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Thursday, July 20, 2006

Don’t Buy A New Car And Retire Earlier

I’ll admit it. Having a new car is pretty darn nice. But according to an article in Finance News, a British publication, upgrading your car less often can really help your retirement savings. “Replace your car every five years instead of every three years and boost your pension by almost �240,000.” In American dollars, that’s $437,666 according to a quick currency conversion. The article doesn’t tell us that we shouldn’t spend money now, but it stresses the importance of finding a balance between spending for a good life now and saving for a good life later. Read the article.

Monday, July 17, 2006

More Financial Calculators Than You Can Shake a Stick At

Need a financial calculator? Have I got a site for you. Check out dinkytown.net. Actually, the retirement section will probably be of most interest to readers of Talking Retirement, but I found the mortgage calculators helpful too.

Tuesday, July 11, 2006

How Much Do I Need To Save?

In the Chicago Tribune’s Get real numbers to find what you’ll need to retire you’ll get an overview of a goal that’s really tough to pin down: exactly how much money do you need to save. The article basically points us to several online financial calculators, but doing multiple calculations from multiple sites will give you some numbers to start with. The sites they recommend are “www.troweprice.com, http://www.vanguard.com and http://www.bankrate.com.” Read the article for more information.

Thursday, July 06, 2006

The Secret to Saving Money

Do you sometimes think you don’t actually have enough money to save some? About.com has a handy how-to article, The Secret To Saving Money: How You Can Save For The Future. It’s got some really simple tips that can get you started on your nest egg.

Saturday, July 01, 2006

4 Retirement Calculators

Every once in a while John and I like to post links to retirement calculators. Of course, none of these things can be 100% accurate, but we think it’s useful to use them to get a general idea of where your are now, and where you might be headed. Here’s an article from USA Today that points the way to 4 different retirement calculators. They’re from NASD, AARP, ERBI and T. Rowe Price. Check ‘em out and start crunching numbers.

Monday, June 26, 2006

Advice for College Grads

In the very brief article Five tips for the Class of 2006, college graduates get a quick education on how to get their working lives in order. The tips come from Suzy Orman’s book, The Money Book for the Young, Fabulous, and Broke.

Tip #2 highlights our constant topic, retirement. “Start your retirement savings when you first earn a salary, as employers will often match the investment of your 401K plan.”

Read the article for the rest of the tips. You might also want to pass the advice along to recent grads. Advice like this is better than anything you could buy them for graduation.

Wednesday, June 21, 2006

Income for Life

Walter Updegrave, the personal finance expert at CNN/Money, has written about annuities before and we’ve mentioned it here. Today he has another great article that goes into more depth about the ins and out of annuities.

Ideally, you want to have a combination of assured pension income as well as money set aside in investments that you can tap for regular income and for splurges and unanticipated expenses, or, if you wish, to leave a legacy for your heirs.

By having both you not only have more financial flexibility to navigate retirement, you’re also likely to have a more satisfying retirement.

He also goes into some detail about how to spread out your annuity purchases over time to help spread out the risk of buying your annuity at the wrong time. Thanks, Mr. Updegrave! Read the article.

Tuesday, June 06, 2006

Asset Allocation Over Market Timing for your 401(k)

Yesterday the stock market took a beating. It’s the kind of day that makes you want to figure out how to “beat the market.” Walter Updegrave from CNN/Money takes a question this week that touches on the subject, but he urges the asset allocation over trying to guess your way to riches through “tactical” stock purchases.

I think there’s a better, and simpler, way. Drop the “tactical” part and follow the good old strategy of asset allocation - that is, choosing a mix of diversified stock and bond funds that’s appropriate given your stomach for risk and the length of time your money will be invested, and then re-balance back to that mix once a year.

He goes on to say that this “simple but disciplined system is much better than trying to predict (i.e., guess) which market sector is going to outperform in the near future.” Read the article for the full story.

Monday, June 05, 2006

Finding Hidden Money for Your Retirement

The Motley Fool has an interesting article on getting more out of your current income so you can retire sooner in an article they call How to Retire Faster. The key is to examine your current spending habits and make small adjustments and put that money away in a retirement fund of some kind. One example they give is eating out at restaurants a bit less. “Eat out just one less time per month. If that saves you $50, that will turn into $600 by the end of the year.” Multiple that $600 by 20 to 30 years and calculate in compounding interest and it adds up.

Want even more suggestions on squeezing out some retirement savings from your income? Read the article.

Tuesday, May 30, 2006

Branching Out Beyond Your Company’s Retirement Account

The Wall Street Journal has an informative article about what to do when it’s time for you to step beyond your company’s retirement account called Opening Your First Investment Account. It doesn’t walk you through the entire process, but it will get you asking the right questions and give you the basic idea behind the different types of brokerage accounts you can open up.

Personally, I use a full-service brokerage. I’ve tried all kinds of different types of accounts and I’ve learned it’s what works best for me. If you’re still trying to determine what works for you, read this article for a good primer.

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