Baby Boomers — those born between 1946 and 1964 — hold about $20 trillion in wealth.1 Over the next few decades, many Boomers may transfer this wealth to their Gen X, millennial, and Gen Z children, perhaps incurring a hefty tax bill. Here are some ways to handle multigenerational estate planning so that the generations after you may keep these assets in the family.
What is Generational Wealth?
As the name implies, “generational wealth” is the wealth that transfers from generation to generation. Think of “old money” families whose generational wealth allowed members of the younger generations to run for office, start businesses, invest in startups, and create family charities.
How May You Build Generational Wealth?
Building generational wealth may come from various sources such as a job, a career, a business, or passive income like royalties or dividends.
After generating enough income to cover your monthly expenses, you might consider ways to use your extra income to build assets for a potential future source of wealth. Some income sources include:
- Investing in blue chip or dividend-paying stocks
- Purchasing rental real estate
- Creating something that pays royalties, like self-published books or a social media channel
- Starting a side business
The more sources and forms of income you have available, the more funds you may have to begin building generational wealth, even at a young age.
Multigenerational Estate Planning: Dos and Don’ts
In our view, there are a few “dos and don’ts” when planning an estate to create and hopefully preserve generational wealth.
DO: Talk to a financial professional.
Navigating the complexities of investing and tax implications could be tricky, and a single misstep has the ability to cost you. Having a financial professional review your portfolio and recommend some options could help you save more now to potentially provide more income later.
DON’T: Ignore tax considerations.
When it comes to building wealth, it is often not how much you earn but how much you keep. Your financial professional may help you manage tax efficiency for your assets, working toward the goal of preserving and reinvesting more of what you earn. The considerations presented could be putting assets in a trust, or investing income in an individual retirement account (IRA), etc.
DO: Diversify your portfolio and assets.
Investing in only a particular asset or sector may leave you vulnerable to market volatility. Suppose you depend on some of these funds to provide you with income in the future. In a downturn, you might sell assets at a loss to stay even. Diversifying your portfolio and managing over-exposure to any particular asset or sector may help avoid major market losses and hopefully help your portfolio maintain its value during periods of high inflation.
Footnotes
1 Millennials’ wealth more than doubled to over $9 trillion since the pandemic began, but Baby Boomers are still worth almost 8 times as much, Fortune,
https://fortune.com/2022/03/22/millennial-wealth-doubles-during-pandemic-9-trillion-boomers
Important Disclosures
Investment advice offered through Planned Financial Services, a Registered Investment Advisor, LLC (“Planned Financial”). Planned Financial and its investment advisors do not provide tax, accounting, or legal advice. Any tax statements contained herein were not intended or written to be used, and cannot be used, for the purpose of avoiding U.S. federal, state or local tax penalties. Please consult your independent advisor as to any tax, accounting or legal statements made herein. This article is distributed for informational purposes only and nothing herein constitutes an offer to sell or a solicitation of an offer to buy any security and nothing herein should be construed as such. All investment strategies and investments involve risk of loss, including the possible loss of all amounts invested, and nothing herein should be construed as a guarantee of any specific outcome or profit. While we have gathered the information presented herein from sources that we believe to be reliable, we cannot guarantee the accuracy or completeness of the information presented and the information presented should not be relied upon as such. Any opinions expressed herein are our opinions and are current only as of the date of distribution, and are subject to change without notice. The investment and tax strategies mentioned here may not be suitable for everyone. Each investor needs to review an investment or tax strategy for his or her own particular situation before making any decision. Planned Financial recommends consultation with a qualified tax advisor, CPA, financial planner or investment manager.
This article was prepared by WriterAccess.
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