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Category: Articles

Tax time is approaching fast. What should taxpayers do over the next month to boost their refund?

Yeah, yeah. I could tell you all the “normal” stuff. Spend deductible money before June 30. Delay income until July 1. Same, same. But let’s try something bigger picture and positive. We always moan about how quickly New Year’s Eve resolutions are broken, usually by mid-January. The weather’s great, you’re on holidays and it’s chillaxin’ […]

Eight super things to do before June 30

SUMMARY: There are just five weeks left to make the most of some super rules for this financial year. It seems to come around faster and faster every year – but 30 June is just five weeks away now. That’s not a lot of time to plan the last-minute special efforts that add the one […]

What three financial lessons for young adults would have been worth learning before you started work?

This sort of financial lessons for young adults advice makes me feel old. But, I guess, anyone who can remember Australia’s America’s Cup victory can no longer claim to be “youthful”. Sniff. Sob. And if you remember Alice Cooper’s Department of Youth coming out … massive fail. Waaaah! I wish I’d understood the following two […]

Planning for the pension changes

SUMMARY: The door stays open until the end of the year for account-based pensions and generous health care cards. There’s going to be a rush of work surrounding super pensions before the end of this year. And it will be largely about locking in access to the generous government health care card. Planning for it […]

Investors have been surging into real estate. What are your top three tips for would-be property investors?

Oh, property! How do I love thee! Let me count the ways. What! Just three tips investing in property? Property investment can be a beautiful thing. But let’s be clear: plenty of people lose plenty of dough on property. Or, nearly as bad, don’t make any money. Largely because they buy the wrong stuff. Tip […]

There’s no extras to top this Federal Budget blockbuster

Pizza. Oh, love of my life! Every experience can be enriched with pizza’s inclusion. Both life’s highs and lows should be celebrated with it. Birth of a child. Grand final victory. Pay rise at work. Redundancy. First date (gourmet, perhaps). Funerals. Graduation. Boys’ nights out. Girls’ nights in. Saturday morning hangovers. Sunday arvo sessions. Divorce […]

Forget the mid-life crisis — take smaller risks often

The older one gets, the closer one’s final breath becomes. Given that, age could be blamed for taking financial risks decisions based on shorter and shorter time frames, right? Logical. But that’s not how it happens. Particularly when it comes to money. It’s the reverse. The closer death comes, the longer you allow financial decisions […]

Which generation is the most generous when it comes to giving to charities. How do you best donate?

MMMM. To be honest, I wouldn’t have said Gen Xers. So many Xers have kiddliwinks – our donating to charity is to try to raise them right. Kids leach all our money, most of which does NOT qualify as a charitable tax deduction. They soak up all our time (occasionally even appreciating it). Cute and […]

How the pension axe could fall

SUMMARY: Thwack! A pointer to how the super taxes rate could be effectively raised, without resorting to taxing pensions. There is more than one way to skin a cat. And it appears we’re going to see a few feline pelts when it comes to winding back the generosity of tax-free super pensions. That is, you […]

Children can teach us valuable money lessons. What is the most memorable one you received from a child?

“You’re only young once, but you can be immature forever.” No, my bad. That was my 40-something-year-old mates. My DebtKids have reinforced in me the lesson of “learned behaviour”. We learn from watching our idols. At my kids’ ages, their idols are us. That, to me, is what makes parenting terrifying. Your tin lids watch […]