Welcome to RRSP Season!

It is that time of year again when attention turns to RRSPs and tax planning. 

The purpose for making an RRSP contribution, from a financial planning perspective, is to build savings and assets over time so that you can replace earned employment income with passive or investment income for your retirement years. In other words, you can sleep in and still have the lifestyle you want without going to work!

The Canadian Government assists you with that objective. It does this by giving you a tax deduction for contributions so that you can save more money on a pre-tax basis than you would if the money was taxed and then saved. Secondly, it allows for the tax-free growth (tax deferral) on your RRSP so that the capital amount will be much greater than it would be if you were taxed annually on the growth or income.

Most people focus on the tax deduction only while ignoring the significant benefits of the compounding effects and growth on the money that is not paid out as taxes. The theory is that you are contributing money while in a higher income tax bracket during your working years and withdrawing it in your retirement years while you are in a lower tax bracket. The reality is higher income earners may find themselves in the same tax bracket in retirement!

This leads many people, including some accountants, to challenge the effectiveness of RRSP by saying: Why bother with an RRSP if you have to pay taxes on the withdrawal!? This viewpoint ignores the real power of tax-deferred compounded growth and the effects of compound growth that you can achieve in an RRSP, especially on the capital that would have otherwise been lost to income taxes.

The math works something like this. If you took the assumed future capital value of your RRSP at age 65 or 70 and then collapsed the RRSP (not recommended) and paid 50% of the capital as income taxes, the remaining capital would still be higher than if you had been building your savings outside the RRSP in a fully taxable environment.

Impossible you say! Take a calculator while watching TV and invest, say $10,000 a year, minus your annual income taxes, say 30%, then invest the balance of $7,000 at an assumed rate of growth, pick 5% to keep it simple, then subtract the taxes on the earned income $105. The net amount at the end of Year One is $7,245. Then do this another 39 times assuming the person is age 25.

Year One Effects of RRSP Investing

Compare this with the RRSP with $10,500 at the end of Year One. The gap only gets bigger over time!

Long Term RRSP Accumulation

There are situations where RRSP contributions may not be the right thing for some people some of the time. For example, young people at the start of their careers or low-income earners nearing retirement. A TFSA may be the better solution!

These are just two alternatives for building savings and assets something which you would still need to do even if RRSPs didn't exist. RRSPs just make it easier to build savings. Call us today to discuss more savings and tax planning strategies!

A Trusted Regina Legal Professional shares information about AMENDMENTS TO THE HEALTH INFORMATION PROTECTION ACT

The Health Information Protection Act (HIPA) was enacted in Saskatchewan in 2003 to govern and regulate the collection, use, and disclosure of personal health information. This legislation places duties and responsibilities on organizations and individuals in the health care system to ensure proper collection, use and safekeeping of personal health information.

You may not have known but some amendments to HIPA came into force on June 1, 2016. The amendments seem to be aimed at increasing the protection and safekeeping of personal health records and increasing accountability of trustees and their employees in handling those records. The amendments include the following:

• If personal health records are found unsecured, the trustee responsible for the records will be found strictly liable for the offence unless he/she can established that he/she took all reasonable steps to prevent the infraction.
• An employee of a trustee can be held liable for intentionally using, accessing, or disclosing personal health information without authorization. These provisions seem to be targeted at individuals “snooping” into the personal health information of others.
• A new provision implements a system to quickly respond to the discovery of abandoned or unsecured records and to take control of the records.

The Government of Saskatchewan has further advised that new privacy legislation, including The Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Amendment Act, 2016 and The Local Authority Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Amendment Act, 2016, is currently being introduced and is expected to come into force in 2017.

A lawyer should be consulted to determine the legal implications of provincial and federal privacy legislation on your privacy and access interests.

This post is for information purposes only and should not be taken as legal opinions on any specific facts or circumstances. Counsel should be consulted concerning your own situation and any specific legal questions you may have.

Refinancing...is it for you?

Canadians today face many reasons to refinance their mortgage. For example, you may have been working at improving your credit score and now qualify for a new mortgage with a better discount, or you may want to stabilize your payments by changing from a variable rate mortgage to a fixed-rate. Refinancing is also a good option to pull out equity for consolidating debt, home improvements, investments, college expenses, and more.

