Registered Education Savings Plans were first introduced in 1974. The program encourages Canadians to save more towards the post-secondary education of their children.
By Mark Halpern, CFP, TEP

It’s that time of   Read More

Toronto tax lawyer Samantha Prasad warns that all is not fair in love and taxes. The CRA may not have the same misty-eyed view of sharing as you and your   Read More

Will the tranquility of your family cottage dissipate when planning for, and financing, succession of ownership? Trust and estate planner Mark Halpern offers some solutions.
Many Investor’s Digest readers are fortunate   Read More

In the market for a cottage as a second home? Then now is the time for proper tax planning, muses Toronto tax lawyer Samantha Prasad from her vacation home on   Read More

Mark Halpern, CEO of WEALTHinsurance.com®, offers several ways to reduce your taxes and accumulate much more for your retirement.
Paying attention to your RRSPs and TFSAs all year-round pays off. The   Read More

Will the tranquility of your family cottage dissipate when planning for, and financing, succession of ownership? Trust and estate planner Mark Halpern offers some solutions.
Many Investor’s Digest readers are fortunate   Read More

Mark Halpern, CEO of WEALTHinsurance.com®, offers several ways to reduce your taxes and accumulate much more for your retirement.
Paying attention to your RRSPs and TFSAs all year-round pays off. The   Read More

Toronto tax lawyer Samantha Prasad warns that all is not fair in love and taxes. The CRA may not have the same misty-eyed view of sharing as you and your   Read More

DRIPs (Dividend Re-Investment Plans) and cash option plans let individual investors build their wealth. That’s thanks to these dozen advantages.
Your stack of cash will grow more   Read More

Why can’t you have your cake and eat it too? Tax lawyer Samantha Prasad offers suggestions for conservative, cash-conscious investors to minimize the tax-man’s slice.
For those conservative investors out there,   Read More

The grim reaper is not going to hang around and wait for you to get organized. He works on his own schedule. Trust and Estate Practitioner Mark Halpern has both   Read More

Wayfair’s ‘ear worm’ struck a chord with tax collectors across the USA who expect e-commerce vendors to collect and remit state sales taxes. Do you sell into the USA by   Read More

Tax lawyer Samantha Prasad says: Be firm in your facts and courteous in your deportment. Both go a long way in resolving disputes with the Canada Revenue Agency.
[caption id=”attachment_7660″ align=”alignright”   Read More

The grim reaper is not going to hang around and wait for you to get organized. He works on his own schedule. Trust and Estate Practitioner Mark Halpern has both   Read More

You receive passive income through ventures that require little daily effort on your part and business activities in which you do not materially participate during the year. Mark Halpern, CFP,   Read More

Accountant Mark Goodfield, aka The Blunt Bean Counter,
No one does a ‘high five’ over a capital loss, especially if you can’t use it as an offset.   Read More

2018 was a poor year for most Canadian stock funds and you may have received some shocking tax reporting slips this month. But now, it’s too late to do anything   Read More

You receive passive income through ventures that require little daily effort on your part and business activities in which you do not materially participate during the year. Mark Halpern, CFP,   Read More

Accountant, income tax and wealth management adviser Mark Goodfield (aka The Blunt Bean Counter) walks us through the process of planning for and using capital losses to offset capital gains   Read More

If you’ve got a case of the January credit card blues, you should first use your cash flow to repay high-interest debt. As high-interest debt melts away, you’ll have more   Read More

Trusts are a great family estate-planning vehicle. However, in 2018, the federal government announced new measures that relate to the tax-reporting requirements for trusts. Tax lawyer and regular TaxLetter columnist   Read More

You have gone through a major change—you’ve sold the business that took up a huge part of your life. Just as you made careful decisions while building, growing and then   Read More

RRSPs, RRIFs, TFSAs, PPPs, critical illness insurance, long-term care insurance, high-limit disability insurance, life insurance, joint-and-last-to-die insurance, charitable donations at death—no wonder we get so tired as we get older!   Read More

We’re approaching that time of year when many mutual funds distribute the capital gains they’ve realized throughout the year to their unit holders. This event should serve as a reminder   Read More

When it comes to getting married, there is always a honeymoon period. But we know from experience that difficulties arise in life. To get the financial peace of mind you   Read More

It’s best to contribute as much as you can to both your RRSP and your TFSA. But that’s hard to do. The Investment Reporter outlines two strategies to assist you   Read More

You already know the importance of defence against too much taxation. But most people are heavily focused on offence while building their business, real estate and investment portfolios. Mark Halpern,   Read More

