I wanted to discuss a question I received from an Audio Insights subscriber who asked, "What should I tell a client’s family after the death of a client or client’s spouse?"

This appeared in yesterday’s (10/5) The Wall Street Journal.  It’s a great example of an adviser being aware of current rules and thinking outside of the box for the best interest of the client.  Staying educated on rules and regs, as well as a good, lasting relationship with your client takes work.  Push yourself to be, as the adviser in this article states, a valuable resource to your client instead of just settling for the easy, traditional means of investment management and

I wanted to announce that I will be holding two, full-day CFP Continuing Education Extravaganzas soon.  The first is September 29th in Philadelphia, PA; the second is October 21st in Boston (Norwood), MA.

Both are worth 10 CFP CE credit hours and 2 hours of CFP® Ethics CE credits, as well as 10 Insurance CE credit hours for MA, PA, NJ, DE, MD, VA, and DC at the Philadelphia event, and CT, RI, VT, and NH in Boston (Insurance licensees only).

There are plenty of tips and tricks to maximizing your retirement benefits, and more than a few are considered “loopholes” that taxpayers have been able to use to circumvent the letter of the law in order to pay less to the government.

But as often happens when too many people make use of such shortcuts, the government may move to close three retirement loopholes that have become increasingly popular as financial advisers have learned how to exploit kinks in the law.

1. Back-door Roth IRA Conversions

Buying a home or starting a family are just a few of the major decisions that people might regard as milestones in their lives. However, a new survey found that a majority of American adults (51%) have delayed at least one important life decision in the last year due to financial reasons. This represents an increase of 20 percentage points from a similar survey conducted in 2007, when 31% of Americans reported delaying a major life event.

The Supreme Court ruled Friday that same-sex couples have the right to marry nationwide, freeing gay couples from complicated legal and financial planning.

“Their hope is not to be condemned to live in loneliness, excluded from one of civilization’s oldest institutions. They ask for equal dignity in the eyes of the law. The Constitution grants them that right,” the 5-4 Obergefell v. Hodges decision read.

In case you missed it, here is the article that I was quoted in: Rethinking the Shift-to-Bonds Strategy, by Karen Weise and Carol Hymowitz, Bloomberg Businessweek, The Investing Issue.

President Obama is calling on the Department of Labor to crack down on the fees charged by brokers and financial advisers who consulting retirement savers.