Web Smarts

www.aarp.scudder.com

WHAT: A site with tons of information for investors age 50 and older now offers free online investment courses.

BEST POINTS: The classes focus on three key areas: investment planning before you retire, stretching assets during retirement, and estate planning.

The easy-to-navigate site contains links to simple explanations of investing terms. (Learn about conduit IRAs, delayed retirement credits, Keogh money purchase pension plans, among others.)

The courses also include mini-calculators that estimate retirement income needs, how inflation will impact a nest egg, and life expectancy. Each section ends with quizzes to test your investing know-how.

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW: Don't look for investment advice. The site is strictly educational. While it promotes Scudder mutual-fund products, the courses are free of ads. To ease worries about inputting financial information, users can remain anonymous. Scudder has been the exclusive mutual fund provider of AARP since 1984.

Compiled by Staff

(c) Copyright 2001. The Christian Science Monitor