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Tuesday, April 14, 2015

Business Day Your Money

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Your Money

Questions About Airbnb’s Responsibility After Attack by Dog

By RON LIEBER
Mike Silverman spent two nights in the hospital after being attacked by his Airbnb host's Rottweiler.
Anibal Adrian Greco for The New York Times

Mike Silverman spent two nights in the hospital after being attacked by his Airbnb host's Rottweiler.

While Airbnb has begun offering secondary insurance coverage to its hosts in the United States, guests in other countries may have to cover the costs of any accidents themselves.

David Slenn said some policies distort the original purpose of captive insurance companies and sidestep gift tax laws.
Angel Valentin for The New York Times

David Slenn said some policies distort the original purpose of captive insurance companies and sidestep gift tax laws.

Wealth Matters

I.R.S. Is Looking Into Captive Insurance Shelters

By PAUL SULLIVAN

Captives can be designed so the risks they insure are so unlikely they will never pay a claim and all the premiums will go back to the owners or their heirs with little or no tax.

Matt Feldman, an entrepreneur who founded Homlux to provide home services in New York, works with Amazon’s services program.

Amazon, Google and More Are Drawn to Home Services Market

By HILARY STOUT

Bringing the efficiency of the web to common household tasks has opened a new door to the home services industry, which is estimated to be worth more than $800 billion.

The Haggler

The Shrinking Cellphone Offer You Can’t Refuse

By DAVID SEGAL

A website that buys used iPhones, laptops and other electronic gadgets receives complaints about paying sellers less than they were offered.

Mutual funds created by the likes of Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase have been drawing billions of dollars from investors.

Wall Street Banks’ Mutual Funds Can Lag on Returns

By NATHANIEL POPPER

Most funds run by the four largest Wall Street banks in the business have underperformed their basic benchmarks over the last 10 years, according to a Morningstar analysis.

Retiring
From left, Rebecca Anderson; her mother, Mary; and her grandmother, also named Mary, at their newly renovated home on the western edge of Milwaukee.

Renovation vs. Relocation in Retirement

By HARRIET EDLESON

As homeowners near retirement, the question of whether to stay put and remodel or buy another home can be complex, involving financial and emotional issues.

Your Money Adviser

An Extension Sends Tax Season Into Overtime

By ANN CARRNS

By filing for an extension, a taxpayer can go beyond the April 15 deadline in filing a return, but there are downsides.

Your Money

Did You Write Your College Application Essay About Money? We’d Like to Hear From You

By RON LIEBER

The New York Times asks high school seniors who are applying for college this year to send us application essays that have to do with money.

Michael Doughty, president of John Hancock Insurance, stretches in Boston. Hancock will offer a program that tracks policyholders’ medical data and offers discounts for healthful behavior.

Giving Out Private Data for Discount in Insurance

By TARA SIEGEL BERNARD

John Hancock will become the first life insurance company to offer a program for Americans that tracks medical information and offers lower premiums for healthful behavior.

Strategies

Measure for Measure, Index Funds Rule

By JEFF SOMMER

At least three-quarters of actively managed stock mutual funds regularly failed to beat the broad market index over three, five and 10 years.

Sketch Guy

Simple Financial Solutions Often Beat the Complex Ones

By CARL RICHARDS

Seekers of money advice overlook simple answers because when they hear simple, they make the leap to easy. But sticking with good decisions isn’t easy.

Amy Speace, a Nashville singer, wrote a song about her experiences with money.
Luke Sharrett for The New York Times

Amy Speace, a Nashville singer, wrote a song about her experiences with money.

Your Money Special Section

My Biggest Financial Lesson

By THE NEW YORK TIMES

This special section is a collection of essays about the turning points or moments when the writers’ feelings about money crystallized.

Sketch Guy

Add Uncertainty to Your Financial Plans

By CARL RICHARDS

In an excerpt from “The One-Page Financial Plan,” the author suggests taking a best guess on the future, based on personal values.

The Upshot
A crowd gathered for a political rally in 2012 in the Villages, a retirement community that is also the center of its own census-designated statistical area in Florida. Last year, the community’s population rose more quickly than that of any other census area in the United States.

The Giant Retirement Community That Explains Where Americans Are Moving

By NEIL IRWIN

The Villages area in Florida shows that warmth and affordable housing have helped a pre-recession population trend reassert itself.

President Obama spoke out in favor of the measures at a community college in Birmingham, Ala., on Thursday.

Payday Loan Rules Proposed by Consumer Protection Agency

By MICHAEL D. SHEAR and JESSICA SILVER-GREENBERG

The rules proposed by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau would require lenders to assess customers’ ability to repay short-term loans.

Robert Neubecker
Your Money

Why Paying for Financial Advice Makes Sense

By RON LIEBER

If you’re willing to pay for a gym membership to stay physically fit, why not hire an adviser to keep you financially fit?

Wealth Matters
Eight months after Robin Williams's death, his children and widow are in court fighting over who gets to keep certain sentimental items, including the tuxedo he wore at his wedding.

When Heirs Fight Over Assets With Sentimental Value

By PAUL SULLIVAN

Robin Williams’s widow and children are in the middle of a fight over his personal effects. Such wrangling is hardly uncommon.

Retiring

Over 50 and Back in College, Preparing for a New Career

By KERRY HANNON

For many retirees, babysitting grandchildren, golfing and relaxing on the beach is passé. Instead, they’re being newly educated for second careers.

