Five Minute Finance

What if your health insurance decision is easier than that giant benefits packet makes it look? Every year, you’re asked to pick a plan without knowing whether your family will barely see a doctor or spend half the year in waiting rooms.

This week, Matt and I cut through the noise: three numbers, two very different years, and a quick test that can expose the plans you probably shouldn’t pick. When one plan wins in a healthy year and another wins when things go sideways → Things get interesting.

That’s where your comfort with risk matters more than any spreadsheet. Before you throw darts at the enrollment form, tune in.

Find out more about Mike at https://www.mortonfinancialadvice.com and connect at https://www.linkedin.com/in/mwsmorton/

What if the biggest skeleton in your financial closet is money you forgot about? I tried the government’s retirement-account search tool and found a lead on a $15,000 401k from my very first job.

Matt and I get into the financial ghosts that follow you through job changes, family changes, and old account decisions, including one beneficiary mistake that can make life miserable for the people you love.

Finding the account is only half the story. You still have to figure out what to do with it. Come see what might be hiding in your own financial past.

A Five Minute Task for Your Family: Check Your Beneficiaries

Draft email to loved ones:

Hi everyone,

Here's a little financial housekeeping task that could save our family a lot of headaches down the road.

Please take a few minutes to review the beneficiaries listed on financial accounts and make sure everything is up to date.

A few things to check:

• Retirement accounts: Review the beneficiaries on your 401(k), IRA, and other retirement plans.
• Bank and investment accounts: Check whether you've designated beneficiaries where the account allows it.
• Life insurance: Make sure the people listed on your policies are still the people you want to receive the benefits.
• Life changes: Think about whether marriages, divorces, births, deaths, or other family changes mean any designations need updating.
• Primary and contingent beneficiaries: Check both who inherits first and who inherits if your first choice can't.
• Per stirpes: If this option appears, understand what it means for your grandchildren or other descendants before selecting it.

One important reminder: Your will doesn't necessarily control who inherits accounts with named beneficiaries. Those designations generally take precedence, so it's worth checking them separately.

Most financial institutions let you review and update beneficiaries through your online account. You don't have to tackle everything at once. Even checking one account today is a good start.

Salutations,

Your Loving Family

Find out more about Mike at https://www.mortonfinancialadvice.com and connect at https://www.linkedin.com/in/mwsmorton/

Your tax deadline is April 15, right? Not exactly. Matt and I walk through three different “doors” that close at three different times, and the first one may be hiding in your Q4 paychecks. We get into what to check now if you want to max out your 401(k), why late-year withholding can be surprisingly useful if a bonus, RSUs, or capital gains knocked your tax payments off course, and which moves really do need to be finished before December 31.

Then there’s the good-news door: a few 2026 contributions can still happen in 2027. The goal here is not to give you more year-end stress. It's to keep you from discovering a deadline after it’s already passed.

Find out more about Mike at https://www.mortonfinancialadvice.com and connect at https://www.linkedin.com/in/mwsmorton/

AI feels private, but how much of your financial life should you actually put into a chatbot? Matt and I look at the line between useful context and oversharing, including the information I would keep out of an AI prompt, how privacy settings differ across consumer and business tools, and why anonymizing your question can still get you a strong answer.

We also get into the bigger financial risk: AI can sound completely confident even when you forgot to give it the one fact that changes the recommendation. I’ll show you how I use AI as a research assistant, when I stop trusting the chatbot to make the call, and the simple question to ask before a real financial decision leaves the screen and hits your account.

Find out more about Mike at https://www.mortonfinancialadvice.com and connect at https://www.linkedin.com/in/mwsmorton/

Free $1,000 for your child sounds like an easy yes. But should you put another $5,000 into a Trump Account, or would that money work harder somewhere else? Matt and I break down who gets the free money, what these new accounts can and can’t do, and where they belong alongside your retirement savings, 529s and Roth IRAs. Plus, I share a tax strategy that could turn a decent benefit today into a much bigger opportunity for your child later.

Find out more about Mike at https://www.mortonfinancialadvice.com and connect at https://www.linkedin.com/in/mwsmorton/

An LLC and an S corp are not the same thing, and confusing the two can leave you paying for complexity you don't need. Join me and Matt this week as we break down what an LLC actually protects, why it doesn't automatically save you money on taxes, how an S corp election works, and the surprisingly complicated math behind those promised tax savings.

We also walk through the roughly $100,000 profit threshold where an S corp becomes worth investigating, the QBI and Solo 401(k) gotchas that can change the calculation, and a simple way to figure out whether your business has actually reached the point where any of this is worth your time.

Find out more about Mike at https://www.mortonfinancialadvice.com and connect at https://www.linkedin.com/in/mwsmorton/

Everyone told you to keep three to six months of expenses in cash. That number hasn't aged well. This week Matt and I break down why the old rule is broken, the two-pile system that stops you from lying to yourself about what's actually an emergency, and the floor times runway formula I use instead of a flat multiplier.

We also get into where that money should actually live once your portfolio grows, and why, in this AI-era job market, your runway might need to be a lot longer than you think. If you've got cash sitting around and you're not sure whether it's too much, too little, or in the wrong place, this one's for you.

Find out more about Mike at https://www.mortonfinancialadvice.com and connect at https://www.linkedin.com/in/mwsmorton/

Artificial intelligence is making it easier than ever to do things yourself—but that doesn't always mean you should. Join me and Matt Robison this week as we explore the hidden opportunity cost of AI, why "saving money" can sometimes cost you hours of valuable time, and how to decide which tasks are worth outsourcing versus handling yourself. You'll also learn practical strategies for avoiding AI rabbit holes, evaluating the true value of your time, and using AI as a tool rather than letting it become another item on your ever-growing to-do list.

Find out more about Mike at https://www.mortonfinancialadvice.com and connect at https://www.linkedin.com/in/mwsmorton/

A child's first summer job can become far more valuable than a paycheck when paired with a Roth IRA. Join us this week to learn who qualifies, how custodial Roth IRAs work, contribution limits for 2026, why parents can fund the account even if kids spend their earnings, and how decades of tax-free compounding can turn relatively small contributions into life-changing retirement savings. It also covers documentation requirements, options for younger children, and practical ways to use the account as a financial education tool.

Find out more about Mike at https://www.mortonfinancialadvice.com and connect at https://www.linkedin.com/in/mwsmorton/

The wealthy don't avoid taxes because they have secret tricks—they operate under a completely different financial framework built around ownership rather than income. Would the "Buy, Borrow, Die" strategy work for you? No, probably not. Learn why most people can't replicate it, and the practical lessons everyday investors can apply to build wealth more tax-efficiently. Shifting from earning to owning can change your long-term financial trajectory, join me and Matt to learn how!

Find out more about Mike at https://www.mortonfinancialadvice.com and connect at https://www.linkedin.com/in/mwsmorton/