Home

Mail

News

Sports

Finance

Weather

Games

Groups

Answers

Screen

Search Finance

Flickr

Mobile

Search
Web
Sign
In

More
Mail

Follow Yahoo Finance

Wed, Jun 11, 2014, 0:55AM EDT - US Markets open in 8 hrs and 35 mins

Recent

% |$

Quotes you view appear

here for quick access.
Quote Lookup

Go

Finance Home
My Portfolio

4 Surprising Ways to
Help You Build Wealth
By Liz Weston
June 10, 2014 12:01 AM

Market Data
Business & Finance
Personal Finance

Career & Education News

Yahoo Originals
CNBC

No, millennials dont all want a free ride

Duke Grad Student Secretly Lived In a Van to
Escape
Why Youre Better Off Graduating in a
Recession
The 14 Most Stressful Jobs in America

View photo
Compare Brokers

15 High-Paying Jobs for People Who Don't

Like Stre

Retirement News
AndreyPopov/iStock/Thinkstock

You likely already know the standard advice about building wealth:
Live below your means. Max out your retirement accounts. Pay off
your debt. But in addition to those tried-and-true methods, there
are other, less well-known ways that can help you grow your net
worth faster. Here are four:

Report: Social Security judges rubber-stamp

claims
Surprise: Even wealthy retirees live on Social
Security
Retirement Savings Fears Grip Americans: I
Dont Have
The risks of taking a 401(k) loan
11 Reasons to Retire in Portugal's Algarve

1. Use a Health Savings Account . These accounts, which are

paired with high-deductible health insurance plans , offer a rare
triple tax break your contributions are deductible, your money
grows tax-deferred and withdrawals for medical expenses are tax
free. HSAs typically allow contributions to be invested in stocks
and other investments for long-term growth, and any unused
money can be rolled over year after year.
HSAs, in other words, can be used to supercharge your retirement
savings. Some advisors recommend their clients funnel savings
into HSAs after theyve contributed enough to their workplace
retirement plans to get the full match. Other advisors suggest
HSAs as an additional way to save for retirement after workplace
plans and IRAs are maxed out.
2. Buy a modest house in a modest neighborhood. The old-

Ad by RegularDeals. More Info | Hide These Ads

school advice was to stretch to buy a home in the best

neighborhood you could afford to maximize your potential
appreciation. The problem, as weve learned, is that appreciation
isnt guaranteed and historically hasnt been that impressive.
Yale University

economist Robert Shiller, who helped create the

widely used Case-Shiller Index to track home prices, found that

long-term returns on residential real estate barely keep pace with
inflation. Once you factor in maintenance, updates, repairs,
insurance and taxes, you may well be losing value rather than
gaining it. Paying down a mortgage does force homeowners to
build equity, but that will happen even with a smaller home that you
can better afford.
Capping your housing payments at 25 percent of your income,
rather than the 33 percent or more some lenders will approve,
should leave you with enough money to save for retirement and

Thank Dad on Father's Day with

Term Life Coverage

Win a Vir
Vacation!

Win a Fam
Luxury Trip
Greater Wi

book Stop Acting Rich and co-author of Millionaire Next Door.

Reliable term life insurance through AIG

Direct. Receive up to $250,000 in life
insurance coverage for as low as
$14/month. Lock in your rate today!

Rather than being an aspirational resident one whos less

Sponsored AIG Direct

pursue other financial goals. Also, research shows living in a more

expensive neighborhood will actually cause you to spend more in
other areas of your life too, says Thomas Stanley, author of the

Sponsored

1 of 5

wealthy than your neighbors and feeling pressure to keep up with

the Joneses people who want to build wealth should live in
neighborhoods where their net worth is higher than average so
they dont feel those pressures, Stanley says.

