Harding Wealth

01/23/2026

Allow us to reintroduce ourselves...

Allow me to reintroduce ourselves.

09/05/2025

A potential client recently asked me about a premium-financed IUL policy they were considering. Of course, the salesperson was glossing over the major risks and using funny math to portray the potential benefits... So let me unpack the 'myth vs. reality' on these kinds of offerings:

Myth 1: “The policy pays for itself.”

Reality: The strategy depends on borrowing money. Loan costs fluctuate with interest rates, and the insurer can adjust caps and charges. If the assumptions don’t hold, you’ll have to post collateral or pay out of pocket.

Myth 2: “You’ll get tax-free retirement income forever.”

Reality: Tax-free loans from the policy only work if the contract stays in force for life. If it lapses or underperforms, the IRS treats the outstanding loan as taxable income. This “phantom income” event can trigger a huge tax bill when you’re least prepared.

Myth 3: “It’s low-risk because of the index crediting.”

Reality: Index crediting isn’t guaranteed. Carriers set caps (the maximum return credited) and participation rates (the percentage of the index gain you receive). They can reduce these at any time, which cuts long-term performance dramatically.

Myth 4: “This is a proven wealth strategy for the ultra-affluent.”

Reality: Yes, some wealthy families use premium financing — but usually with liquidity to spare, and as part of a highly managed estate plan. For most investors, it’s not “proven,” it’s speculative. The wrong sequence of rates and returns can collapse the whole plan.

Myth 5: “It beats investing directly.”

Reality: If you can already invest in markets directly, paying layers of insurance costs plus loan interest is usually less efficient. Premium financing only “works” on paper if illustrated returns stay high and borrowing costs stay low — both very uncertain.

Myth 6: “The insurance agent wouldn’t recommend it if it wasn’t safe.”

Reality: Premium-financed IUL pays some of the highest commissions in the industry. Sales incentives can cloud judgment. Always ask who benefits more: you, or the person selling it.
..I don't believe an actual policy has ever outperformed the illustration used to sell that policy. Remember that and beware.

09/03/2025

A ten year financial plan isnt valuable; too many assumptions are needed.

A ten year relationship with someone who adapts your plan to your ever-changing life is much better.

08/29/2025

As a firm, Harding Wealth Inc. recently hit a milestone we'd had our eyes on for a couple years.

What matters here isn't the specific milestone -- I won't mention what it is because, frankly, it doesn't matter whether it's a small or medium or big number.

What does matter, however, is that we wouldn't have been able to reach this number without doing impactful work which makes us worthy of retaining. I like what that suggests about what we're building.

At the end of the day, specific goals are just guesses and not much changes after you hit a number. You know this because that one time you breached a six-figure income or a million dollars in your portfolio or something like that, nothing changed after.... You just had to set a new target.

But along the way it's worth taking a peak in the rearview to give credit to how far you've come.

Shoutout to the HW team for bringing us this far.

08/05/2025

This week we sent a 5 year old to his first day at Kindergarten. We revisited some lessons learned along the way. Read more here:

Did you know the word ‘kindergarten’ means ‘Don’t buy meme stocks’ in German?

03/14/2025

Markets are doing what markets do.

Time to keep some perspective.

Gratitude.

07/18/2024

All of the most sophisticated people say things like “Dude. Exactly.” when talking to the Wall Street Journal.

See here:

A viral X post asking whether to give your beneficiaries the money today, or let them wait to inherit it, has drawn more than 10 million views

06/20/2024

(posted by Adam Harding)

If you work at NVIDIA and have stock, I'm begging you to spend some time unpacking a very simple word:

Enough.

Specifically, how much is enough?

I recall a conversation I had back with someone in 2021. The person had about $12m in Netflix stock and a $15m net worth.

As I typically do in early prospect discussions, I asked them what they wanted their life to look like and they said things like "feel financially free", "sleep well at night", "spend more time volunteering" and "buy a cabin and spend more time there with our two boys (ages 3 & 5)".

I said, "cool, you can have all of those things right now, but we need to reconsider your concentrated stock position." They pushed back -- after all, look how far they'd come from that single stock. I get it.

(For the record, my position has nothing to do with the Netflix -- it could have been any stock and I likely would've said the same thing.)

Over the next few months, NFLX dropped 75% before they elected to diversify.

The difference between a $6m and $15m net worth is pretty substantial where they live. Don't get me wrong, $6m is still a lot, but you're definitely not sleeping as well and a cabin isn't too sensible.

As of today, NFLX is almost back to it's pre-crash levels and they can heed that advice or not (they didn't become a client), but one thing is for certain:

Those kids are now 6 and 8 and those three years aren't coming back.

Remember why you're investing and see if you can align your strategy with that.
..And if you need some tactics to wrap your mind around diversifying your NVDA position, here are some mental gymnastics:

Tactic #1: If you have $X worth of stock, ask yourself "If I had $X in cash and not stock, would I feel comfortable placing a buy order today for $X?"... Aside from capital gains taxes, electing to hold a security is akin to buying it. However, folks tend to hold things while having far less conviction than they'd need in order to buy the same things.

Tactic #2: Consider hedging both your fear of loss and your fear of missing out. You do this by taking a meaningful diversifying measure to protect against getting blindsided while still keeping a position which helps you feel like you're part of the move you've participated in up to this point.

Tactic #3: I took two Ubers in LA last week -- both drivers asked me what I thought of NVDA and told me their son/brother/nephew or whatever had suggested they buy too... Ask yourself "are the buyers at these levels the early, sophisticated investors or those who are anchoring their opinions to recent performance?".... Think of the person on the other side of the transaction and then choose who you want to be.

Look, at the end of the day this isn't about future performance of an investment, it's about the future layout of your life and making sure the vision board gets realized.

If you have enough, pat yourself on the back and make some moves to protect it.

06/17/2024

You get on the ride knowing there’s a designated endpoint….Then it gets wild.

You deal with it because unbuckling yourself and jumping off mid-ride is more dangerous than the ride itself.

Investing is like this — Know your endpoint before you get on the ride; it makes the ups and downs easier to stomach.

This is from page 49 of a book we recently published.

If you want a copy, email [email protected] and let us know!

06/07/2024

Sell in May and Go Away? Not so fast.

Here's the average S&P 500 performance by month, along with the long term chart of S&P 500 price for the full year or if you sell in May and Go Away until October.

Our position? Don't follow this rhyming advice. Instead, make buying or selling decisions based on three things:

(1) When do you need to have cash instead of stock?
(2) What do you need the cash for and how flexible are you about needing it?
(3) How comfortable are you with the ups and downs of the market?

06/04/2024

The investor's behavior typically matters more than the investment.

Remember that.

07/17/2023

Last year we briefly touched on a 20% decline for US stocks, and that isn't reflected here.

However, in nine out of the 15 bear markets since 1929, investors who stayed the course made back their losses within a year. If you stayed put, odds are that last year's losses have been largely recovered too.

If you didn't stay put, I only request one thing:

Please stop playing short term games with long term money. It's a recipe for disaster.

Past performance isn't indicative of future results.