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The 4% Rule for Retirement: What You Need to Know!

one of the most common retirement planning 
questions people have is how much money can   I pull from my portfolio every year and live on 
in retirement and that's where the four percent   rule comes in handy and it basically says that 
if you can pull four percent or less from your   Diversified portfolio invested in things like 
stocks and bonds and live off of that amount   while keeping the rest invested then there's 
a good chance that your money is going to last   20 30 years or more and as a frame of reference 
if you had a million dollars then four percent   would be forty thousand dollars if you had 
five hundred thousand dollars it would be   twenty thousand dollars per year and it's not 
set in stone it is based off a study that was   done many years ago and has held up well over 
time but there are instances where people as   they get older could pull more or if they retire 
early maybe they want to consider even doing less   than that but it's a really good way to get 
a frame of reference on looking at how much   you've saved and what that can translate 
into in retirement as far as income goes

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Pay This Off Before You Retire – Retirement Planning Tips

in this video we'll look at what expenses you should think about getting rid of before retiring and a few mistakes that retirees make when it comes to expenses in retirement there's a few things that you may want to say goodbye to before you say goodbye to that wage or that work income we're going to cover this in three parts it's going to look like this first we'll go over needs and wants and then what i'd call highway robbery and then also what to ear mark in retirement we've seen that the retirees that can get rid of these expenses before retiring have a little bit more breathing room and they feel better about their retirement plan because when you're planning for retirement we usually think about really two types of expenses it's the needs which are the essentials the absolute must-haves to just live you know as you think about my maslow's hierarchy of needs those things at the base layer and then there's the wants which are the the nice to have things but then there are other types of expenses that really don't fit into that category of needs or wants those are the things that we need to be done with before retirement and by the way i'm dave zoller and me and my team we run streamline financial it's a wealth management firm focused on retirement planning and we've been helping people personally for 13 years and streamlines been around for 22 years and we created this channel to share what's working with our clients so that you can benefit too so if you're close to retirement be sure to subscribe because i share one new video each week to make your retirement a little bit better i also put some free resources in the description below like my favorite diy retirement planner if you're more of a do-it-yourselfer so let's get into the list and then as you're watching if i leave something out please share it in the comments below i'd love to hear from you and then also i'll try to reply back to depending on how many comments i get so the first two you will probably agree with but you might not be thinking about the other ones and i want to show you ways to prepare and just make sure that your retirement is a little bit smoother by using our retirement planning software the first one which you already know is to pay off high interest debt which i sometimes think of as highway robbery it's when those interest rates are just so high and they're charging people it just seems unfair right that high interest debt i'm referring to is usually credit card debt and sometimes it's student loan debt and you'd be surprised at the number of people who in their first year of retirement they still have a large monthly payment towards credit card payments or student loan debt and this should be the number one thing that we should focus on to really reduce before we say goodbye to that job income or that wage because if you retire with credit card debt and then you get serious about paying it off in retirement then that means you've got this bigger amount that you got to take from investments which could alter your retirement plans i helped a woman recently who's not a client but she was looking at her plan and she wanted some help and she had about 20k of credit card debt she also had over a million dollars and her regular expenses adding on this 20k of a lump sum expense to her plan it really made quite an impact and once we looked at that together it gave her the motivation to work a little bit extra and extra hard to get this debt payment down to zero or get the credit card debt down to zero before retiring because she'd have a greater peace of mind and it would just increase her confidence as she was going into retirement that peace of mind it's key right i'm sure you're feeling the same way i actually want to share a little bit more about how to achieve this before you retire and during retirement and i share that at the end of this video so stay tuned the next ones are expenses that you can either pay early or at least you want to earmark these in your retirement plan and i'll show you what i mean when i say earmark that just means setting aside funds