Posted on 12/17/2004 12:15:42 PM PST by Constitutionalist Conservative
Try this on for size. You’re seventy five years old. You live in the comfy home you’ve always lived in. You play golf in good weather. In bad weather, you travel to where it’s warm and sunny. When your grandchildren call, you take them out on the lake in your new boat. Your wife takes classes in the local college and paints. This is your life in retirement and it’s everything you always hoped and dreamed it would be.
Or, try this scenario: you are seventy-five years old. You live in a tiny apartment with the smell of boiled cabbage and noisy neighbors all around. You live in a scary neighborhood and you dare not go out after dark. Eating at restaurants is just a dream. Your apartment is too small to have your kids or grand kids visit. If you get sick and you have to spend time in nursing care, you don’t know how you’ll afford it. Your life is pure fear.
The fact is that if you are a baby boomer, one of the 77 million racing towards retirement, you have -- to a large extent--your choice of which of these retirement outcomes is yours. You get the good outcome or something like it if you start early, get a sensible, solid financial advisor, make a solid sensible plan for retirement savings, stick to it through thick and thin, accumulate diversified savings of stocks, mutual funds, bonds, real estate, variable annuities and foreign investments. You should accumulate an amount equal to roughly fifteen to twenty times what you need annually to live on–with allowances for pensions and social security. It’s a tall order, and it’s a bit scary to think about, but if you even come close to it, you get to have that great retirement life.
The point is, making sure you have a swell retirement is up to you. Not to Uncle Sam, usually not to your employer, not to your kids. You have to max out your IRA’s, your Keoghs, your 401K’s and do it sensibly, and then some. And you have to start with that all important plan.
Or, you can just be the happy go lucky grasshopper in your working years, not think about retirement, and then later, you get to live in terror. Which sounds better to you? I thought so. No matter how old you are, get started now and do the best you can.
Oh, you should know I am honorary spokesperson for National Retirement Planning Week. And, yes, I get paid for preaching to you. But your doctor also gets paid to tell you to stop smoking and eat green leafy vegetables. That doesn’t make us wrong.
and dont forget they have the hugest voting bloc.
Once I get out of college, I will be paying off that student loan debt....what a nightmare that will be....like paying off a new car loan for crying out loud.
you should check this out
With your kids....make sure to tell them to save early.
If they start at 25, it is amazing how much money one will have for retirement.
Yeah, you don't need a too expensive rv, but we sold our house after reading several books on Full Timing. the idea of renting it our did not appeal, and we could not even drive to our house with an rv, (streets to small and no parking). Lots of ppl do keep their homes, or even buy in a community that supports rv'ing, such as the Escapees rv club sponsors. Look into books and check out the escapees club for ideas to help in your planning. We started going to RV shows 5 years before we actually retired.
<<<I've just given up $58,914 at the age of 75.
In fifty years that $58,914 will be JUST ENOUGH to pay your property taxes for 6 months.
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We've been going to Wrightsville (live in Richmond, VA) for years. SE NC is a great area. A friend from Wrightsville opened a new place in Surf City called Buddy's, (named after himself, natch) a couple of years ago. It seems to be doing well.
I love it down there.
Any particular reason why I should read it? My retirement is well financed and getting better all the time.
The Mrs and I are very satisfied with how everything worked out for us.
I pinged you because you seem to take an interest in the subject? No offense... it seemed you found some where none was meant. Like pinging me to a 2nd Amendment article and me saying "hey I already have guns!" LOL!
Have a nice weekend, and thanks for the advice. Maybe I will call you for more info.
How much could one save per year probably with $20,000 in student loan debt to pay back? I want to pay as much as I can as soon as I can once I get out of college and get a real job instead of the part time stuff that pays crap while in college. But, I am acutely aware that even waiting until I am 30 to start saving for retirement will cut by a lot how much I can get saved than if I start out at 25. Man, I will be eating ramen noodles for a couple years or something...lol.
Certainly inflation must be taken into account, but even in Europe I doubt it would be that bad.
Many will suffer at the hands of this every growing government and out of control government spending.
All is well and good if you make enough to put some away! Looking at the average income for a single person, it looks to me that most people will have a hard time saving much.
Aeticles on retirement planning are for those who aren't retired. I retired in '98 and offered to show you some of the techniques I used to plan for it 30 years ago.
Not for my personal gain, just to help you setup a plan where SSI wouldn't be your only income which is too common today.
There are truckloads of material, videos, books and classes which someone can use. The key is doing it while you are young, not waiting until you are 50 something or waiting for Granny to die and leave you her fortune.
Yup ... and it isn't just people ... it's your kids! ;)
"Because there were no general savings, or education savings, the only thing they considered was household income. Even folks who are well-to-do will be eligible for some financial aid at the more expensive schools, if assets are primarily in home equity and retirement accounts."
I make under $40 grand a year, own a nice house, have had a son in private school for 9 years and when I went to get a school loan for the 10th year of private high school, I was denied. Why? BECAUSE OF MY INCOME TO DEBT RATIO!!! Translation, I did not have enough debt!@##$ I asked if I had a new car loan would I have been qualified and was told yes! Here I am spending frugally, ( some friends say CHEAP), and get turned down. Go figure.
Yup ... and it isn't just people ... it's your kids! ;)
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Over my dead body, lol!
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