Recently, more mutual funds have been focusing on effective tax-management. These funds try to not only buy shares in good companies, but also minimize tax burden on shareholders by holding those shares for extended periods of time. By investing in funds geared towards "tax-managed" returns, you can increase your net gains and save yourself some tax-related headaches. To be worthwhile, though, a tax-efficient fund must have both ingredients: good investment performance and low taxable distributions to shareholders.

4. Missing Deadlines

Keogh plans, traditional IRAs, and Roth IRAs are great ways to stretch your investing dollars and provide for your future retirement. Sadly, millions of investors let these gems slip through their fingers by failing to make contributions before applicable IRS deadlines. For Keogh plans, deadline is December 31. For traditional and Roth IRA's, you have until April 15 to make contributions. Mark these dates in your calendar and make those deposits on time.

5. Putting Investments In The Wrong Accounts

Most investors have two types of investment accounts: tax-advantaged, such as an IRA or 401(k), and traditional. What many people don't realize is that holding right type of assets in each account can save them thousands of dollars each year in unnecessary taxes.

Generally, investments that produce lots of taxable income or short-term capital gains should be held in tax advantaged accounts, while investments that pay dividends or produce long-term capital gains should be held in traditional accounts.

For example, let's say you own 200 shares of Duke Power, and intend to hold shares for several years. This investment will generate a quarterly stream of dividend payments, which will be taxed at 15% or less, and a long-term capital gain or loss once it is finally sold, which will also be taxed at 15% or less. Consequently, since these shares already have a favorable tax treatment, there is no need to shelter them in a tax-advantaged account.

In contrast, most treasury and corporate bond funds produce a steady stream of interest income. Since, this income does not qualify for special tax treatment like dividends, you will have to pay taxes on it at your marginal rate. Unless you are in a very low tax bracket, holding these funds in a tax-advantaged account makes sense because it allows you to defer these tax payments far into future, or possibly avoid them altogether.

Investors need to be careful, though. Most floating rate loans are made to below-investment-grade companies. While there are provisions in these loans to help ease pain in case of a default, investors should still look for funds that have a broadly diversified portfolio and a good track record for avoiding troubled companies.

3.Short-term bond funds

Another option for bond investors is to shift their holdings from intermediate and long-term bond funds into short-term bond funds (those with average maturities between 1 and 3 years). While prices of short-term bond funds do fall when interest rates rise, they do not fall as fast or as far as their longer-term cousins. And historically, decline in value of these short-term bond funds is more than offset by their yields, which gradually increase as rates climb.

4.Money-market funds

If capital preservation is your concern, money market funds are for you. A money-market fund is a special type of mutual fund that invests only in very short-term money market instruments. Since these instruments usually mature within 60 days, they are not affected by changes in market interest rates. As a result, funds that invest in them are able to maintain a stable net asset value, usually $1.00 per share, even when interest rates climb.

While money-market funds are safe, their yields are so low they hardly qualify as investments. In fact, average seven-day yield on money-market funds is just 0.70 percent. Since average management fee for these funds is 0.60 percent, it does not take a genius to see that putting your capital in a money-market fund is only slightly better than stashing it under your mattress. But, because yields on money-market funds track changes in market rates with only a short lag, these funds could be yielding substantially more than 0.70 percent by end of year if Federal Reserve continues to hike rates as expected.

5.Bond ladders

“Laddering” your bond portfolio simply means buying individual bonds with staggered maturities and holding them until they mature. Since you are holding these bonds for their full duration, you will be able to redeem them for face value regardless of their current market value. This strategy allows you to not only avoid ravages of higher rates, it also allows you to use these higher rates to your advantage by reinvesting proceeds from your maturing bonds in newly-issued bonds with higher coupon rates. Diversifying your bond portfolio among 2-year, 3-year, and 5-year Treasuries is a good start to a laddering strategy. As rates rise, you can then broaden ladder to include longer maturity bonds.