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Jan 15, 2025 | 
theneighborhoodfinanceguy.com | Lawrence Gonzalez
While the 401k (403b and 457b equivalent) is one of the best available retirement saving options for many people, only 30% of Americans fully maximize their value. I fault all of that on the lack of education and accountability. There has been no shortage of social media influencers, scammers, and insurance salespeople tearing down 401ks. Why? Most are financially illiterate, parroting misinformation from salespeople. The confusion is gospel to those already apprehensive.
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Jan 13, 2025 | 
theneighborhoodfinanceguy.com | Lawrence Gonzalez
Finally, my wife and I are back for another quarter of Building a Brighter Financial Future. Kinda sounds ostentatious, at this rate, I’m running out of SEO titles. Creating a new blog post title is similar to creating new passwords all the time. It’s a struggle to be original. While I might have referred to the journey as a “season” before, a “quarter” seems more appropriate for the long game.
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Jan 10, 2025 | 
theneighborhoodfinanceguy.com | Lawrence Gonzalez
December was tentative and then turned sour. The Santa Clause rally for 2024 never came, though we had some spikes. It made for an interesting end to a positive year. Who knows? Well, back to the intro. My name is Lawrence Delva-Gonzalez aka the Neighborhood Finance Guy. I write about financial literacy topics that include, but are not limited to, Personal Finance, Better Budgeting, Tax-Efficient Money Management, Steady Growth Investment strategies, Retirement tips, and Net Worth Tracking.
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Dec 18, 2024 | 
theneighborhoodfinanceguy.com | Lawrence Gonzalez
Finally no more election shenanigans, time to get back to building wealth again. Another added benefit of post-November, we can kiss the $12 billion election ad campaigns goodbye. It’s time for the Shen Yu ads to run through February 2025. Seriously, those election ads cost an estimated $12 billion. This is a hint for anyone who wants to pursue a political media, analyst, or strategist career. They get paid a median of $175,000 plus. That’s neither here nor there. For my household, it’s time to plan.
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Dec 10, 2024 | 
theneighborhoodfinanceguy.com | Lawrence Gonzalez
Below are the newest 2025 stock market S&P 500 price forecasts, ranging from 6,400 to 7,000. This implies a return of +5% or +15% from the December 5, 2024, adjusted close of 6,075. We pulled through the cocaine bear market low (of 3,577 in October 2022). Clawed back victory on the back of 2023. Thank God, we survived the US Elections of 2024. We are now riding the irrational fumes of a Dark MAGA Bull Cycle. To make matters worse, Sports betting and Bitcoins are in vogue.
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Dec 4, 2024 | 
theneighborhoodfinanceguy.com | Lawrence Gonzalez
Inflation is stabilizing while higher prices are here to stay, my wife and I will postpone our annual year-end trip until next November. Don’t worry. We went to a Michelin-style restaurant [BACÁN] instead. It was GREAT by the way. Had to name drop. With the 2024 U.S. elections behind us, stocks soared. November is fast becoming my favorite month. In conjunction with Thanksgiving, our wedding anniversary, and my birthday (looming), it’s a lot of fun. Even if we settled on two staycations this year.
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Nov 13, 2024 | 
theneighborhoodfinanceguy.com | Lawrence Gonzalez
Tracking TNFG’s QTR 3 2024 Passive Income ProgressThe third quarter numbers are in, a run-of-the-mill $7k month. The glory days of $20,000 quarters from 2020 are long gone. Relatively, I’m grateful for our +$6,000 average. My goal is to bring that up to an average of $10,000 monthly by 2027. Unfortunately, prices are up on our business expenses, and dividend yields are down. In positive news, Federal interest rates are easing to 2 percent. Times are harder.
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Nov 12, 2024 | 
theneighborhoodfinanceguy.com | Lawrence Gonzalez
Post $950 billion Halloween blood bath, the Trump 2.0 economy has been booming. Experts (now say) that the stock market could enjoy a bigger boost from President-elect Donald Trump than any previous administration. This is all thanks to his pro-business policies, a potential renewal of the tax reform set to expire at the end of 2025, and the Drill-Baby-Drill mantra. Table of ContentsToggleI didn’t think we could even run again. This was an uphill battle with a near-miss assassination attempt.
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Nov 10, 2024 | 
theneighborhoodfinanceguy.com | Lawrence Gonzalez
The best way to improve your cash flow for 2025, is to increase your retirement contribution. While this sounds counterintuitive, it works. Contributing to a qualified retirement account can (1) save you money on taxes while getting you (2) closer to your financial goals. To reap those tax benefits, you’ll need to observe contribution, income, and deduction limits set by the (IRS). To contextualize this, here’s our real-world example.
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Nov 4, 2024 | 
theneighborhoodfinanceguy.com | Lawrence Gonzalez
Yep, stocks trended downward on the last day of October 2024. All United States indices dropped on bloody Thursday; the S&P 500 fell 1.9 percent, the Dow Jones dropped 0.9 percent, and the Nasdaq composite tumbled 2.8 percent. To make matters worse, election confusion is pending. The U.S. Vice Presidential candidates opened the month with a welcome surprise of civility. That part lasted about a week.
