How to Live to Be 103 And Not Regret It | Affinity Capital

July 6, 2021

I am fortunate enough in my practice to have multi-generational involvement in the lives of my clients. Being involved in many aspects of their lives brings many benefits – I am witness to births, weddings and in sadder instances, funerals. I help clients plan for payment of these events as well as college and retirement, and not necessarily in that order.

So when a client of mine was reporting about her 100-year-old Father and said, “Pops fell,” I was concerned. I asked how it happened, envisioning him prone in the middle of the night, perhaps pushing a button for help.  She answered, “at Pilates”. I know are you are right now imagining a 100-year-old Pilates student.  You would just have to know this man. In the interest of client confidentiality, I’ll call him Oliver. And I want you to know the secrets of his financial success as well as his personal achievements.

Oliver passed in 2015 at the age of 103.  He left a legacy of a loving family, a successful business and many friends and admirers.  He lived at home with minimal help.  He was a Father, Grandfather and Great Grandfather and very good friend. I know, you are still wondering how he did Pilates up until about 6 months before he passed.  You have to know more about this life to explain this and understand the elements that went into this remarkable man’s life.

Of course, I first knew him as a client for almost 30 years.  At a time when I very young and working hard to build my business, Oliver told me that he wanted to work with a woman because he trusted women more, that he felt that women were more open and so he could read them better.  This was and still is a wonderfully progressive way to view the professional world and built on the confidence I carried in myself.

Nothing happened to ensure his success like a family inheritance or Ivy League education.  He was by far not my wealthiest client but he planned well and listened to professionals.  He paid very close attention to his investments.  A story I like to tell is when we generated quarterly reporting, we would hold his out for extra review, because even when he reached an advanced age, if a decimal point was out or a cost basis off or a typo was present, Oliver would notice it.  I began writing market comments some time ago and when I found myself lacking time to make them a personal product and began to utilize statistics and third party information, Oliver, when asked, told me it was ‘turgid’.  Did I mention that he was honest?  But I took it to heart and began writing from my own heart and voice.

We reviewed his portfolio on a regular basis, and he was constantly curious about the decisions we made about the portfolio, how much risk he was really taking for his outcome and even why we had chosen specific investments. He was curious that way but also shrewd. He kept a consistent budget and we reviewed it in relation to his portfolio on a regular basis.

So how does one live like Oliver? How does one live honestly and authentically, plan well for retirement and enjoy life?  Obviously genes play a factor – Oliver has three children who are active and healthy, but they have also inherited his zest for life and an abiding passion for family, friends, and activities.

Paying attention very much impacted his financial plans.  Early on, before most people in my experience begin to plan for a long life, Oliver created a succession plan for his successful business that reflected the confidence he placed in his three children who to this day own, operate and participate in the business.  He gifted funds to his children, grandchildren, relatives. He was charitable and generous. He created trusts into which his assets would land both during his life and beyond. 

When I was starting my own business in 1995, I asked him for his advice and he told me to be certain to have funds to last for at least one year while I got on my feet.  He said to always send clients birthday cards and to acknowledge these events in their lives.  Yet when I asked him what he would do differently, he stated simply, “I would spend more time with my family”.  Now, this is not to say that he did not spend a great deal of time with his family because he did, by most measures, and most pointedly that of his family, but that at the end of a career and especially a life, one tends to reassess choices.  Does anyone listen to an 83-year-old man?  I did and the relationship that I now have with my 15 nieces and nephews (most are blood, all are heart) can be partly attributable to that one moment of openness, from a slight sharing that can make one pause and think about potential regret.

Aside from genes and good financial planning, what did Oliver do to ensure a rich and fruitful life? A lot of it is what we read on a daily basis – but who gets to be the 103-year-old beta tester for life?

He was mentally active and passionate about his interests. He did extensive genealogical research into his family going back generations and wrote many articles on the subject. He attended genealogy conferences and when he could not travel alone, his children gladly accompanied him. He did the daily crossword and Hot Sudoku – once obliterating my attempts at winning against him!

