Tools

U.S. News & World Report featured a review of five free retirement planning tools that can be found online. The review includes retirement planning software from: AARP Fidelity MetLife T. Rowe Price The U.S. Department of Labor The general conclusion is that the tools do "an inconsitent and poor job," often ignoring critical factors such as longevity risk , inflation and medical expenses. Source: U.S. News & World Report Full Story

A good article from Investment News on the use of calculators for Roth IRA conversion calculators. Deciding whether to convert to a Roth IRA is fairly complex. There are a number of variables that come into play such as tax rates, investment returns, inflation rates, etc. Faulty assumptions for any one of the factors will produce faulty results and possibly poor decisions. Free, web-based calculators are often less robust than those used by financial advisors. Calculators and other analytical...