Now is a good time to consider the various ways you might be able to minimize your 2018 taxes—before the onslaught of the holiday season becomes uppermost on your mind.   Read More

RRSPs, RRIFs, TFSAs, PPPs, critical illness insurance, long-term care insurance, high-limit disability insurance, life insurance, joint-and-last-to-die insurance, charitable donations at death—no wonder we get so tired as we get older!   Read More

You have gone through a major change—you’ve sold the business that took up a huge part of your life. Just as you made careful decisions while building, growing and then   Read More

Family trusts are becoming increasingly common and are now the norm for many families—even those without yachts! Tax lawyer Samantha Prasad, a contributing editor to The TaxLetter, describes how a   Read More

Investor’s Digest of Canada columnist Mark Halpern, CEO of WEALTHinsurance.com®, answers the seven most-frequently asked questions about retirement problems. He offers cost-efficient and tax-efficient solutions that will safeguard your finances   Read More

Accountant Mark Goodfield, aka The Blunt Bean Counter, warned The TaxLetter readers in April about new reporting rules regarding the sale of a principal residence. Simply put, if you sold   Read More

RRSPs, RRIFs, TFSAs, PPPs, critical illness insurance, long-term care insurance, high-limit disability insurance, life insurance, joint-and-last-to-die insurance, charitable donations at death—no wonder we get so tired as we get older!   Read More

Investor’s Digest of Canada columnist Mark Halpern, CEO of WEALTHinsurance.com®, answers the seven most-frequently asked questions about retirement problems. He offers cost-efficient and tax-efficient solutions that will safeguard your finances   Read More

Accountant Mark Goodfield, aka The Blunt Bean Counter, warned The TaxLetter readers in April about new reporting rules regarding the sale of a principal residence. Simply put, if you sold   Read More

Accountant Mark Goodfield (aka The Blunt Bean Counter) recently warned subscribers to The TaxLetter of some costly common investment mistakes and how to avoid them.
The duplication of investments is one   Read More

Contributing TaxLetter columnist Mark Halpern, CFP, TEP, spends a lot of time with generous and fortunate people who will have accumulated a lot of money by the time they die.   Read More

Even better than borrowing from the bank of mom and dad is borrowing from yourself—or at least borrowing from your RRSP. Just remember that the taxman is probably not as   Read More

The TaxLetter contributing editor Mark Halpern recalls Martin Luther King’s sagacious advice: “If we are to go forward, we must go back.” When it comes to planning your financial future,   Read More

Strip bonds are well suited for RRSPs, RRIFs or TFSAs. They offer many advantages, such as certainty when planning for income. Remember, however, it’s best to hold strips inside a   Read More

A new version of draft legislation related to the tax on split income (TOSI) rules was introduced on Dec. 13, 2017, theoretically in effect as of Jan. 1, 2018. We   Read More

Columnist Mark Halpern shares his insight and analysis on using a Canadian insurance policy to protect your assets from the tax man. It’s a tax-smart investing strategy that honest, hard-working   Read More

“Sometimes governments think that civil society are a pain but I have always said that if only a government can listen to one or two things that civil society says   Read More

The federal taxman is back! However, columnist Mark Halpern tells tax-paying Canadians not to fret. He has some professional tax-smart investing strategies for the seasoned investor as well as basic   Read More

Pondering taxes can be a headache-inducing exercise so we hope not to compound the after effects of anyone’s riotous holiday partying. In any event, TaxLetter columnist Mark Goodfield (aka The   Read More

It’s that time of year when many of us are thinking of both gift giving and tax planning opportunities. Contributing editor to The TaxLetter, Mark Halpern, CFP, TEP, is a   Read More

The TaxLetter contributing editor Samantha Prasad, LL.B, offers a number of ideas to help you minimize the tax impact on your will so you can leave as much of your   Read More

At some point you may have been asked if you’re agreeable to being named an executor of an estate. You may have forgotten all about it until a long-lost cousin   Read More

There’s a lot going on these days for those with private corporations and those without. You owe it to yourself to preserve your hard-earned money for the people and causes   Read More

“It’s a cruel, (cruel), cruel summer/Leaving me here on my own/It’s a cruel, (it’s a cruel), cruel summer/Now you’re gone”. British pop artists Bananarama weren’t singing about Canadians’ 2017 proposed   Read More

Selling the family cottage (or, depending on where you live in Canada, the cabin, the bungalow, the lake, the chalet, the camp, the shack, the farm or the summer house)   Read More