The White Coat Investor: A Doctor's Guide to Personal Finance and Investing (The White Coat Investor Series)

“To laugh often and love much; to win the respect of intelligent persons and the affection of children; to earn the approbation of honest citizens and endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty; to find the best in others; to give of one’s self; to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeeme

Further discussion of whole life insurance and other hybrid insurance/investment products is beyond the scope of this book, but you can learn more here.

Unfortunately, there are nineteen states with estate and/or inheritance taxes, and most of them use lower estate tax exemptions than the federal government. Political types won’t be surprised to see that most of these are “blue states” and include Washington, Oregon, Nebraska, Minnesota, Iowa, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Pennsylvania, New York,

When you give a highly appreciated asset (think of a property or shares of a mutual fund you bought for $100,000 that is now worth $500,000) to someone else, they get your basis on the asset, or $100,000. However, if you die and they inherit it, the basis is reset at the value of the asset at the time of your death. They can sell it the next day an

Combining the Good News with the Bad News

One of the easiest, and cheapest, asset protection techniques is to title your home properly. For married physicians in many states, this will be “John and Jackie Smith, Husband and Wife, Tenants By The Entirety.” This means that both John, and Jackie, each own 100% of the home. So a successful lawsuit that only names John cannot take the

Attending physicians should carry an “umbrella” policy with limits of $1 million to $5 million. A resident may not want to spend the $200 to $700 a year this type of policy costs, but at a minimum he should increase the liability limits on his auto and renter’s/homeowner’s policy to $300,000 to $500,000.

If you are interested in learning how to accurately calculate your own return, I have a blog post on the website that shows how to use the XIRR function in a spreadsheet program like Microsoft Excel to do so. You can find it here.

Assets with named beneficiaries go directly to your heirs without passing through the probate process.