Since age 17, I’ve read every Money Magazine, Wall Street Journal and every other sensible financial publication and book I could handle. My parents were so poor they had to sell a cow to pay each car insurance or college bill. By the time I had my first child at age 32, I was no longer struggling. I had saved 10 percent of every paycheck since my first year after college. I raised my two boys with every bit of wisdom I could muster with intentions of imparting the awesomeness of savings and compound interest to my children.
Having not yet been kicked out of any Young Professionals’ clubs, there’s a couple more decades of experience under my belt than the next generation of young professionals. As a personal investor and financial planner with over 30 years of experience, here’s some ageless wisdom for young professionals in your 20’s and 30’s.
If you are in your early 50s and just buying a home, you may be paying that mortgage in your 80s. Most financial planners believe this could lead to disaster down the road because seniors don’t usually have the income to support debt repayment in addition to monthly expenses, so they may run out of money way too soon. Yikes! You need a better plan other than being a Wal-mart greeter to pay for it. Here’s a few ways this may not destroy your retirement:
We deserve it. Everyone else gets one, why not us? My husband, who works a ‘straight’ job gets three weeks of vacation a year. My boss (me!) told myself for several years, “no vacation.” We’re too busy. We can’t afford it. Who will help our clients?
So I sat down with my boss (me!) and set her straight. I want four weeks of vacation a year. My company name is Good Life Financial and I should practice what I preach. So there!
My husband and I have started, owned, and grown four businesses in our 24 years of marriage and are starting a fifth. In that time, we have owned four homes. Although the majority of our business has been conducted outside the home, most were started at home or involved the use of our home in numerous ways. If you are a business owner or ever think you’ll be one, below are questions to think about when buying a home.
If we want next year to be better than this year (and who doesn’t), we need to develop a plan to make that happen. As business owner, business coach and financial planner I use the following wrap up/ramp up process to build my own progress and recommend these steps to my business-owner clients as well.
