Senior Finance Editor
Gerald covers the long-horizon end of personal finance: mortgages, index funds, retirement accounts, and the products that get sold as simple because the complicated part is in the prospectus.
His pieces tend to start with a rule nobody reads and end with the one number worth checking. He is skeptical of anything marketed as new, on the grounds that most of it has been run before under a different name, and he will usually tell you when.
You sold the loser in December to bank the loss, then bought it back a week later because you still liked the position. The loss you were counting on to offset your gains just evaporated, and the IRS did it with a rule from 1921 that most people meet for the first time in April.
October 20, 2026 · 9 min read
Feeding a lump sum into the market slowly feels prudent. The data says it costs you about two-thirds of the time, because you spend most of the period sitting in cash while the market does what it does most years, which is go up.
August 25, 2026 · 8 min read
It is the most heavily sold, least understood product in personal finance. Whole life is a real contract with a narrow set of legitimate uses, wrapped in a sales pitch aimed at people who need something else. Here is how the machine actually works, what the cash value really returns, and the handful of situations where buying it is the right call.
August 19, 2026 · 17 min read
For deaths after 2019 the inherited IRA has to be empty inside ten years, and starting in 2025 the IRS wants annual withdrawals along the way. On a $400,000 account handed to someone in their peak earning years, that is a five-figure tax bill they did not budget for.
August 19, 2026 · 9 min read
Two funds with 2030 in the name can hold twenty percentage points of different equity exposure. The year is a marketing label, not a risk disclosure, and 2008 already demonstrated what that costs.
August 9, 2026 · 11 min read
You own 500 stocks and call it diversified. But 37 percent of your S&P 500 fund is seven tech companies. That is a concentrated bet, not a portfolio.
August 7, 2026 · 9 min read
A provision that only exists between ages 60 and 63 lets you put an extra $11,250 into a 401(k). A second rule that took effect this January quietly took the deduction away from higher earners. Almost nobody was told about either.
August 5, 2026 · 10 min read
Banks have discovered they can advertise 4 percent to new customers while quietly paying existing ones 0.30 percent, using nothing more sophisticated than two products with nearly identical names.
August 4, 2026 · 10 min read
The consolidation pitch sounds great: replace 24.99% credit card debt with a 10.5% personal loan, save thousands in interest, and be done in three years. The arithmetic works, but 60% of borrowers run their cards right back up within 18 months. Here is how to tell if you are in the 40% who actually come out ahead.
August 3, 2026 · 9 min read
Only 9% of HSA holders invest any of their balance. The other 91% are using the most tax-advantaged account in the U.S. tax code as a debit card for copays and contact lens solution. Here is why the HSA beats both the 401(k) and the Roth IRA, and how to actually use it.
August 2, 2026 · 9 min read
Robinhood pioneered commission-free trading, but the trades were never free - someone else was paying. Here is who, how, and what it costs you as the trader.
July 28, 2026 · 8 min read
Buying your first home means choosing a mortgage type before you even know which house you want. FHA, conventional, VA, fixed-rate, and ARM loans all have different trade-offs. This guide explains each one in plain terms.
June 30, 2026 · 10 min read
Roughly seven million borrowers are sitting in SAVE, which stops existing at the start of next month. You get 90 days to pick something else. Do nothing and the Department picks for you, and its default choice is the expensive one.
June 3, 2026 · 9 min read