Rates
Mortgage Savings Credit Cards Auto Insurance
Average rates in Los Angeles, CA

3. Buy fewer cars. The AAA estimates the average car costs

Loan Type

$8,876 per year to own and operate, based upon 15,000 miles of
annual driving. Thats a huge chunk of most household budgets .
But you can save significant amounts of money simply by owning
your cars longer. In my book Deal with Your Debt, I calculated
that someone who buys a car every 10 years rather than every five

Today

Change Last Week

30 yr fixed

4.19%

4.15%

15 yr fixed

3.21%

3.15%

30 yr fixed refi

4.17%

4.13%

15 yr fixed refi

3.20%

3.14%

30 yr jumbo

4.22%

4.14%

5/1 ARM refi

3.19%

3.24%

years would save more than $250,000 over her driving lifetime
(assuming the first car cost $20,000, with subsequent car prices

View rates in your area

Bankrate.com

adjusted for 3 percent annual inflation, and that each purchase

was financed with a five-year loan at 6 percent interest). You can
save even more by buying gently used cars instead of new and

Editors Picks

paying for cars with cash, rather than financing.

4. Fund a Roth. Everybody knows the advantages of Roth IRAs,
dont they? Apparently not. Fewer people have Roths than have
traditional or rollover IRAs, according to the Employee Benefit
Research Institutions IRA database, which contains information

Daily Ticker

on 25.3 million accounts and 19.9 million people. Nearly 73

As the job outlook brightens, some

workers are being left behind

percent of IRA owners had traditional or rollover IRAs, compared

to the 28.1 percent who owned Roths.
Roth IRAs dont offer upfront tax breaks, but money withdrawn in
retirement is tax free. Thats a huge perk, but not the Roths only
one. There are no required minimum withdrawals for Roths as
there are with other retirement accounts, so the money can be left
to grow and even bequeathed, income tax free, to your heirs. The
younger you are, the more likely your tax rate will be higher in

Daily Ticker

Detroit bankruptcy advances; the city

will be saved, says venture capitalist

retirement than it is now, which makes funding a Roth a good bet.

Liz Weston is an award-winning journalist and author of several
money books, including the best-selling Your Credit Score. She
writes about personal finance at her site AskLizWeston. You can
like her on Facebook and follow her on Twitter.
You Might Also Like:
5 Celebrity Money Mistakes We Can All Learn From
Think Like a Millionaire
7 Simple Rules for Making Money

Breakout

Ho-Hum stocks like GE help market

grind to new highs. Can it last?
Talking Numbers

How one big

investor is
navigating this
market
Breakout

View Comments (3)

Share this

The future of
'Zombie'
RadioShack

Daily Ticker
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/4-surprising-ways-help-build-040100780.html?soc_src=copy
The move that could
save Twitter

Recommended for You

Gilead Sciences: Who Pays Billions for a Drug

That Will Be Dead in Three Years?
Barrons.com
Yesterday, Gilead Sciences (GILD) fell 4.1% after Merck (MRK)

announced
it would buy Idenix Pharmaceuticals (IDIX), which is
GILD
$79.54that
0.68%
working on a competitor to Gilead's hepatitis-C treatment Sovaldi.
RBC's Michael Yee
and team
think
thesandwiches
selloff created are
a buying
Dunkin'
CEO:
Our
opportunity. Yee explains why: Bottom

Daily Ticker

Why its good to

question the nation's
economic
policymakers

snacks, not lunch

Daily Ticker

NEW YORK (AP) If you're grabbing a sandwich at

Dunkin' Donuts, the chain wants you to consider it a
Associated
snack, notPress
a full lunch.

More workers are

getting a raise

Fathers Confess: Don't Make the Same Money

Mistakes I Did
In life, there are occasions when we wish we could get a "do-over."
U.S.New
World
Report
LP
Just as sin& the
movie
"Groundhog
Day" or Tom Cruise's latest sci-fi
thriller "Edge of Tomorrow," we would love the opportunity to keep
doing somethingStanford
over and over
until we get
it right. Mike Robbins, a
President:
Entrepreneurs
motivational speaker
and
Should
Wait To Become CEO
Business
It seemsInsider
that every entrepreneur in Silicon...

