Usually when people reach retirement age they find they are financially comfortable – and that’s a great thing. It means you’ve worked hard all your life and you’ve put away sufficient funds to provide for yourself. Retirement should be a time to relax and enjoy your life and family. Sadly, the best-laid plans can go astray and the cause can be the people who love you most: your family.
Family members are quick to notice that if you are able to provide for yourself in retirement, you must have a stash of cash somewhere. The temptation, then, for family members is to “relieve” you of some of that cash. This plays on the natural parental instinct to provide for and help your children. The cash is there within easy reach, your children have a need and so you draw down a percentage of your retirement savings. It’s so easy. It’s so tempting. It’s so bad. It should be resisted at all costs.
Focus on what giving away a chunk of cash might do to you and your chances of successfully funding your retirement right to the end. Think about the final years of your life and what it would mean if you ran out of money and only had the age pension to rely on. It’s a situation you wouldn’t enjoy, and you’d enjoy it even less if you knew the reason you’re in that situation is because of decisions you made earlier in retirement to give your children a bit of financial help that they might not even remember.
To be forewarned is to be forearmed, so I will run through the more common traps. This may not stop your family from taking advantage of you, but hopefully you will make better decisions in terms of helping family members out financially and so minimise the adverse impact doing so might have on your retirement.
Bu hikaye Money Magazine Australia dergisinin April 2021 sayısından alınmıştır.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Giriş Yap
Bu hikaye Money Magazine Australia dergisinin April 2021 sayısından alınmıştır.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Giriş Yap
An outrageous, beautiful monopoly
Telstra's mobile business is a cash machine with few competitors, giving it the highest returns in the world.
Drop the anchor to judge value
Buying and selling decisions should be based on where a stock price is going, not where it has been.
Powering the AI boom
Beyond the software and chipmakers, where will the energy come from?
Get into life
Tucked inside super are products that can protect you from life's inevitable uncertainties.
Paths to home ownership
Taking the road less travelled can sometimes deliver unexpected benefits.
Sold! Quick ways to add value
Small, strategic changes can have a big impact on the look and feel of your home. And get you a better price on auction day.
Money lessons the kids need to know
Your children can learn a lot from your past money mishaps. Here are eight financial conversations I have had with mine.
Property-investing rules: are they likely to change?
The pressure for the government to curb the tax benefits of tax concessions, such as negative gearing and the capital gains tax discount, is unrelenting. Most recently, independent senators David Pocock and Jacqui Lambie proposed five options for paring back investment property tax concessions, with savings to the Federal budget of up to $60 billion over the next decade.
What's love got to do with it?
A rollercoaster of emotions could be driving poor crypto behaviour.
Are we ready to be cash-free?
Saying goodbye to our piggy banks too soon could leave small businesses in the dark when problems arise.