Shortcuts
Teresa Mears dealt with a partner’s death, family health issues and the losses of her job and her house, all in eight years. But she took her life in another direction and now says that, to her surprise, she’s happy.

Rolling With the Punches, at Any Stage of Life

By ALINA TUGEND

Most people recover after even the most difficult changes, but it’s easier to bounce back if you have emotional, social and financial resources.

Money Management

Calculate Your Financial Comeback

See how long it could take for your portfolio to return to its peak value.

The 1% More Savings Calculator

What would happen to your savings balances if you saved just one percent more a year?

Interactive Feature: 31 Steps to a Financial Tuneup

A customizable checklist to guide your own financial tuneup, providing tips, the time needed to achieve them and links to additional resources.

Interactive Feature: Managing Your Money Through the Ages

An interactive checklist to help navigate ways to prepare and secure your financial future at each stage of life.

Special Section: Retirement

A writer confronts his anxiety over having enough money after he stops working. Also, how retirees are bucking conventional wisdom about real estate.

Special Section: Your Taxes
Pushart

Reformers Try to Tackle the Tax Machine

By JONATHAN WEISMAN

One problem Congress faces as it prepares to overhaul the tax code is that each complexity has a constituency that will fight for it.

Tips for Navigating a Changing Tax Landscape

By JAN M. ROSEN

How to handle new forms related to the Affordable Care Act, thwart identity theft, claim deductions for job searches, and other advice.

Special Section: Wealth
Tim Bower

Stressed by Money? Get on the Couch

By PAUL SULLIVAN

The young field of financial therapy tries to identify disorders in how people view money, to better advise them on planning and investments.

Giving Special Section
Dr. Rick Sacra, who contracted Ebola in Liberia, left isolation at Nebraska Medical Center in September and was reunited with his wife, Debbie, and son Jared.
Doing Good in Harm’s Way
By JOHN SCHWARTZ

Those who go abroad to scenes of disaster or conflict already take considerable personal risks — and those who go where Ebola is prevalent can face misunderstanding at home as well.

Financial Calculators
The Upshot
Is It Better to Rent or Buy?
By MIKE BOSTOCK, SHAN CARTER and ARCHIE TSE

The choice between buying a home and renting one is among the biggest financial decisions that many adults make.

Interactive Graphic
Student Loan Calculator

A guide to student loans at various universities, and what it takes after graduation to repay that debt.

INTERACTIVE FEATURE: Sketch Guy: Personal Finance on a Napkin

Carl Richards, a financial planner, has been explaining the basics of money through simple graphs and diagrams.

Interactive Feature
What Percent Are You?

See how your household income ranks in 344 zones across the United States.

Students and Money, in Their Own Words

The college-application essays that four students submitted this year on emerging stronger from economic challenges.

Graphic
Inexpensive Advice for Index and Exchange-Traded Fund Investments

These companies offer help picking and rebalancing index and exchange-traded funds or similar investments, and none charge more than about 0.5 percent of your assets each year for the privilege.

Student Loans
The Upshot
Students in the library at California State University, Long Beach.

Student Debt: A Calculator Focused on College Majors

By DAVID LEONHARDT

Most college graduates earn enough to repay their student loans. The bigger problem is that they’re asked to do so when they are earning the least.

Managing Student Loan Debt as an Older Adult

By JOHN F. WASIK

Debt held by those 65 and older has risen significantly in recent years, but the load may be eased with careful planning or government aid, or through an employer.

The Upshot
Indiana State University graduates in Terre Haute in May. Although having student debt is far from ideal, it's important to consider the benefits if it helps you get a degree.  

What We Mean When We Say Student Debt Is Bad

By SUSAN DYNARSKI

Student loans need reform. But recent gloomy reports obscure the key benefit of borrowing for college: a college education.

The Upshot
The College of Charleston campus in April. Student debt is rising, but the problem is often exaggerated.

Q. and A. About Student Debt

By DAVID LEONHARDT

Readers have questions. Co-authors of a recent study from the Brookings Institution have answers.

From Sunday Business
The Haggler

The Shrinking Cellphone Offer You Can’t Refuse

By DAVID SEGAL

A website that buys used iPhones, laptops and other electronic gadgets receives complaints about paying sellers less than they were offered.

Strategies

Measure for Measure, Index Funds Rule

By JEFF SOMMER

At least three-quarters of actively managed stock mutual funds regularly failed to beat the broad market index over three, five and 10 years.

Your Money Contributors

Ron Lieber

writes the Your Money column, which appears in The Times on Saturdays.

Tara Siegel Bernard

is a personal finance reporter with The Times.

Paul Sullivan

writes Wealth Matters, a column looking at strategies that the wealthy use to manage their money and their overall well-being.

Special Sections
Suzanne Fontaine, 66, said she would have retired years ago if CVS had not let her work the winter months at a store in Naples, Fla., where she and her husband have a second home.

Retirement

Valuing knowledge and experience, some employers are making extra efforts to encourage longtime workers to stay.

Your Money, Your Career

Freelancers are increasingly piecing together a living in the temp economy.

Wealth

Want to buy an Irish castle? For those of means, the price is right.

Giving

Guide dog schools are considered charities that do work of great value, but they have commensurate expenses. Also, a step-by-step guide to choosing a charity wisely.