for specific purposes and either not including those funds in your retirement plan or including them but at least showing the specifics within the plan and i'll show you some images coming up of a retirement plan and how to do this number one thing to earmark is any big travel expenses that you're looking forward to that first year of retirement or really the first few years of retirement a lot of people kick off retirement and they'll really have a big special trip that they've always wanted to take or a place that they've always wanted to go to and lots of times that vacation it's going to cost more than the typical vacation that you might take on a regular year it's really that cap to uh ending work and then really doing a bigger than normal trip some clients choose to take one of those european uh river cruises that are pretty popular and they can cost 10 to 20k or more and knowing that this is a bigger than normal expense or a lump sum expense coming soon into retirement you can either pay that ahead of time like actually many of the cruise places make you do or you can at least earmark it in the plan and make sure that it all works with everything and i'll throw it in there as an example coming up soon here's an example of a retirement plan that's based on annual expenses going up each year three percent regular inflation rate and then over on the left side we can add some expenses that are bigger and irregular you know not the regular every year expenses but things we can earmark so that we can see the impact of on the plan before actually spending the money and doing it this way we can add some peace of mind to your retirement plan and your confidence as you're spending money and so you can just feel that it's a good decision and feel good about that vacation or whatever it might be a few other bigger than normal one-time expenses we've seen are related to your adult kids if you have them whether it's final college expenses or maybe a wedding that you want to help out with or future gifts maybe towards a home purchase or something like that for those you're not really able to pay those before you retire because we don't know when they're going to happen so earmarking them is the next best step and setting funds aside to make sure that these potential expenses that you might have in the future are ready and available ready to deploy when needed one mistake that we've seen some retirees make getting close to retirement is not factoring in these one-time expenses and then getting caught a little off guard when it's time to pay for them especially if we're in a market like we are now now you might be thinking one big expense that i did not mention and before i share that one if you enjoyed watching this video so far and you found it helpful please click the like button so this can hopefully spread to other people who are like you and might find it helpful as well so that one big expense that you might be thinking of that i didn't mention yet is paying off your whole mortgage before you retire and this is a big one for many people as you've heard before behind every financial decision there's also an emotional one as well and many people they feel very strongly or maybe adamant on on being debt-free in retirement and that's a really good feeling for for many people for others depending on their financial decision it actually a mortgage could actually make sense in retirement some people see it as a fixed expense which doesn't go up with inflation it actually gets cheaper as everything else increases with inflation and as one dollar can buy less and less over time which is basically what what inflation is it may be at really attractive interest rates as well and some people want to have a little bit more flexibility in their retirement accounts by keeping some funds available in their non-retirement accounts versus using that money to pay off the mortgage the more important thing to to think about when deciding whether this makes sense whether to pay it off or not is try to measure first just the emotional feeling or comfort with debt you know yourself and then also your spouse if you're married and then step two is map out both scenarios what does it look like that plan that we're just looking at over here what does it look like if you pay off debt early or don't pay off the mortgage at all look at the difference see which one's okay lots of times it comes down to the strength of the emotional feeling around debt for one person in the relationship or if it's just you then it's just whatever you prefer when we're thinking about paying off expenses or earmarking things in retirement get help from a financial professional a cfp could be a great place to start but i'd like to hear from you what did i not mention as we're thinking about these different expenses in retirement i'd love to hear your thoughts about these expenses and especially the thoughts on mortgage having a mortgage in retirement and i want to share another video about how increasing peace of mind and making sure that you get both parts needed for a successful retirement the sad thing is that in this industry the financial industry most of the time they focus on one thing but here's a video to watch that'll help you think about and prepare for both sides of retirement so hopefully i'll see you there and if you haven't already subscribe and then i'll see you in future videos take care you

