I was a runner before training for this race but would usually run just 3 miles a couple of times a week.  I knew if I wanted to run over 13 miles I would have to get serious about my training.  I began training in July and started off slow with just 1 and 2-mile runs.  As summer turned into fall I began to increase my distances until, towards the end of October, I was able to run 12 miles.  I followed a strict training plan and this was the last long-distance run before the race.  After running this far I was pretty confident that I would be able to complete the race since I had done all I could do and was as ready as I would ever be.

After completing this race, I thought how my training and the end result could relate to money and saving for retirement.  I started off running short distances and did not try to run the entire 13 miles that first week.  The same is true of retirement and saving money.  Most of us cannot set aside one million dollars for us to have when we stop working; however, most of us can start investing a smaller amount each month and then add to this as we get raises.  These small steps will help us grow a nest egg into a sizable amount.

I also thought about the discipline it took to train for this race.  Saturday mornings were my long run days and, towards the end, I was getting up early to run over 8 miles.  Let me tell you, there were many Saturdays that running that long was the LAST thing I wanted to do.  My bed felt so good and I could come up with a lot of reasons why I should stay in it rather than get up to run.  I knew if I did this I would pay the price later and would not be able to accomplish my goal.  The same is true when it comes to saving money – discipline is very important.  There are plenty of things I could buy instead of using this money to invest for my Golden Years.  I see things I want all the time that are much more exciting than my Roth IRA but I know if I don’t invest for my future I will not be able to live the life I want to when I am older.  A little bit of sacrifice right now will pay off big dividends in the future.

I also realized the hardest step to take in my training was that first step.  Once I got the momentum going the miles went by pretty fast.  If you are struggling to come up with a savings plan, that first step is often the most difficult to take too. Once you get the ball rolling you will see that, as time goes by, it won’t seem that hard and, before you realize it, you will have completed that half-marathon in your financial life.

When my mother found herself at the age of 50 with medical bills and debt in the tens of thousands, she knew she had to make radical changes.

At the age of 50 she had never asked herself the question, “What is investing?”… but that was about to change. She made a plan, went to work on it, learned how to pay off debt, and learned to save and invest.

A recent visit to see her inspired me to think about people who begin to save later rather than earlier. What an inspiration! She’s living debt free and has built a very nice nest egg for her retirement (and she only began 15 years ago). She shared her story of how she did it with me and it sent me on a quest for more ideas about beginning to save after 30, 40, or 50.

Wall Street subway station © by epicharmus

So, I went to my money manager and friend Ragiem for a casual conversation on saving money and investing. This conversation gave many insights worth sharing.

What is Investing?

Jennifer: I’m doing an article on saving after the age of 30, 40, and 50…

Ragiem (interrupting): Saving is a general term that’s come up out of common language. The technical term would be creating a surplus. A surplus is created when you make a $100, you spend $90 and you have a $10 left over. That $10 is what people refer to as savings, but the technical term is “surplus”.

Jennifer: OK, but how is creating a surplus different at different ages?

Ragiem: Creating a surplus is no different for a 30-year-old, 40-year-old, 70-year-old, or 10-year-old. If you’re 10 years old and you get $5 in allowance and you spend it all on bubble gum and candy, you’re in the same position as the person who makes a million dollars a year and spends it all on car payments, house payments, jewelry, parties, etc. It’s really no different than bubble gum and candy.

Jennifer: Hopefully, by 70 you’re not spending everything you make … you’ve been investing ….

Ragiem: Yes. What you do with that surplus after it is created is called “investing”. With a surplus, you must decide what to do with it. Do you put it in a savings account at .002 interest; do you invest in bonds or stocks; do you hire a financial advisor?

A surplus saved or invested is eventually going to replace the income we just reference. So, eventually you’ll be pulling out of your savings to cover your expenses.

You cannot create a surplus if you have deficit. A deficit occurs when you have an income of $100, spend $110, and must borrow $10 to cover your expenses. Generally the borrowed money happens with credit cards. One must invest first in eliminating deficits!

Jennifer: Ok, you’ve answered the question, “What is investing”. But where do you start? At what point do you hire a financial advisor?

Ragiem: The better question might be, “When might a financial advisor be willing to take you on?” I would say many advisors would want $100,000 before they could take you seriously enough to spend any time on your account.

