Plenty of our clients cross the George Washington Bridge into Manhattan every morning. Our office is a few blocks away, in Linwood Plaza. We're financial advisors in Fort Lee, NJ, a town with large Korean and Chinese communities. Many of the families we work with are first-generation, parents who want to leave their children an inheritance. Several of us are multilingual. You can review your finances in Korean or Mandarin.
Family protection comes first
Young families usually need protection before they think about growth. One lost paycheck shouldn't put your mortgage at risk.
Most families start with life insurance in Fort Lee, NJ. A term policy costs little and covers the years when the children are young and the loan balance is high. Aim for 10-12 times your annual pay. The goal is to clear the mortgage and replace your income while the children are still at home. Coverage through your job usually ends the day you leave. It rarely exceeds a year or two of salary, so most people add an individual policy and keep it wherever they go.
Permanent policies address later needs, and estate planning is the common one. So is providing for a child with a disability who will need support for life.
Disability income insurance is the coverage people skip. It replaces your paycheck if illness or injury stops you from working. Pay the premiums yourself, in after-tax dollars, and the benefit will be tax-free. Set it near 60% of your income and the monthly check will roughly equal your take-home pay.
Commuters have an extra step across two states. If you work in New York and live in Fort Lee, you'll file in both states and claim a credit so the same wages aren't taxed twice. Get the withholding right and you'll avoid a surprise bill in April.
Saving for college with a 529 plan
New Jersey rarely offers tax breaks. College savings is one of the exceptions. Open an NJBEST 529 account and several state benefits apply:
- Deduct up to $10,000 a year from your state income tax if your household earns $200,000 or less.
- Claim a one-time matching grant worth up to $750 if you earn $75,000 or less.
- Roll up to $35,000 of unused funds into the beneficiary's Roth IRA.
- K-12 tuition and test-prep now count as qualified withdrawals.
On a full $10,000 contribution, a household in New Jersey's 6.37% bracket keeps about $637 that would otherwise go to the state. Account ownership affects financial aid. A 529 in a parent's name counts only lightly. A grandparent's account, under current rules, no longer reduces a student's aid at all.
A 529 isn't your only option, though. We'll weigh it against a custodial account, and for some families, permanent life insurance with cash value. Each one changes how much aid you'll qualify for, and how much control you keep over the money.
Income that lasts in retirement
Saving is the easier half. The harder task is turning those balances into income that lasts thirty years or more. Annuities can guarantee a base income, a set amount each month. The rest of your portfolio remains invested for growth. They also protect against a very long life, the one risk a portfolio alone can rarely cover.
No annuity suits everyone. The fees and terms vary widely, so the choice has to fit your wider plan. As a retirement planner in Fort Lee, NJ, we'll model your cash flow a few years ahead, while there's still time to adjust. Our role as your investment advisor in Fort Lee is to manage the portfolio that funds it.
Buying a first home
Many younger clients are saving for a first home, usually a Fort Lee condo that costs more than they planned for. A Roth IRA can cover part of it. You can take your own contributions out at any time, plus up to $10,000 of earnings toward your first purchase. Once you're a year or two out, we'll shift the down payment into something steadier than stocks, so a downturn can't delay your closing. The state also offers down payment assistance for first-time buyers. We'll point it out the moment you qualify.
Small business owners
A good number of Fort Lee families own the business they work in. Owning one raises new questions. Your retirement account is yours to build, and two options cover most owners:
- A SEP-IRA shelters far more than a regular IRA in a strong year, which suits an owner with no staff or uneven profits.
- Once you have a few employees, a SIMPLE plan fits better and keeps the paperwork light.
Financial planning in Bergen County looks different for an owner than for an employee. We're your financial planner in Fort Lee, so we keep the business and the household inside a single plan.
Families with ties abroad
Many Fort Lee households hold assets in more than one country, or include a spouse who isn't a U.S. citizen. The tax code treats these cases differently, and the default rules can be costly. A non-citizen spouse complicates the estate plan. The unlimited marital deduction, which lets one spouse inherit everything tax-free, won't apply here. A qualified domestic trust, or QDOT, holds the assets for the survivor and restores most of that benefit.
Gifts to a non-citizen spouse have their own annual allowance, well above the standard limit and adjusted each year. Holdings abroad add a reporting requirement. If your foreign accounts exceed $10,000 combined at any point in the year, you'll need to file an FBAR. The penalties for missing it are heavy.
Find us in Fort Lee
- We are located at 158 Linwood Plaza, Fort Lee, NJ 07024.
- There's parking out front.
- Your first meeting is free.
- We'll talk in whatever language you're comfortable with, so bring a recent pay stub and a sense of what you most want to protect. By the end of it, you'll have a first plan to look at.
- Call 201-582-5100, or ask us about a video meeting.