CSCO $25.00 0.81%

Cramer: Prepare for stock declines

On Tuesday, the Dow Jones industrial average, again, closed at an
all-time high. But what goes up often comes down. Are you ready?
Cramer is.
CNBC

Retirement Savings Fears Grip

Americans: I Dont Have Enough
Americans are freaking out about their personal
savings and for good reason. A recent Gallup poll
The
Fiscal
found
thatTimes
59 percent of those surveyed were very or
moderately worried they wont have enough money
for retirement
by far their
biggest After
concern. Many
World Bank Cuts
Global Growth
Forecast
Bumpy 2014 people
Start once counted on a triad of support for
The World Bank cut its global growth forecast amid weaker outlooks
Bloomberg
for the U.S., Russia and China, while calling on emerging markets to
strengthen their economies before the Federal Reserve raises
interest rates. The
U.S. forecast
reducedon
to proper
2.1 percent from 2.8
Federal
viewswas
diverge
percent while outlooks
use offor
painkillers
WASHINGTON (AP) How do you have a
conversation about prescription drugs that provide
Associated
Press
critical pain
relief to millions of Americans yet also
cause more fatal overdoses than heroin and cocaine
combined?
How Long Can Stocks Maintain All-

Time Highs?
The market has gone years without a correction, but
is that a reason to cash out and put your profits
WSJ
Live
under
the mattress? UBS strategist Jeremy Zirin sits

More Top New s

Market News
Paula Deen
Reflects on Her
Challenging Year
00:57

Paula Deen
Discusses
Attracting New
Viewers
00:54

Paula Deen Unveils

Her New Paula
Deen Network
00:00

RadioShack Is Collapsing
RadioShack shares were down as much as 21% in...

Copyright DailyWorth 2014

Data Disclaimer

Business Insider
Help / Suggestions

A Health Insurer Calls, With Questions

Insurers are calling people new to the Affordable Care Act asking
health questions. The companies say the calls are beneficial to
consumers,
The
New York but
Times
some experts arent so sure.

Grad Students Could Win Big as Obama Slashes

Debt Payments
Reports say the president will make more student borrowers eligible
BusinessWeek
for a program to reduce their monthly payments

Apple's 7:1 Stock Split: Is It Time to

Buy?
Investors expecting a continued pop in Apple's stock
after its split Monday may want to temper their
WSJ
Live
enthusiasm.
WSJ's Steve Russolillo takes a look at
the track record of post-split stocks.

Hollande taps bank economist to

steer economic policy
Reuters
By Emmanuel Jarry PARIS (Reuters) - Francois

Hollande
chosen
a senior economist at a U.S.
MER-PM has
$25.48
-0.04%
bank as his new top economic advisor, an official in
the French president's office said on Tuesday, as
France tries
to sustain
a sputtering economic
Africa's
women
entrepreneurs
take
recovery.
the leadEmmanuel Macron is stepping down as
Hollande's
KAMPALA, Uganda (AP) Madinah Nalukenge
recalls the day she set out to sell food on the filthy
Associated
edges of aPress
bus terminal in the Ugandan capital in
2004. She had just $10 left over from a failed attempt
to things
sell bedto
sheets.
5
know about Apple's stock

split
Associated
Press
SAN FRANCISCO
(AP) Apple's resurgent stock

may have
as much
AAPL
$94.25
0.59%to do with financial engineering
as the company's technological wizardry.

United changing how travelers earn

mileage rewards
DALLAS (AP) United Airlines is about to reward
its big-spending customers at the expense of
Associated
Press travelers who rack up miles with
bargain-hunting
long-distance getaways.

Fiat Chrysler names first 86 Alfa

Romeo dealers in North America
The first 86 dealerships to relaunch the sporty Alfa
Romeo brand in North America, most of them now
Reuters
selling Fiat cars, were announced on Tuesday by
Fiat Chrysler Automobiles . The 83 Fiat dealerships
and threefarmers,
Maserati dealerships
will be the
first to sell
Ageing
low-yield crops
hurt
the
limited-edition
Alfa Romeo
4C sports
Cameroon's
cocoa
ambitions
By Anne Mireille Nzouankeu and Bate Felix
YAOUNDE/DAKAR (Reuters) - Cameroon's ambition
Reuters
to triple cocoa production and become one of the
world's top three producers within a decade is being
hampered by aTrucker
failure to modernize
ageing
Authorities:
in Morgan
crash
plantations
and attract young farmers to the sector.
hadn't
slept
Cameroon, the
Associated
Press
NEW BRUNSWICK,
N.J. (AP) A truck driver's
lack of$76.62
sleep is
being blamed for the highway crash
WMT
-0.51%
that injured Tracy Morgan and killed another
comedian in New Jersey.
Load more stories

Privacy

About Our Ads

Terms