You’re probably better off initially educating yourself on the basics of investing. Stick to what might be a balanced fund of both stocks and bonds and stick to low cost providers (for example: Vanguard and their balanced fund: VBINX).

You can purchase funds directly through providers like Vanguard or through a financial advisor or through e-trade, etc. Buying directly from the fund provider will involve the least cost.

Jennifer: What about your 401K, can you purchase balanced funds in this way?

Ragiem: A 401K usually offers a suite of 10 funds for you to make up your own balanced fund allocation. So, in your 401 you can buy a global stock fund for 60% of your money and a global bond fund for 40% of your money and recreate something that looks like our example of the Vanguard balanced fund. Rebalancing these funds on your own takes work.

Jennifer: What if I’m 30 years old, and I’ve never saved before, what’s your advice?

Ragiem: Start.

Jennifer: OK, but how is that different from saving and investing when you’re 50? What choices are different?

Ragiem: Theoretically your investment allocations are based on when you decide you may need the funds. The longer you can withstand volatility (or market movement), the better chance you have of growing your investment.

For instance, if you buy a stock and you need the money in 5 days, that stock has to be up in price in 5 days. That’s a pretty tough assumption to make. Whereas if you buy a stock and hold it for 5 years, you have a better chance of making a return on your money.

Almost all investments have to do with your allocation between stocks and bonds. Historically bonds are less risky assets. Although I have to throw a caveat in there, because a lot of investing has to do with valuation at the time when you invest. We could be at a historical high in bond prices (so you have to do your research on this).

There’s an old general “rule” that you subtract your age from 100 and that’s the percentage of stocks you should own in your portfolio. So if you’re 30 you’d own 70% of your portfolio in stocks and 30 in bonds. (As your age increases your risk tolerance generally decreases, so you’d own less stocks and more bonds).

It’s a rule of thumb, but it’s not exact, of course and this is where a financial advisor can be of great benefit. If you’re 50, 50% stocks may be a good allocation or may not be the optimal allocation. However, it’s better than no plan at all and putting 100% of your surplus into stocks. If you look at historical portfolios, you’ll see that a portfolio made up of 80% stocks and 20% bonds out performs a portfolio of 100% stocks over time. However, historically stocks are more volatile, so a balance must be made, depending on how much time you have to see a return on your money.

Jennifer: How do you best educate yourself on investing so that you can begin to invest at any age?

Ragiem: The internet is a great source.

Jennifer: Who do you trust?

Ragiem: I would say your reputable, low cost providers are usually good websites. (Providers like Fidelity, Vangaurd, etc). Let me be clear, I’m referring to trusting their research and white papers on how to invest. Whether an investor trusts their products is up to the individual investor.

Jennifer: What the minimum amount you need in surplus to start investing in “low cost” fund?

Ragiem: Some mutual funds allow you to start with an initial investment of $100, with a monthly investment of as little as $50… depends on the fund. Each mutual funds website will give information on the minimum investment required.

Now that we’ve got a handle on the question, “What is investing?” it’s important to remember that investing in paying off debt is the first place to start!

So, back to my inspiration, my mother. How did she start saving and investing at the age of 50? Read her story of getting out of debt and saving after the age of 50.

The long term used to mean 5 or 10-year periods for stock investors looking to take some of the risk out of investing. Then came the 2000s, dubbed the Lost Decade, when the U.S. stock market posted negative returns in a decade for the first time since the 1930s.  This has caused some economists to re-think how long investors should keep their money in stocks.  Performance statistics going back 60 years suggest that holding stocks for 20 years may be what it takes to ride out the market’s ups and downs.

Historical data compiled by OppenheimerFunds show that stocks have not suffered an average annualized loss in a 20-year holding period (measured in rolling monthly periods) since 1950. That’s not the case for buy-and-hold periods lasting 10 years or less.  “Historical evidence suggests that longer investment horizons typically produce better results,” says Oppenheimer’s chief investment strategist Brian Belski.

Belski’s data show that while average annual returns since 1950 are quite similar regardless of how long you hold your stocks, the range of returns differs markedly. Short-term holding periods are far more volatile.  In contrast, returns are smoothed out over longer periods.  The biggest annual gain with a one-year holding period is 53.4%.  The worst is a decrease of 44.8%.

