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Financial Planning

What Does It Mean When You Say No To Insurance

Have you ever wondered what does it mean to you when you decide to say No to a Financial Planner, who is doing up a financial needs analysis and at the same time recommending some insurance plans to you?

The Role Of A Financial Planner

Basically the role of a Financial Planner is to make you realize or indirectly disturb you emotionally with a Problem (concern about Medical Bills, not enough for Retirement or the means to save enough for your Child’s University Education) through a Financial Needs Analysis Process.

And after doing so, he will recommend a set of solutions to the above problems by means of  committing to a certain range of Insurance Product – Endowment, Investment-Linked Plans, Medical Insurance and/or Critical Illness Insurance.

The objective of this post is not to tell you much about what a Financial Planner does for a living and here I will assume that the Financial Planner who may be attending to you is capable of doing what he/she is required to do in Financial Planning.

But rather, I will focus on, if the Financial Planner has actually done well (to make you realize that you have a problem) but in the end you decide to say one of the Few Common Nos’ (known as Objections to us) like:

  • I Do Not Need Insurance
  • I Have No Extra Money For Insurance
  • I Would Like To Wait

So let’s get down to the first No…

No to Life Insurance!

What Does It Mean To You When You Say That You Do Not Need The Insurance…

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Have You Started Your Retirement Planning?

Part of a Good Financial Planning is planning well and early for your retirement and a good rule of thumb of starting your retirement planning can be well around your mid 20s as you may have started working by then and have the means to start saving.

What To Note For Your Retirement Planning

And the things to note for your retirement planning would be basically

  • The retirement monthly income you would need for your daily expenses (without really working) and lifestyle
  • How long you plan for this retirement income to last

A general guideline to know how much you would need is to note down how much are your current expenses and once you have gotten this figure, do a rough estimation whether you would like to maintain this kind of lifestyle (you can choose to have an even better or just a simpler one – it’s your life, so your choice!)

Then the portion for the how long you plan for it to last would be a gut feel. An average person would wish to have a retirement income to last for 20 years starting from the average retirement age of 65.

Once you have your figures ready, head over to the CPF Board’s Retirement Savings Interactive Calculator to get a rough feel how much you need to start saving now to hit your desired retirement income.

A sample of my Retirement Planning would be like below:

My Retirement Planning

Hmmm… and seems like I do have to start saving like $600 per month for the next 37 years in order to achieve my desired monthly retirement income of $2000.

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Mixed Feelings: Should You Protect The Goose That Lay The Golden Egg Or The Golden Egg Only?

There is a favorite story that Financial Planners will use to show Breadwinners the importance of Income Protection or Whole Life Protection and that will be the story of the Goose that lay the Golden Eggs.

The Background Of The Story And What You Can Relate From It In Today’s Reality

In brief and in comparison to today’s context, this story shares that there is this Special Goose (in comparison, will be similar to a Breadwinner who maintain and sustain a family and reproducing future generation) that lays a Golden Egg each day (in comparison to the Children, who is the future pillar of of the society).

This Golden Egg, in the story, has actually made the owner very rich as the owner can sell the eggs for very good profit. Thus in reality, Children are good and valuable resources to the society as they can contribute their talents and services back.

Read More »Mixed Feelings: Should You Protect The Goose That Lay The Golden Egg Or The Golden Egg Only?

Larry Winget Says: You’re Broke Because You Want To Be

How Totally True… If you are offended by the title because I do not know you at all… Sad to know is that, this is really the case happening in the world – You’re Broke Today Because You Want To Be!

This view was evident after a small chat with a Client and reading a book by Larry Winget: You’re Broke Because You Want to Be: How to Stop Getting By and Start Getting Ahead

My Chat With A “Poor” Client

The CPF Board has recently raised the premiums for the Medishield Plan (a medical insurance plan) and the raised premiums also mean that the benefits have also increased.

The Premium for the Medishield Plan is basically very low and affordable for every (almost) Singaporeans but very sad to say is that this Client is unable to afford it…

As we chat on… tears were on the edge of her eyes… and she was also saying that she still owed her tv license fees, utilites bill and phone bills for the last 2 months. She would rather forgo this medical coverage and suffer at home (if she is down with any major illnesses) than rather not to be able to service the rest of the bills.

Read More »Larry Winget Says: You’re Broke Because You Want To Be