Keeping you informed and up to date.

The end of the financial year is rapidly approaching and now is certainly a great time to take steps to reduce your tax bill and put yourself in the best position for the next financial year. All too often tax planning is left to the last minute which makes it difficult to minimise tax, so…

Aspire Retire’s Olivia Maragna is featured in caricature style in today’s Courier Mail, thanks to James McCullough's City Beat column. download adobe cs6 Olivia Maragna is the Co-founder of Aspire Retire, a rapidly growing independent financial planning firm and has cracked the top 10 for the first time as one of Australia’s leading finance influencers sharing the list…

2013 Federal Budget Wrap Up from Aspire Retire Click here Federal Budget 2013      

Budget Summary 2013 Personal Income Tax Deferral of the 2015-16 tax cuts. The Government will defer tax cuts until the carbon price is projected to be above $25.40 in the Budget. This is essentially estimated to be in 2018-19.  Introduction of Disability Care Australia The significant reform is the introduction of DisabilityCare and the increase…

THE Budget has delivered better funding for school kids but little relief for families. People with disabilities and entrepreneurs are getting more funding, smokers are getting taxed more, and pensioners stand to benefit from selling their houses. Find out what the Budget means for you. If you’re thinking of having a baby… … it’s time…

Tonight, Wayne Swan handed down the 2013-14 Federal Budget with the expected headline that the Government is predicting an $18 billion deficit in 2013-14.  The Government predicts a return to a balanced Budget in 2015-16 and a Budget surplus in 2016-17. The key focus of this Budget was implementing the Government’s well-publicised education funding and…

The Reserve Bank has cut interest rates by a quarter percentage point to a historic low of 2.75% so it doesn’t surprise me when people start asking when the “right time” will be to fix? Australians now understand more than ever how the Reserve Bank of Australia uses interest rates to manage the economy. So…

Statement by Glenn Stevens, Governor: Monetary Policy Decision At its meeting today, the Board decided to lower the cash rate by 25 basis points to 2.75 per cent, effective 8 May 2013. The global economy is likely to record growth a little below trend this year, before picking up next year. Among the major regions,…

Winner proves she’s in for the long haul It’s a sobering statistic but less than 40 per cent of businesses that launched a decade ago are still around today, according to official figures. Worse, Australian Bureau of Statistics numbers show half never make it to their fourth year. It’s for this reason that Telstra’s 2008…

You’ve planned financially for your retirement and now that it is here … the time has come to travel and pursue those hobbies you’ve always wanted to try. That is, of course, unless you’ve somehow become a day care centre for your grand children. Are more and more retirees missing their window of opportunity to…

Negatively geared property investors lost an astonishing $13.2 billion in 2010-11. So will the government change the rules around this tax perk? RENTAL INCOME AND DEDUCTIONS There are now 1.76 million people in Australia who own an interest in a rental property. The figures identify negative gearing as one of the key drains on personal tax…

State of the States – State & territory economic performance report How are Australia’s states and territories performing? Each quarter CommSec attempts to find out by analysing eight key indicators: economic growth; retail spending; equipment investment; unemployment, construction work done; population growth; housing finance and dwelling commencements. Just as the Reserve Bank uses decade averages…