Many investors try to time the market and move money in and out based on fear.  These investors can miss out on a lot of money.  If you missed out on the 10 best days between 1980 and 2010, your average annual return would have dropped to 5.7 percent from 8.2 percent, according to Oppenheimer’s report.  We can use the most recent financial crisis to show why investing for the long-haul is so important.  During the bear market of 2007-09, the stock market dropped almost 57%.  Despite this huge drop, a recent study by the Employee Benefit Research Institute found some 91 percent of 401(k) investors who had account balances during the 2007-09 bear market now have more money in their accounts than they did at the market peak in October 2007.  Since its low point in 2009, the stock market has almost doubled in value.

When the stock market drops, many investors pull their money out and place it in bonds.  This is causing them to lose money.  A Vanguard study has found that stocks have outperformed bonds nearly 100% of the time over 20-year periods since 1871.

The reason I am pointing this out is because so many of us adjust our investment strategy based on fear.  We watch the national morning shows and hear this negative news.  This causes us to pull money out of the stock market and, thus, minimize the amount we will have for retirement.  If you do invest in stocks and mutual funds, some years will be great whereas others will be terrible.  Just remember you are in this for the long-haul.  We are not trying to time the market and do not need this money next year.  Keeping your eye on the bigger picture will help you get through the rough patches your retirement accounts will face.

The peer-to-peer lending method is structured similar to a traditional loan in terms of how the borrower uses the funds. However, the borrower must prove his ability to repay the debt and convince lenders to lend. Here is a closer look at how the process works.

• A lender decides how much money he wishes to lend out to anyone in need. He joins a website that focuses on peer lending. The lender wants to turn a profit through interest.
• The borrower needs to borrow money for any reason and turns to the same peer lending website to help him connect with lenders. The borrower needs to convince lenders at the site that he is a good risk to take.
• 
  The borrower creates an ad or a profile that allows him to provide details about the reasons for borrowing the money. He documents all of his needs for the money and why he is a good risk. The borrower decides what interest rate he is willing to pay and displays this on his ad, too.
• The website does the legwork of pulling credit reports on the borrower and determining the amount of risk the borrower is, with the approval of the borrower. Private information, such as addresses and Social Security numbers (as well as specific data on credit reports) remains hidden, but lenders get to see basic information about the borrower’s credit history.
• Lenders bid on the borrower’s ad, placing as much money as they would like on that ad. If enough lenders lend, the borrower secures the loan and the funds transfer to the borrower to use. He then begins to make payments within a month’s time.
• The lending website handles the collection of the payments and funnels the money back to the lenders who bid on the offer, including any interest paid.

This type of scenario can be a good option for many people. Some lenders, or investors, are willing to take on higher levels of risk and therefore will loan to those who have a lower credit score. However, some are not and it can be hard to get a loan if you cannot prove your worth. Also, from the lender’s point of view, there is a lot of risk taken on and it is possible you could lose your money. However, for many, it is an opportunity to make some profit and to help those in need. Peer lending can be an ideal way to skip the banks and turn the profit over to real people.

This is a guest post from George Gallagher who is a personal finance and education blogger.  He is currently helping students in California find California student loans.

44% of those polled are not confident that they’ll have enough money to live comfortably in retirement.  More than half (57%) say they lost money during the recent economic downturn and many who were affected (42%) say that’s why they’re delaying their retirement.  Economic anxiety has certainly taken its toll on us. With the dwindling number of pensions and the lack of savings, many are solely dependent on the government to support them in their Golden Years.  This shows in the ways these boomers feel about their retirement will be.  55% have at least some confidence that they will have the financial resources to live comfortably during  retirement but only 11% are deeply confident that they are financially prepared.

The baby boomers retirement poll shows that married boomers (61%) feel more ready for retirement than their unmarried counterparts (46%). Among households with incomes below $50,000, just a third (35%) express feeling financially ready for retirement, compared with more than two-thirds (66%) of those in higher income households. Those polled who give themselves poor grades when it comes to personal money management skills are simply extremely worried.  Nearly half (47%) say that they have no confidence at all that they’ll be able to pay for retirement.  This poll shows the median retirement savings stand at $40,000.  This figure is hugely impacted by those who have nothing saved for retirement – nearly 25% of those polled.  Among those who have saved something, the median savings is $100,000.  This poll goes on to show that 65% say Social Security (which was created to supplement and not to be the main source of one’s retirement income) is “extremely” or “very important” when asked to rate the relative importance of different sources of income in retirement.  Among those that will be able to retire, many (67%) plan to work for pay once they have retired and more than one-third (35%) said they will do so in order to make ends meet.