Refinancing isn't necessarily a bad thing or term

There are many things that play a role in whether or not refinancing is a good move.  The first thing is to determine what your overall goal is by refinancing.  It can answer many questions for you including providing you with these benefits.  Why do you want to refinance?

• Getting a rate that reduces your monthly payment while being low enough to offset the costs of refinancing is one common reason to refinance
• Paying down higher interest debts like credit cards or loans or lines of credit .
• Having your monthly payment reduce to help you pay off your mortgage quicker as your not incurring more debt but able to now focus on just paying the mortgage off
• Buying a rental property or 2nd home(cottage).
• Increase your quality of life now, maybe buying a boat or trailer for those family outings.
• Doing some investments and get a higher rate of return on your investments and borrowing the money at a lower rate for the mortgage.
• consolidate their high-interest debt to reduce their overall interest rate and free up hundreds of dollars in cash flow every month.
• Doing some much-needed renovations to your home using the existing equity to increase the value of your home it's a win-win.

Here is something most people don't know when considering when doing a refinance all costs can be included in the mortgage including lawyer fees and penalties. 

When done correctly, a refinance can save families money on long-term interest.

If you are curious to know how much can save if you refinance your mortgage this calculator will help you find out!. 

Finding the shortest and safest route to any of your dreams requires planning and only with a carefully thought out financial plan can you be sure to make the most of your resources and to protect against risks along the way.  At Worby Wealth Management, Chris will do his best to help you achieve those dreams with a plan that is tailored to your specific needs and based on your individual situation.

Expert Financial Advice Regarding Household Finances.

The truth is that financial management is boring. I mean, it sounds interesting when you watch movies and they’re yelling, “Buy, Buy! Sell, sell!” But this behaviour does not make you rich – in fact, it can have the opposite effect.

Smart people understand one thing – tactics do not win the battle, logistics do. And one of my best pieces of advice is the 25% rule.

It essentially breaks down like this: If you want to attain financial security contribute 25% of your net monthly income towards your net worth. It is very important that financial security has very little to do with being ‘rich’ but everything to do with having the resources available to have options throughout your life.

Net worth is composed of two things: Assets and Liabilities. I think of liabilities as the hole requiring filling and think of the assets, as the mountain you build with your resources.

A few notes about each. Paying down credit cards does not fit into the asset/liability described above. Credit cards are consumption. If you have already made errors and are carrying balances, then you need a plan to pay them down and it can be worked into a liability repayment plan. However, further credit card debt becomes consumption rather than a liability.

Big expenses – trips, renovations, etc. should be paid for with funds that have been saved in advance; they should not be financed. The reasons are many. First, once you start down the ‘financing fun’ road, it can be hard to maintain discipline. Second, a trip paid for and fully funded is less stressful. Third, something you pay for as you go tends to be better planned out and fits your budget – and studies show that planning your spending is almost as fun as the actual spending.

Building assets is then the ‘exciting’ part, right? “Buy, buy, sell, sell” and all that. Actually, it is very hard to get rich quickly and fairly easy to get rich slowly. Using pension plans and RRSP, TFSAs and RESPs to accomplish your family’s plans can be done well over time but the ‘get rich quick' schemes rarely work out.

Find a strategy you are comfortable with and run it as a discipline. If you are going to buy and hold, never deviate. If you are going to move with certain market cycles like a momentum system, or act as a value manager, do this and never change it. Make sure you do your homework upfront to get a working system and then never change. Mistakes in investing come from emotion.

But none of that happens without a strategy – and the spending strategy that works best is using 25% of your net, monthly income to build your net worth. Not only do you have funds available to build assets and pay down liabilities but you also create a buffer in case something bad happens. You aren’t living at capacity with your finances, you have options.

And that is financial security.

Some of the services that Worby Wealth Management can help you with: 

• Insurance Advice
• Investments
• Wealth Management Services
• Pay Less Tax With Tax Planning 
• Become Mortgage-Free Faster With Financial Education 
• Estate Planning 
• Retirement Planning 

TRUSTED REGINA FINANCIAL ADVISOR Chris Worby from Worby Wealth Management helps you live your dream!