He had an interest in young people. His Grandchildren visited him frequently and he invariably recounted to me specific details about their lives.  One whistled a beautiful tune at his memorial service, because ‘Pops’ had taught him how to whistle as a child.

He had a sense of humor.  After his 100-year birthday party, which was attended by over three hundred people, my assistant apologized to him for not being able to attend and told him she would see him at the next one. He asked, “How do you know that?” She was taken aback, but to know Oliver was to understand that wry response.

We can all take and keep life lessons from this man- both to ensure financial success, but mostly personal!

The Order of Returns

April 29, 2026
The first four months of 2026 have been a useful reminder that markets do not move in straight lines. After entering the year at record highs, U.S. equities pulled back sharply on geopolitical tensions tied to the Iran conflict, with the S&P 500 coming close to a ten percent decline before recovering much of that ground. Volatility has returned again on rising energy prices and a softer tone from the technology sector that has carried so much of this cycle’s leadership. Oil sits near one hundred dollars per barrel, the ten-year Treasury yield hovers near four and a half percent, and traditional diversification between stocks and bonds has been less reliable than many investors have come to expect. None of this changes our long-term view. It does sharpen a conversation we believe every household within ten years of retirement, on either side of that line, should be having right now. THE QUESTION THAT MATTERS MOST After more than thirty years of advising families through every kind of market, I have come to believe that one question matters more than almost any other in retirement planning. It is not what your average return will be. It is not even how much you have saved. The question is this: in what order will those returns arrive, and what will the portfolio be doing when they do? Two households can finish their working years with identical balances and identical long-term average returns. One can run out of money. One can remain wealthy for life. The only difference between them is the order in which good and bad years happened to fall. WHY ORDER MATTERS MORE THAN AVERAGE When a portfolio is accumulating, a market drop is something close to a gift. Contributions buy more shares at lower prices. When a portfolio is distributing, the same drop is a wound. Every dollar withdrawn during a downturn cannot participate in the recovery, and the base from which all future growth compounds is permanently smaller. Retirees who began withdrawals in 1973, in 2000, or in 2008 lived through outcomes quite different from those who retired even two or three years earlier or later. Same averages over the long arc. Very different lives for the family. THE RETIREMENT RED ZONE Retirement planning does not begin the year you stop working. It begins five to ten years before. We sometimes call that window the retirement red zone, and it is the period in which the wrong portfolio, held too long, can do real and lasting damage. A portfolio that served someone beautifully through their fifties is rarely the right portfolio for the first decade of withdrawals. Waiting until the retirement date itself to reposition is not a plan. It is a hope. HOW WE REPOSITION PORTFOLIOS Repositioning is a multi-year process, not a single trade. We model honest cash-flow needs in dollars. We construct one to three years of withdrawals in stable, liquid reserves so no client is ever forced to sell equities into a falling market. We build an intermediate layer of high-quality bonds to refill those reserves over time. We sequence withdrawals across taxable, traditional, and Roth accounts to manage lifetime tax cost, often using the years before Social Security and required minimum distributions for thoughtful Roth conversions. We rightsized concentrated and legacy positions over multiple tax years. And we stress test the plan against a meaningful market drop in year one before any client crosses the retirement line. A CLOSING THOUGHT Sequence risk is not really a math problem. It is a human one. The discipline to reposition during good markets, when it can feel almost unnecessary, is what separates retirees who sleep well from those who reach for the wrong decision at the worst possible moment. By the time a dramatic market drop arrives, the work either has been done or it has not. Whether you are a long-time client of Affinity Capital or considering a relationship with our firm, we would welcome a conversation about how your portfolio is positioned for the years ahead.