This Baby Boomers retirement poll shows why it is so important to have a plan.  I know many of these boomers were affected by the stock market crash but much of that money has been recovered with the recent upturn in stocks.  Many people go along in life without having a plan.  If I were going to take a road trip to California, I would first look at a map to make sure I was going in the correct direction – with my sense of direction I might end up in South America if I did not plan this out.  Why don’t people do this with their money and life goals?  If you have no destination in mind guess where you will end up – nowhere!  The same holds true with money.  If you do not have a goal in mind you will end up with nothing.

Many feel that retirement is far away and will worry about it when it comes.  I am only 35 so 65 seems a long ways away to me but I know it will be here before too long.  I have been proactive in planning for this time because I have certain things I want to do once I am no longer working.  I do not want to be forced to live my Golden Years according to how much the government can pay me – I want to have the freedom to do what I choose.  I hope this Baby Boomers retirement poll/study shows others why it is so important to take an active role in in preparing for the future and getting ready for retirement.

Are you ready for retirement?

Photo Credit: dtraleigh

I have heard people voice jealousy over someone else’s “beach” body.  They look at them and say it must be nice for them to have good genes or how lucky they are to be “blessed” with such a nice body.  They do not take into account how hard this person worked over the cold, dark winter to get into shape and look good in a bathing suit.  My wife, for instance, is out the door running at 5:30 am, 4 days a week.  She did this even if it was 20 degrees outside.  Because of this devotion, she will look much healthier this summer than she has in the past.

I have heard other “unfortunate” people say the same things about others once they near retirement.  They see peers that are able to stop working and live the life they want to because they planned ahead and sacrificed for their futures.  Those people who do not take control of their lives blame others and make excuses why they are not in a similar situation.  We hear things such as, “The evil rich are so lucky and we should take more money from them to pay for others not as lucky as them.”  Some do not take into account that these “evil rich” people were just like them during their working years with one exception – they delayed their satisfaction and planned for their futures.  One does not have to invest a large amount of money to retire with a decent nest egg.   If you are 25 years old and invest only $200 a month, you will have $1.2 million when you hit 65 (this assumes your stocks average 10% growth each year which is the historical average rate of growth).  If you waited until you were 35 to begin investing this amount, you would still retire with a nest egg over $450,000.

It is so easy to find reasons why we cannot do something.  I don’t always like jogging every other day but I know it pays off with the benefits I get from it – more energy, better immune system, etc.  I also could use the money we invest each month for our retirement but know that it is important to use it for delayed gratification so Tracy and I are not dependent on others to take care of us later in life.   Like the Nike saying goes – Just Do It!

Photo credit: orb9220

So, what is the best way to determine how much you’re going to need to save for retirement?  Let me start by saying I’m not a financial professional, or a retirement planner.  I don’t claim to know all the aspects of retirement planning, but I think this post will give you some important points to consider for your situation.

With retirement savings not being my primary goal right now, I did a little bit of research to find out what types of resources are available to tell me how much I need to save when the time is right.  Almost instantly, I found an interesting post from J.D. Roth at Get Rich Slowly exploring this topic further.  J.D. identifies a common dilemma in retirement planning.

The problem is that nobody seems to agree on what assumptions to make when planning for retirement. How much should you assume for inflation? For investment returns? For rising health-care costs? How long should you expect to live?

Is there really not a good way to determine how much you need to save for retirement and are we better off just maxing out savings as much as we can today?  Perhaps focusing on the amount to contribute is the wrong approach.

Focus On How Much You’re Going To Spend

Rather than focus on how much to save, J.D. leans towards finding out how much you’re going to spend and says:

If you can live a lifestyle that is comfortable but not extravagant, you will effectively decrease the amount you need to save for retirement.

This approach makes a lot of sense to me.  It seems a logical approach to planning for the retirement years is to do the following:

1. Consider what you’ll be doing and the associated lifestyle.
2. Adjust your lifestyle as much as possible today to align or to eventually transition into your lifestyle at retirement
3. Build your savings goals, investment strategy based on that chosen lifestyle.

