The financial news that actually matters
A new executive order is set to reshape what can sit inside a workplace retirement account. Signed in August 2025, the directive aims to open 401(k) plans to so-called alternative assets, including private equity, real estate funds, and cryptocurrency, categories that have long been walled off from ordinary retirement savers and reserved mostly for pensions…
A little-noticed change in how food-stamp benefits are calculated is quietly shrinking the monthly help that many households receive, and the way it is written creates a sharp dividing line based on age and disability. The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program long gave households an automatic utility credit when they received even a small amount of…
A change in how Social Security recovers money it believes it paid by mistake is now hitting retirees where it hurts most: the monthly deposit. For overpayment notices dated on or after April 25, 2025, the agency’s default is to withhold up to half of a person’s Title II benefit each month until the balance…
For many older homeowners, the house is the single most valuable thing they will leave behind, and the last thing they want is for it to get stuck in probate court while heirs wait and legal bills mount. A transfer-on-death deed offers a simple way to hand the property directly to the next generation the…
Turning 65 comes with a tax benefit that requires no receipts, no schedules, and no shoebox of paperwork. The standard deduction — the flat amount every taxpayer can subtract from income before tax is calculated — gets bigger for people 65 and older. The extra amount is automatic for those who take the standard deduction,…
Families who rely on Medicaid to cover a nursing-home stay often assume the program is a grant, not a loan. For long-term care, that assumption can be wrong. Federal law requires states to seek repayment from the estates of people who received certain Medicaid benefits later in life, and the largest asset on the table…
A house bought decades ago for a modest sum can be worth many times that today, and for a retiree ready to downsize, that gain looks like a tax bill waiting to happen. In most cases it is not. A long-standing rule lets a homeowner erase a large chunk of the profit from a home…
An annuity is sold as a promise of steady income, and for many retirees it delivers exactly that. The trouble starts when life changes and the money is needed sooner than the contract expects. Pulling cash out of an annuity in its early years can trigger a surrender charge that swallows a slice of the…
Plenty of people claim Social Security at retirement, then return to work a year or two later because they miss the paycheck or the purpose. What many do not realize is that the decision to claim is not necessarily locked in. A retiree who is back to earning can hit pause on the benefit and…
A parent hoping to leave something to the children sometimes starts giving money away in later years, thinking generosity now beats taxes later. If nursing-home care enters the picture, that instinct can backfire. When someone applies for Medicaid to pay for long-term care, the program looks back over the previous five years for gifts and…