July 2019 newsletter

When we plan for life after retirement, we can often tend to focus on saving for a comfortable standard of living and travel. It can be difficult to factor in anything other than a happy and healthy journey as we get older, even if we know the reality can be very different.

What do you do if you’re working in the gig economy and want to build up a super nest egg?

Gone are the days when ethical investing existed on the periphery of investment management and the debate centred around whether or not environmental, social and governance (ESG) focussed funds could actually perform as well as mainstream funds.

A recent court case, known as the Narumon case, demonstrates how important it is for self-managed super fund (SMSF) trustees to ensure their documentation is up-to-date, and that binding death benefit nominations are valid.

An easy way to determine if you believe your super fund is good value, is to assess the cost of your super fund against the average costs for the different types of super funds available.

Discover the top 10 performing Growth super funds over 1 year and 10 years to 30 June 2021. Growth funds have 61-80% invested in growth assets.

In this article we report median super fund performance for 1, 3, 5, 7, 10 and 15 years, up to 30 June 2021 and across five different investment options.

Financial barriers to retirement have eased a little since July 1, with increased super contributions caps, but retirees will have to wait for a relaxation of the work test.

While the exact number is hard to pin down, various industry estimates put the total number of Australian retirees who are now living overseas at around 90,000, a figure which has risen steadily in recent years.

The Federal Government has finally bowed to pressure to cut pension deeming rates but stopped short of passing on the full cut in official interest rates.

As official interest rates drop to a record low of 1%, Age Pensioners who depend on income from cash investments face a double whammy. Not only do they receive less income from their bank deposits as interest rates fall, but they also risk losing some pension because they are deemed to earn more than they do.

Under the deeming rules, you are ‘deemed’ to earn a certain annual rate of return on your financial assets, regardless of the rate of return you actually earn.

The tax on your super death benefit can be tricky to understand, but it’s important to know what’s what so your beneficiaries don’t end up paying too much tax.

Having your super pension automatically revert to your spouse can be an easy way to ensure your spouse’s financial situation is taken care after your death.

When it comes to your super benefits, tax is always at the heart of it, whether it’s when you make a contribution, or when you take your money out at the other end.