Of course, there is still the dilemma of estimating all of those other items such as inflation, returns, etc., but I suppose that’s probably best to leave that up to investment calculators and financial advisors of your choice.

So, if my focus is on what I’ll be doing and how I’ll be spending (and not blindly saving hoping for the best lifestyle possible), I think I can make some fairly accurate assumptions.

Retirement – A New Idea?

According to an MSN article retirement is a fairly new idea:

The whole concept of retirement is fairly recent, an experiment that began with the creation of Social Security in 1935, observes Ken Dychtwald, a gerontologist and authority on aging in the U.S.

Scripture doesn’t mention such a thing either.  Larry Burkett references Numbers 8:24-26.  He tells us the following:

As long as one is physically and mentally capable there is no scriptural basis for a person to retire and become unproductive.

Personally, I don’t consider my future retirement years as workless.  What about you? Rather, I hope to position myself to achieve true financial freedom.  To me, this means I’ll be able to give more of my time and resources to help others.  And you probably would guess that’s helping people in the area of personal finance.

My friend John Gay, who is a financial planner and advisor, guest posted at One Money Design during last year’s retirement week.  His advice:

If retirement is like landing a plane, what is the best retirement plan?  Don’t land the plane (just let it run out of gas).

How Much Do I Need To Save?

Considering my plane isn’t going to land (I know what I want to do in retirement) and I can probably do some estimating around this lifestyle, I can then get back to the original question of how much I need to save.

So, how should you go about answering that question and identifying the savings amount?

1.  Regardless of where you are with emergency savings and debt reduction you should save up to the minimum amount required to receive a company match on 401k contributions.

2.  Next, there are a number of retirement calculators on the internet provided by trusted websites.  I think this is a good place to start.  I think this one from MSN Money is a pretty good retirement calculator.

2a. Visit with a financial advisor to discuss your lifestyle at retirement and seek some planning advice.

3.  And finally, when it’s the right point on my financial journey (debt paid off and emergency savings funded); I’ll increase my contributions as much as possible to provide for my future lifestyle.

Final Thoughts

In closing, I’ve decided not to join the panic about retirement savings.  While I think everyone should save and invest for the future, I don’t think it should replace important goals such as getting out of debt and building emergency savings.  The only time there is an exception to this rule is when a company provides a match to your contributions.  Invest to get the match if you can still make forward progress on debt or emergency savings goals.

When I reach the point of extending my contributions, I’ll consider my lifestyle and save accordingly.  But beyond all of the calculating and planning, I’ll trust God to provide for my needs and put me where he wants to me to serve Him.

What’s your take?  How do you plan to make sure you’re saving enough for retirement?

This post was originally posted at BibleMoneyMatters.com.

Even though we had advance warning, many people did not start making preparations until Sunday morning – less than twenty-four hours before the weather turned bad. The stores were jam-packed with people buying water, batteries, firewood and milk. I started thinking, “Why do we wait until the last possible second to prepare?” We do this not only with weather but also with our finances.

How many people wait until there is an emergency until they realize they need an emergency fund? How many people wait until they hit 55 before thinking about how much money they need for retirement?  Early retirement planning is a second thought in society today!

Here are a couple of sobering statistics to show how ill-prepared many of us are:

• According to The Wall Street Journal, nearly 70% of consumers live paycheck-to-paycheck.
• According to USA Today, due to a lack of savings, 60% of the 77 million baby boomers will not have the means to support their current standard of living when they reach retirement.
• According to a 2008 survey by the National Foundation for Credit Counseling, roughly 76 million adults say they do not have any non-retirement savings. Of those who do have a cash fund, 61% don’t have enough to cover 3 months of income.
• 28% of Americans spent more time watching reality tv last month than they spent planning and preparing for retirement over the past 10 years.

Pretty surprising, huh? The sad thing is I was not too shocked by these. I still see people who were living paycheck-to-paycheck only 6 months ago revert back to their old ways once they started making money again.

If you live in an area where it gets cold, it will probably snow at some point and you need to be prepared. If you live in a house long enough it will probably need some repairs. If you live to be 65 (most of us plan to), you will need money to pay for your expenses.

Start preparing now so your life does not come to a stand-still when that storm comes.

Photo by Kevin Burkett.

