A Financial Guide to Buying Your First Home
Buying a home is one of the most exciting – and financially significant – decisions you’ll ever make. Like any…
Money and Meaning: Aligning Your Finances with What Matters Most
When it comes to money, it’s easy to focus on numbers—budgets, returns, and debt ratios. But real financial success isn’t…
Any Credit Card Success or Failure Starts With Understanding Your FICO Score.
Your credit score is an integral part of your financial picture. It stands as one of the most important metrics…
Charitable Giving in 2024 and Beyond: Key Trends and Developments
Now that we are well into the second half of the year, we can reflect on how the landscape of…
Does it still make sense to downsize in today’s market?
Traditionally, downsizing from a larger home has been a strategic move for retirees looking to simplify their lives and bolster…
How Diversification and Smart Planning Can Better Inflation-Proof Your Finances
For the past couple of years, you’d be hard-pressed to go more than a few days without seeing, hearing, or…
Medium-Term Financial Goals
The conversation surrounding financial goals typically focuses on the short and long term. Which makes sense, of course. Naturally, people…
Game Plans for Success: Building a Diversified Portfolio vs. Crafting a Winning Fantasy Football Team
In the realms of finance and sport, strategic planning and diversity play pivotal roles in achieving success. Building a diversified…
Slaying the Beast: Tips for Paying off Debt in a High-Interest-Rate Environment
Inflation has been a hot topic in finance for more than a year. The Federal Reserve has steadily increased interest…
Healthy Financial Habits and Investment Plans
How to set yourself up for success by creating an investment plan and staying the course. Creating an investment plan…
Social Security Changes (and Why That’s Great News for Retirees!)
Increases in Benefits Inflation has been a hot topic since the Fed started hiking rates last March to try and…
Medicare Changes in 2023
As we begin to say goodbye to winter and usher in spring here in Washington, DC, change is often expected,…
Charting a Course for 2023
Investors had to navigate an environment full of twists and turns in 2022. After hitting a new all-time high in…
2022 Year In Review
To say that 2022 was a challenging year for the markets would be an understatement. The stock markets saw big…
‘Tis the Season…to hold off on buying or selling a home?
Inflation. It’s a trigger word for all of us heading into this holiday season. As if the crunch before year-end…
Year-End Review: How History Provides a Path Forward
As 2022 progressed, investors and consumers were treated to a steady stream of bad news, and the markets reacted in-kind,…
Financial Wellness Check
As crazy as it may sound, we are more than halfway through 2022. Now is a great time to give…
Preparations Before Sending Your Child to College
There are many preparations that must be made when sending your child off to college. From the move-in to school…
Freedom and Financial Planning
One of the great traps of the information age is the wealth of data at our fingertips. It stands to…
Changes to FAFSA coming down the pike
The excitement and pride that stems from having a child is often the most significant aspect of one’s life, and…
Protect yourself: 10 ways to prevent identity theft
Identity theft is a growing problem in the U.S., and pandemic relief made it worse as identity thieves targeted relief…
Preventing Over-indebtedness
Before the COVID-19 pandemic, a large portion of the country was struggling with debt and many estimate that one in…
Planning for Financial Literacy
As we wave goodbye to tax season and usher in spring, our thoughts and conversations with clients begin to include…
Knowledge Is Power: The Great Wealth Transfer & Financial Education
In 1973, just shy of the 100th anniversary of his death, descendants of Cornelius (“the Commodore”) Vanderbilt gathered at Vanderbilt…
Budgeting for 2022 Life Events (Big and Small)
Creating a budget can be a challenge even in the calmest of times, so how do you begin to tackle…
Six Resolutions to Improve Your Finances in 2022
At the beginning of the year people make resolutions involving health, work, or family, but getting your financial house in…
A Form that Accommodates the Mess: Financial Planning in an Age of Uncertainty
The idea that times past were simpler isn’t new. Modern life buzzes with confusion. The pace at which things change…
Who is Alexandra Armstrong?
This is supposed to be a short essay on Alexandra Armstrong – a little recap of her climb up from…
Year End Planning for 2021
It is that time of the year again – crisp fall air and holidays approaching – which is also time…
Opportunity and Optimism Amid the Pandemic
For many, the pandemic turned the world upside down. For some, it offered an opportunity to view life from a…
Saving vs Investing
It’s a common misconception that saving and investing are one and the same. They are both key concepts to creating…
Know the Rules to Avoid 529 Distribution Mistakes
As a continuation of one of our recent blog posts on 529 accounts, we now wanted to focus in on the various…
529 Accounts: The Ins and Outs of Qualified Expenses
As you may know, 529 accounts are a great savings vehicle for many individuals to save money for education. The…
Impact of Children on Your Financial Path
When thinking about your future, there are many factors and life choices you will have to plan and save for—whether…
Financial Spring Cleaning
Are you a hoarder? Did you just put that Pepco bill away last month and see that the one all the…
To Buy or Not to Buy: Is that the Question?
We’re all quite familiar with the idea of the American Dream at this point. The house, the white picket fence,…
D.C. is a Financial Standout. Are You Making the Most of Your Career?
The politics of our hometown might get more headlines, but the economics of D.C. tell a story that’s just as…
It’s Graduation Time, and Your 529 Plan is Ready for its Grand Entrance
The education world may be in flux, but higher learning will continue to be a priority for most families –…
The Mortgage Market’s Wild Ride: What Does it Mean for You?
It’s not standard practice to feel you need to check mortgage rates on a daily basis. But just as everything…
All Of It
We lionize problem solvers. Rescue someone, and you’re their hero. Problem solvers earn accolades, headlines, and promotions. Problem solvers tend…