getting like 7000 apiece instead of 70.

Can you imagine how much fun, how much joy most people would feel in getting a $7,000 gift out of the blue?

They would lose their minds.

They would be joyous.

And let's be fair, if your mom is doing all of this, your mom is of an advanced age and mom has a substantial estate.

So there is likely likely more to come at some point in the future, hopefully many years in the future.

But to be disrespectful and lack gratitude.

Yeah, my opinion you asked for it.

Cut them off, Megs.

Who do I annoy next?

Hopefully this one's not annoying.

I do agree with you though.

This one says Thanks for your continued outstanding show.

I recommend it to others.

When people are seeking financial information.

I did not laugh.

This one says, Would you please answer the following question?

I've made QCDs to satisfy RMD requirements in 2023 from traditional IRA accounts.

I believe that they are not also tax deductible as gifts to charity on schedule A else that would be double dipping.

Would you please confirm that if I wish also to make gifts to charity that are deductible on schedule A, the amount of QCDs will not be a part of the total amount of gifts to charity subject to the limit on the amount that may be deducted.

In other words, QCDs do not reduce on the number of gifts to charity that otherwise are deductible on Schedule A and subject to the limit.

Thank you for your much appreciated help.

Thank you.

And thank you, Megan, for not laughing.

The question is worded in a way that for some of you you're doing I'm not getting it.

So I'm going to I'm going to give you kind of a a Reader's Digest condensed version of what this young lady is asking.

She has an IRA that requires her to take money out every year.

She doesn't like that part.

So the IRS permits her to identify that RMD.

There's money she must take and send it to charities of her choice.

Those are called QCDs qualified charitable distributions.

So far it's fantastic.

I'll use simple numbers.

She has a $300,000 IRA.

Her RMD is $12,000 this year.

She splits it up between her church, Folds of Honor, Children’s Home of Easton, laughing at my nightmare and fill in the blanks and all of it goes directly from the IRA to those named charities.

When I say directly, the checks might come to her.

That's okay.

But they're not made out to her.

They're made out to the individual charities.

If she wishes, she can go and present those checks or if she doesn't, they can be sent directly to the charities that as as mom used to say, Marks Next.

Doesn't matter.

All of that happens and doesn't really affect her income tax.

It will be shown as an RMD with a taxable amount of zero.

So it does not increase her income.

It does not increase her income tax.

If she was exposed to a potential increase in her Medicare, it doesn't affect that either.

So this is fantastic, doubly fantastic.

This is such a much better question after the last point.

Have kids that want more money from Grammy.

She wants to do more.

She wants to help more.

She wants to support more charities.

Now, theoretically, there are limitations on how much she can deduct.

They really aren't very large.

So not to worry.

Her question is over and above what we just talked about.

If she gives another $10,000, can she deduct that on schedule A?

Yes.

Does the original distribution that we discussed the RMDs QCDs going directly to charities, does that impact schedule A at all?

No, not not not even a little bit.

So if you are concerned about exceeding how much you're allowed, don't be concerned.

It doesn't affect it.

So you're doing everything right.

You're being so generous.

Bless you.

So many organizations.

Whomever you're picking.

Fantastic.

Good for you.

And what a generous spirit.

What a great time of the year to do it.

Well done, you, Megs.

One more back there.

We do our last question tonight.

Says or asks who can open a 529?

Can a child only have one of them?

If parents open one who can contribute?

And is there a maximum that can be put in each year?

I have two great nieces and one great nephew.

I would like to help them with college since 529 are tax free.

I thought that would be better than just sending the money.

Thank you for your help.

Well, from a tax standpoint, 529 can very well be better.

You might end up with a deduction on your Pennsylvania return if you're a Pennsylvania resident.

For folks who are watching our show from California and from the South, I know that we've got folks in Delaware that watch our show and and elsewhere.

Check with your state regulations in terms of what is or is not tax deductible.

But is it better to go 529 versus just sending a check?

And there's a couple of things you need to pay attention to.

How old are the children?

Are they already in college?

In which case the benefit is going to be very modest or not any at all.

So if you've got a sophomore in college and they're saying, hey, they need 3800 bucks for their meal plan, sending the check to the college is probably as good as it needs to be.

If they are eight years old and you're hoping to really significantly impact their ability to afford a higher education.

yeah.

529 is a great idea.

Are they allowed only one?

Nope.

A child can have multiple 529s because it's not the child.

If you set one up it’s yours, if the parents set one up, it's theirs.

If the other set of grandparents set it up, it's theirs.

One child could be the beneficiary of multiple 529s.

No problem whatsoever.

If the parents set it up, who can contribute?

Anybody.

Any.

Literally.

Anybody.

Relatives.

Non relatives.

Friends.

Family.

The guy down the street that had a few extra bucks and wants to toss it in because this is a good kid.

They can absolutely do that.

No worries whatsoever.

Some folks would suggest that having the grandparents own the 529 and have the parents put the money into mom and dad's plan might actually be better from a financial aid standpoint.

But that's a little sophisticated.

Something we probably don't need to dig into right now.

But to answer your question.

Absolutely.

Great idea.

Make sure that you're talking to a financial adviser who understands 529 plans really well.

Be willing to discuss your nieces and nephews circumstances kind of in detail so that the advisor knows the best way to counsel you and you're off.

Well done.

Very generous of you.

Very kind of you, indeed.

So we had some really kind, generous folks.

All right.

We had an exception.

But really kind.

All right.

Three exceptions.

What are you going to do?

We had some very kind of generous folks asking wonderful questions.

This week about how to help other people.

Isn't that amazing?

It it it truly is an amazing.

I have the advantage.

98% of the people I meet, they're wonderful.

They're caring, They're loving.

They want to help.

They want to help their friends.

They want to help their family.

They want to help charities.

They want to help.

Hopefully, we've been helping.

Hopefully you want to have us help.

So if you have a question, send it to us, GENE AT ASK MTM DOT COM And who knows?

When we're back next week, we might be answering your question.

Right here behind this desk on more than money.

Good night.