My husband and I are both state employees and are vested in a state-sponsored retirement program (which is well-run at this time in our state).  We have about 18 years until we would like to retire.  Our monthly retirement works out to be about 50% of our top 5 years.  Our home mortgage has another 24 years left on it.  I contribute to a 403b (not as much as I should), and he has a Roth IRA (which he has not contributed to regularly).

My husband and I have been blessed to be able to continually pay all of our bills, and the Lord has provided for us in times of need repeatedly.  I am not sure why He does this because we have been terrible stewards of His money in that we splurge on restaurants and fun activities (now we have limited these activities greatly and budget for them).  We now are making a conscious effort to better handle His provisions.  My husband and I agree in debt-snowballing our credit card debt and we should be credit-card free in 3 years.  Once we have attained that goal, we can increase our contributions even more to the church. 

However, after that point, my husband and I are in a quandry. 

Should we contribute to our retirement accounts to the maximum allowed and then contribute the left-over from what has been put to our credit cards to the mortgage? 

Should we contribute much more to our mortgage and contribute a moderate amount to our retirement accounts? 

He would like to have the maximum amount that we can in cash at retirement (who wouldn’t).  I would like to have no house payment by the time we retire.  I don’t want to be house rich and cash poor, but I also don’t want to have a mortgage.  Any suggestions?

Thank you so much for reading this.  I have searched the internet everywhere, but no one mentions being state employees within a state retirement system in their questions for retirement planning vs. mortgage pay off.

Here are my thoughts:

I’ve struggled in the past with trying to try to find the right priority for my financial goals.  It’s often easy to try to juggle multiple goals at once, but it leads to little progress.  Such questions are often difficult to answer as there are a world of emotions involved and everyone has a different situation. 

But for such situations, I often turn to the Crown Money Map to help guide my way.  Why?  First, it’s based on Biblical principles and God’s truth.  Second, it’s proven based on year’s of experience from Howard Dayton and Chuck Bentley from Crown Financial Ministries.  So, I love the Money Map as my advisor in such situations.

If we look at the Money Map, we can see that the recommendation is to begin retirement saving before paying off the home mortgage (step 4).  By the way, Dave Ramsey suggests the same if you look at his Baby Steps.  Why would you want to do this?  Well, you can spend a lot of time paying off the mortgage and end up with nothing left for retirement.  Yes, being a Godly steward of your resources involves following God’s principles of getting and staying out of debt, but it also involves preparing for the future.

Obviously, this is a motivated reader who is trying to do the right thing.  I have not doubt such energy and effort to be a good financial steward will one day lead them to paying off their mortgage too.  I would max out those retirement contributions if I were debt free and then work on paying off the mortgage as I have the extra money.

Still…one final thought…make sure you have adequate emergency savings before fulling allocating all your extra money to retirement investing.  Not having money set aside for emergencies will set you up for more credit card debt in the future.

To learn more about the Crown Money Map, check out the following series:  Dave Ramsey Baby Steps and Crown Money Map Series.

Readers, what would you do in this situation once the credit card debt has been paid off and giving increased?

You’ll have greater flexibility in retirement years.  

Apparently, traditional IRA owners are required to take distributions whereas you don’t have to take them with a Roth.  So, if you’re still working hard into your 80′s you can just leave that Roth alone and keep growing it. 

You can convert your 401k balance to a Roth. 

You can shift part or all of your balance to a Roth in the same plan.  Why would you want to do this?  Keep in mind you have to pay the taxes since a Roth is an after-tax investment account.  In 2010 only, you can include part of the income in 2011 and part in 2012.  Time is running out if you want to make this move!

It’s a tax sheltered asset. 

As I mentioned above, you pay taxes on your income and then contribute to your Roth.    Your asset has the abilty to grow tax free at that point and when you withdrawal the money for retirement you won’t owe any taxes on it.

How do you know if a Roth IRA or Traditional IRA is right for you?

According to YahooFinance, you should compare your current tax rate to what you think it will be in the future when you retire.  If you’re expecting to be in a higher tax bracket at retirement the Roth is definitely a good move.   Keep in mind,income from a traditional IRA and 401k is taxed when you withdraw it.

I’ve always assumed taxes will continue to climb and that it’s entirely possible we’ll all be in a higher tax bracket someday.  No one knows for sure about the taxes, but regardless, the Roth IRA is a great choice for retirement investing today.

What do you think about the Roth IRA?  Can you think of any other advantages?