The new tax code may mean you need a new strategy for giving. Depending on your personal tax situation, you might want to consider “bunching”: making two years’ worth of gifts in one year. This strategy could work if you make substantial gifts but still land just below your standard deduction threshold.

Entering the “real world” can be overwhelming; between starting a new job, navigating a new city and making new friends, dedicating time to think about your financial situation might be low on the priority list. However, the sooner you can take a proactive approach to your personal finance, the better.

You know the income tax code has changed for 2018, and you may have a vague idea of the impact to your situation. Most taxpayers are getting offsetting doses of positive and negative adjustments, and it is time to start thinking about some of the details and the planning implications. To help our clients start thinking about their personal situations, we hosted an educational event a few weeks ago to highlight some of the major changes in the new tax code.

Ben Yeager and David Wise provide a summary view of our investment committee’s latest research.

You’ve cleaned out the garage and straightened your closet, but when was the last time you organized something that truly mattered? Too many of us accumulate the debris of one-time financial decisions and never clean up: an old 401(k) that you haven’t rebalanced in years, 15-year-old tax documents sitting in your desk drawer, a permanent life insurance policy that hasn’t been properly funded and the list goes on

It’s easy to understand why spring is a favorite season for many North Carolinians. Flowers are blooming, temperatures are temperate, and there’s no shortage of fun events to enjoy with friends and family. To help you fill your spring weekends, we’ve rounded up a few of our favorite events going on across the Triangle this season.

If you’re looking to buy a new home or improve your current home, there are some things you should know about the new tax law, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which goes into effect for the 2018 tax year. In fact, the law may affect you as a homeowner, even if you aren’t making any changes to your address or spending money to renovate the place.

Chris Hostetler and Rusty Eriksen provide a summary view of our investment committee’s latest research.

“Black Wall Street,” a term coined by Booker T. Washington, describes the vast business developments on Parrish Street in the early 1900s. Located north of the Hayti Community, one of Durham’s largest African-American communities, Black Wall Street became a center of black life in Durham.

One important immediate update affects anybody who receives a salary. You may see a change in your net paycheck between now and February 15, because the IRS has just updated tax withholding rules to account for the new brackets and standard deductions. For some, this will mean a larger net paycheck, but others may receive a smaller net paycheck.

OK, we’re a week into the new year. Have you already cheated on your resolutions? We aren’t encouraging you to give up, but if you’d like to add some new resolutions – ones that would make your financial advisor proud – we have a few ideas.

At Hilltop, we are big fans of podcasts and blogs – this is a golden age for content, with a virtually infinite variety of topics and perspectives available. A client recently suggested we share our listening (and reading) list, and we figured now is a great time to share.

“Make a positive impact on the world around you.” It’s more than just a key element of Hilltop’s mission statement. We believe that making a difference in the lives of others is a critical component to living a fulfilling life.

When you retire, you don’t have to travel the world to expand your horizons. You can grow wherever you live. In our October retirement panel event, we explored several ways to make the most of your retirement.

Welcome to the first series of videos on the Hilltop Views blog! We just held our quarterly investment review and wanted to share what we are seeing in investments around the world.

One of the great joys we experience as advisors is living vicariously through clients of ours who are traveling the world. Often, this is the payoff for years of hard work and careful planning. So we were excited to host an educational panel recently, “Envision the Retirement of Your Dreams”, with speakers discussing a range of ways to make the most of your time after the career phase of life.

As the leaves turn and college sports kick into gear, we love what the Triangle offers this time of year. If you’re looking for the best ways to celebrate the season with family and friends, here are some of the things we are looking forward to.

Whether you’re collaborating on an annual report or organizing your favorite charity’s annual fundraiser, the team’s success depends on how well you work together. Good teamwork isn’t happenstance – the team’s chemistry can and should be built intentionally.

As you have probably heard by now, the Equifax credit bureau reported last week that their database was infiltrated by criminals between May and July of this year. According to Equifax, the criminals gathered information on 143 million people, including names, Social Security numbers, birth dates, addresses, and some driver’s license numbers.

We take it for granted now that the world is becoming more globalized every year. This can be seen in the production of goods – NPR’s Planet Money produced a series in 2013 following the production of a simple T-shirt, showing how cotton makes its way from the US to Asia or South America for production and back again to the US for sale.