Do you have enough to retire?

Some of us work to leave a legacy, some just want a simple life. Do you know if you have enough to retire? Have you been scared by insurance agents masquerading as financial planners whose sole aim is to sell you ILP which pays them the highest? Then think again. Think out of the box. I say ditch those financial agents and understand things for yourself.

There are tonnes of information and calculators out there which can help you.

a. the AARP calculator, 
b. the MarketWatch calculator, and the 
c. “Ballpark Estimate” calculator 

My own understanding is the 4% withdrawal rule and the passive income concept. 

This article appears on Marketwatch, 28th Sept 2014.

There are 5 rules of thumb.

• Make it your goal to have 15.7 times your annual pay. This comes to us courtesy of Hewitt Associates. Since Social Security will provide 4.7 times your pay, you need to save 11 times your annual pay in an IRA, 401(k), or other retirement vehicles. (See also 5 checkpoints on your race to retirement.)
• Calculate whether you're on track for your current age. This comes to us courtesy of Fidelity. They suggest that you have 8 times your ending salary by age 67 to meet your basic income needs in retirement. To accomplish this goal you should have one times your salary at 35, two times your salary at 40, three times your salary at 45, four times your salary at 50, five times your salary at 55, six times your salary at 60, and 7 times your salary at 65. (See: Retirement savings: How much is enough?)
• Use a safe savings rate to ensure income adequacy. This comes to us courtesy of fellow RetireMentor Wade Pfau, who suggests a safe level of savings of a little over 16% of salary a year might be a reasonable target. The good news is employer matching and nonelective contributions count toward the 16% rule of thumb. The bad news is people need to start early in their careers; otherwise the amount they need to save increases.
• Make it your goal to save 11%-15% of pay- According to the Principal Financial Group, maintaining a similar standard of living during retirement requires an estimated annual savings rate of 11% to 15% of income over the course of your working career. Once again, it is fair to count the employer match or other employer contributions. Principal cautions, however, that merely maxing out the company match will typically leave you short of this goal. One other caveat: High-income earners may need to save at higher rates, since a lower percentage of their income will be replaced by Social Security.
• Catch up after a late start. The Boston College Center for Retirement Research found that if an individual begins saving for retirement at age 35 and does so for 30 years until retirement, the average household needs to have an annual savings rate of 14% of pretax income to maintain the standard of living they had before retirement. For low-income households it is 11%, for middle-income households ($41, 501 to $76,500) it is 15%, and for high-income households it is 16%.

Are you more confused?! Good! 

Changes yet again in Malaysian Real Estate rules

Here I am in Kuala Lumpur catching up with my real estate friends and heard them saying that Selangor is going to introduce some measures regards to restrictions in ownership for foreigners. I am just back in the condo, and I saw in propertyguru.my the same piece of information.

http://www.propertyguru.com.my/property-news/2014/9/64622/Selangor%20unveils%20restrictions%20on%20foreigners%20buying%20properties?utm_source=pgmy-newsalert&utm_medium=edm&utm_campaign=dailynews-22Sep2014&utm_content=links

What this means is effective impacting foreign confidenc in the country. Foreigners's speculation could be curbed in Selangor.

Luckily, there is still Kuala Lumpur which is not under Selangor state government's control. I think, prices have to go up for KL. Well, I'm vested.

cheers!

Down Down Down the property in Singapore

It was not long ago when the property prices in the tiny island state shot up 100% since 2008. A series of cooling measures ensured that speculators will not find it worthwhile to enter the market anymore. Huge release of supply of properties through the HDB ensured that the nation's citizens have a roof over their head. 

Channelnews asia reported that the number of mortgagee sales at property auctions in Singapore jumped sharply during the first three months of this year. Investors... standby - sign that owners in financial difficulty are finding it harder to dispose of their properties and you can find distressed properties. 

Bankruptcies in Singapore have also risen, she added, citing statistics from the Ministry of Law that showed the number of people made bankrupt rose by 14 percent to reach 1,992 in 2013.

2015, 2016, lets bide our time for the real-estate correction. 

Wait... does it mean other countries would be affected as well by the pessimism?

Source: http://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/business/singapore/mortgagee-sales-at/1050756.html

Cassava Plots for Sale

This is the 2nd year I'm holding on to this Cassava Plot yielding >10% per annum for sale. I'm selling this 1 plot for 26k USD and 0.5 plot selling for 13.5k USD. The contracted yield for the next 6 years are, 2.42k USD and above for 1 plot and 1.21k USD for 0.5 plot, thats initial contracted yield for the next year and its going up. email me if you are keen.

thanks!

Turf guarding

As with all people, those people with the resources will say, come to me. As someone without resources you are just at their mercy. 

Do you want to be one with resources or be the one without?

Deploying Assets

Investing is very much like a war. In my youth I've seen some Hong Kong movies of stock market investments where the fund managers took to playing and manipulate the stock prices buying and selling and deploying assets to do so. It is very thrilling to do so.

In my younger days, I'm quite a good chess player. Chess is a game where you can really play "king" for a while; you have full control of your game. I love to play black and I love to play the Sicilian Defence, or in particular the Sicilian Dragon.

Defence is a misnomer. Sicilian Dragon is one of the most powerful counter attack moves. I feel empowered playing black anytime against a D4 Queen's pawn opening. 

In defence, you create a strong move for counterattack; should the enemy slip up, you could attack it with no mercy and you would be surprised with the swiftness of the deployment of assets to attack from this position.

I would like to be in this position with ready assets to be deployed. Once market crashes... its attack time.

Set your assets to be mobile and ready to move. 

1. Build good relationship with banks - they are your rooks to give you cannon power.

2. Build good relationship with agents - they are your queen to scoop for resources.

3. Build pawns - cashflow to advance positions and move into more strategic position.

All kinds of chess pieces wins you the game. Deploy them strategically and it can help you to win the game beautiful and crush the opponent... its not just winning... its crushing your opponent that is fun!