Anthem Advisors

08/31/2026

Grateful for the opportunity to attend the James Wessel Event with Vantage Leadership Initiative last week. We appreciated the meaningful conversations, new connections, and time spent with such a strong community.

08/28/2026

Plenty of people like the idea of investing according to their faith. What stops them is the accounts they already have.

Faith-based investing is simple in concept. Your portfolio favors companies doing work worth supporting and avoids the ones whose business runs counter to biblical principles. Getting there from an existing 401(k), IRA, and brokerage account takes a little more than a good intention.

So we start by looking. We pull your statements and walk through what is actually inside those funds. For most people this is the first time anyone has shown them.
From there it becomes a plan. Some accounts can be repositioned right away.
Others have tax consequences worth timing carefully. We take it in the order that makes sense for you.

You do not have to overhaul everything this week. You just have to look.

anthemwealthadvisors.com/investment-management

Maximize your investments with strategic, personalized management at Anthem Wealth Advisors. We craft portfolios that reflect your goals, risk tolerance, and values.

08/26/2026

A lot of people assume that once they're on Medicare, the Part B premium is a set number they can pencil into the budget for good. It resets every year, and most years it climbs.



For 2026, the standard Part B premium is $202.90 a month, up from $185.00 in 2025. That's close to a ten percent jump in a single year. And that's only the base. IRMAA rides on top of it for higher earners, and those brackets move every year too.



The fix is simple. Build the climb into your plan from the start. When we map out a retirement, we assume healthcare costs drift upward over time, because pretending they'll hold flat only sets you up for a surprise later.



It works like the property taxes on a home you own free and clear. The mortgage is long gone, but that tax bill still shows up every year, and it rarely shrinks.



If your plan treats Medicare as a fixed cost, it's worth a second look. Let's make sure it accounts for the climb, so nothing catches you off guard down the road.

08/24/2026

Why are long-term Treasury yields continuing to climb? In this week’s Anthem Angle, Davis Mobley explores the message coming from the bond market, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s move to increase long-term Treasury buybacks, and why some of the most expensive investing mistakes happen when emotions take control.

08/21/2026

Not many people know this one, and it has saved folks real money. If IRMAA hits you because of an old high-income year, you may be able to ask Medicare to reconsider.

Here's the situation I see most. Someone retires, their income drops like a stone, and then a Medicare letter arrives charging a surcharge based on their last big working year two years back. On paper they look wealthy. In real life, that income is gone.

For cases like that, Social Security allows an appeal. Retiring or cutting back your hours counts as a life-changing event. So do marriage, divorce, losing a spouse, or losing a pension. You file a form called SSA-44, show them what your income looks like now, and they can reset the surcharge to fit your real situation.

It works a little like a bill that was clearly meant for the old you. You don't just pay it and move on. You call, you explain, and you get it corrected.

Plenty of good people quietly overpay for a year simply because no one told them the appeal exists. If you've had a real income change and IRMAA showed up anyway, let's take a look. It may be worth filing.

08/17/2026

Most people approaching retirement focus hard on one number, which is how much they've saved. The other half of the equation is how much they'll need to spend every month, and that side stays within your control right up until the day you stop working.

I sat with a couple recently who are working hard at that second half. They're paying extra on the house each month with a payoff date already circled on the calendar. The day that ends, the whole payment rolls straight onto the car loan, and by their math it disappears about a year later. Their aim is to walk into retirement owing nobody anything.

Here's what makes that so powerful. Every payment you retire before you stop working lowers the income you'll need for the rest of your life. Savings gets all the attention, and it should.

For them it's already showing up in a real way. Once those payments are gone, the extra part-time hours he's been putting in become optional. That's the whole point of the exercise. A shorter list of obligations turns into a shorter list of things you have to do.

It works a lot like taking weight out of a backpack before a long hike. Same person, same trail, same distance. Every mile just costs you less.

And the money those payments free up doesn't vanish. It becomes margin. Room for giving, for the trips you've been talking about for years, for the surprises that show up most in every retirement.

If you're a few years out and still carrying payments, this stretch right here is the best window you'll get. Let's map out the order to knock them out in and look at what it frees up on the other side.

08/14/2026

There's a hard turn in the road that catches widows and widowers off guard, and I'd rather you see it before you're on it.

When one spouse passes away, the survivor usually files taxes as single from then on. And the income lines that trigger IRMAA are far lower for a single filer than for a couple, close to half. So the very same income that kept you comfortably under the line as two can push the one who's left into a surcharge.

Sit with how that feels. You've lost your spouse. You've likely lost one of the two Social Security checks, maybe part of a pension. Your income went down, and your Medicare premium climbs anyway. It's a gut punch stacked on top of grief.

The good news is this one can be softened ahead of time. Some couples do Roth conversions together in their earlier retirement years, so there's less taxable income later for the survivor to trip over. It's a quiet act of care for whoever ends up alone.

It's a little like leaving the porch light on for someone coming home after you've turned in. A small thing you set up now, so the person you love isn't left fumbling in the dark.

If you're a couple heading into your Medicare years, this is worth looking at together, long before it ever becomes real.

08/12/2026

You probably know what your portfolio is worth. Do you know what it owns?

When you invest, you are buying small pieces of real companies. Those companies do real things in the world every day. They hire people, make products, and treat their workers and communities one way or another.

Faith-based investing means we pay attention to that.

We look for companies doing work worth supporting. Providing quality healthcare. Creating steady jobs. Treating people fairly.

We steer away from companies whose business runs counter to biblical principles or brings harm to vulnerable people.

Your portfolio still must do its job. Growth, income, a level of risk you can live with, all of it matters. This adds one more question to the process, which is whether the companies you own reflect what you believe.

Most people have never been asked that question about their own money. It is a good one to sit with.

Want to know what your portfolio is actually invested in? Let's talk.

anthemwealthadvisors.com/investment-management

Maximize your investments with strategic, personalized management at Anthem Wealth Advisors. We craft portfolios that reflect your goals, risk tolerance, and values.

08/11/2026

Extraordinary returns often come with extraordinary risk. In this week’s Anthem Angle, Davis Mobley examines the story of Situational Awareness and the dangers of excessive leverage, along with why Sequence of Returns Risk is an important consideration when building a sustainable retirement income plan.

08/07/2026

When folks hear their Medicare premium depends on their income, they usually picture the number at the bottom of their tax return. The one Medicare watches sits a little higher up, and it tends to be bigger than people expect.

It's called your Modified Adjusted Gross Income, or MAGI. Think of it as your income before most of your deductions get to work, with one surprise folded in. Your tax-free municipal bond interest counts too. You never pay income tax on it, and it still lands in the MAGI that sets your surcharge.

That catches good savers off guard. Capital gains from selling something, a required IRA withdrawal, the taxable slice of your Social Security, it all feeds this one number. And the deductions you count on to shrink your tax bill often do little to shrink your MAGI.

I think of MAGI like the ID they check at the door. Whatever it says is the number that counts.

If you're near Medicare or already on it, it's worth knowing your MAGI before you make a big move, so you can see a surcharge coming while there's still time to plan around it.