What a Noisy World Means for Your Portfolio

March 26, 2026
If it feels like the news cycle has been louder than usual lately, that's because it has been. Geopolitical tensions across multiple regions, shifting U.S. trade relationships, and a rapidly changing domestic political landscape are all contributing to elevated market volatility. We want to take a moment to share our perspectives on what this means for your portfolio and for the broader inflation picture. What's Happening Globally We are in an extraordinary moment. The U.S. is reshaping its economic and geopolitical relationships in ways that are accelerating global fragmentation and creating real uncertainty for businesses and investors alike. Energy markets have been particularly sensitive to these developments, with commodity prices responding sharply to supply disruptions and shipping route concerns. Most forecasters believe current disruptions are short-lived and expect prices to moderate as conditions stabilize, but the range of outcomes remains wide. Closer to home, affordability has become the defining political issue heading into the midterm cycle. The administration is rolling out consumer-focused measures around housing costs, prescription drugs, and credit, which could benefit some sectors while creating headwinds for others. What This Means for Inflation The inflation picture is nuanced right now. If current disruptions prove temporary, the impact on consumer prices should remain limited. However, if tensions persist and energy prices stay elevated, we expect to see some upward pressure on inflation over time. It is worth keeping in mind that energy prices, while attention-grabbing, are historically less influential on long-term inflation than factors like wage growth and domestic demand. The broader U.S. picture reflects a tension between tariff-driven price pressure on one side and softening economic momentum on the other. The Fed is navigating this carefully, balancing inflation concerns against labor market signals. For now, rates appear likely to hold steady near term, with modest cuts possible later in the year if conditions warrant. How We're Thinking About Your Portfolio Volatility is uncomfortable, but it is not the enemy of long-term wealth building. History has demonstrated consistently that market disruptions driven by geopolitical events tend to be temporary in nature. Long-term investors are best served by staying anchored to their goals and risk parameters rather than reacting to the news of the day. This environment does reinforce several principles we apply in managing your portfolio: maintaining thoughtful diversification, ensuring fixed income allocations reflect your actual income needs, and being intentional about where inflation and energy exposure sits within your overall strategy. We are monitoring developments closely and will continue to adjust positioning as the picture becomes clearer. As always, if anything here raises questions specific to your situation, please reach out. That conversation is exactly what we are here for.

What the New Tax Legislations Mean for Your Tax Plan in 2026

March 12, 2026
If you’ve been paying attention to the tax landscape this year, you already know the ground has shifted. New tax legislations signed into law last July made sweeping changes to the federal tax code—and for high-net-worth individuals and families, the implications are significant. Let’s cut through the noise and share what we think matters most. First, the seven-bracket individual rate structure from the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act is now permanent. That means the top marginal rate stays at 37 percent. For years, many of us were planning around the possibility that rates would snap back to 39.6 percent in 2026. That’s off the table. If you’d been accelerating income into prior years to avoid a potential rate increase, it’s time to reassess that strategy. Second, the standard deduction was made permanent at its elevated level. For most of our clients, this doesn’t change the calculus—you’re likely itemizing anyway—but it’s worth noting if you have family members in simpler tax situations. Third, and this is the big one for estate planning: the federal lifetime gift and estate tax exemption is now permanently set at $15 million per individual, indexed for inflation. No more sunset. For married couples, that’s $30 million you can transfer free of federal estate tax—and that number will only grow with inflation adjustments. If you’ve been hesitating on gifting strategies because of uncertainty around the exemption, that uncertainty is gone. There are also new wrinkles in the charitable deduction rules. Starting this year, itemized charitable deductions are only available for amounts exceeding 0.5 percent of your adjusted gross income, and the deduction is capped at 35 percent for taxpayers in the top bracket. That’s a meaningful change from the prior 60 percent AGI limit for cash gifts. If philanthropy is part of your wealth plan—and for many of our clients, it is—we need to rethink how and when you give. The SALT deduction cap has also been adjusted, rising to roughly $40,000 with phase-outs starting around $500,000 in modified AGI. For those of us in Texas, the lack of a state income tax softens this blow, but if you hold property in high-tax states, it’s still relevant. Here’s our takeaway after thirty years of doing this: certainty in the tax code is rare. When you get it, act on it. The permanent nature of these provisions gives us a genuine planning window. Let’s not waste it. If you haven’t reviewed your tax plan since last summer, let’s schedule a conversation.