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Mastering the FIRE Method: The Ultimate Guide to Early Retirement & Financial Independence

at some point of time you would have thought of retiring early or maybe you're thinking of it now and truth be told retirement is not about abandoning work there are very few who would say I won't work any further but what we yearn for is the freedom to operate to live life in the way we want and that brings us to the five moment now fire stands for financial Independence retirement it's a very catchy acronym and to put it in a nutshell it's a program that's designed around saving aggressively investing in high return instruments like equities and disciplined withdrawals which put together ensures you have enough money to cover your living expenses for the rest of your life and therefore retire early in this video I shall be explaining the concept in Greater details we look at the implementation steps some calculations and why fire needs to be a deliberate part of your financial life this might be a short video but it's a very powerful concept so let's begin the concept of fire was popularized in a book titled your money or your life it was built around self-sufficiency control over one's time moderate consumption and of course living life outside the nine to five for instance this guy Pete atney who is better known as Mr Money Mustache applied the fire principles which allowed him to retire from his job as a software engineer at the age of 30.

He's 48 now and he continues to live comfortably of his Investments after so many years and it's not just Pete there are writers bloggers people traveling the world software developers and even YouTubers who are using these principles to lead a more open life and have attached some articles and videos in the description to that effect some of these stories are really inspirational and it proves the fact that a little bit of planning on the financial side can have a profound impact on other aspects of one's life and in a very positive way now there are three parts one needs to address when implementing a fire strategy the first step is savings and the hardcore fire disciple is expected to save anywhere from 50 to 70 percent of one's monthly income this is of course easier said than done and probably where a lot of people make up their mind that this is not their cup of tea but from what I have read and what I've experienced the saving need not be always defined as a percentage and we can also work with absolute numbers which we'll see when I come to the calculations part now when we hear the word saving our first reaction or response is on reducing our expenses however money can also be saved by upping one's income which is what I suggest and it does make sense right I mean there is a limit to what one can save but income generation has a much longer Runway and in our case it can include taking a part-time job doing some consultancy work asking for a pay hike changing jobs for a better salary reskilling oneself or of course starting a side hustle which can be a mix of active and passive work in fact I have a friend in Bangalore who works as a data scientist from Monday to Friday and then on the weekends he takes classes on an edtech platform and also does some consultancy work to put it in numbers what was earlier a monthly saving of 50 000 Rupees is now easily over 2 lakhs a month and this guy has absolutely changed his life around by leveraging what he knows so he's on fire metaphorically speaking and the the fire strategy encourages us to find creative and better ways of increasing our savings rate the Second Step under the fire strategy is to spend wisely notice I didn't say don't spend I said spend wisely which means you need to identify what is an essential expense and what can be tagged as discretionary now people who practice Fire have a ton of helpful advice for us these include driving a good used car instead of a new one renting versus buying a house cooking at home rather than eating out track your daily expenses cancel unnecessary subscriptions Etc from what I've read these small steps can reduce your monthly expenses by up to 30 percent which if you choose to look at it differently is like getting a 30 incremented salary so you don't have to be stinky when it comes to your expenses but try to be a bit more rational about it and the third and final pillar in the fire system is the investment part now on a basic level the system requires advisors to invest as much money as you can and as early as possible so it's the principle of compounding at work here and this table here is a handy guide to how well your Corpus expands when you give it the necessary capital and a decent amount of time to grow now the fire method keeps this investing part ridiculously simple one you invest some money every month or as we call it you set up an sip a systematic investment plan and secondly this money is invested in a low cost Index Fund or ETF which in our case is either the nifty 50 or maybe a slightly broader Nifty 500 Index so essentially the focus here is to participate in the equity markets rather than actively trying to beat it which by my Reckoning should Fetchers and analyze return of 12 to 13 percent again the idea here is to maximize the returns which is why equities have been suggested but if that makes you a little uncomfortable then you can also settle for a mix of different asset classes which is something I explained in my video on asset allocation a few weeks back yet another investment you can make which is encouraged under the fire movement is on account of passive income dividends from stocks interest from your fixed deposits income from your blog your podcast YouTube channel monetization rental income are just some ways of making an Roi from physical or virtual assets now notice I have put this part under Investments and not income because passive income does require a lot of upfront work but once you do the hard work and you do it well one can expect a continuous stream of income over the next few years which will not only support your early retirement Ambitions but will also act as a safety net in fact there is something called an fi Ratio or the financial Independence ratio which largely means if your passive income is greater than your expenses then you're making some great progress on the path to financial Independence so to sum it up remember fire has three simple principles that you need to work on which is save more spend less and invest wisely if you're getting good value from this video then please do give this video a thumbs up and if you aren't a subscriber yet then do consider becoming one as I can then serve you videos as soon as they are released and also share with you some investing strategies tips and stories that are continually Post in the community section the original fire formula is based on the four percent rule which is the amount of saving you can safely withdraw every year without worrying that your money will run out for example let's say you are 29 years old and your monthly expenses are around 50 000 rupees if you want to retire at 40 then you have 11 years to accumulate a retirement fund so here's the math if household inflation is likely to grow by eight percent per annum then the 50 000 you spend now will rise to 1 lakh 16 000 rupees by the time you're 40.

So annually this comes to 14 lakh rupees and per the four percent rule it's 14 multiplied by 25 which means you need to accumulate a couples of three and a half crores to safely navigate through your retirement years or at least that's what the fire formula says now in my view there are some gaps with this four percent rule that I think we should all be aware of firstly this rule is okay for someone who has factored 25 maybe 30 years of retirement but if the retirement Horizon goes higher let's say 50 years for example then this formula starts getting a bit shaky and I've pinned a research study by Vanguard on this in the video's description secondly the four percent rule is a United States origination of the 1990s and has been tested on a historical basis when the yields on equities and Bonds were sufficiently high now we are not Americans and what works there will most likely not work for us which means there's an asset allocation and a market performance risk which needs to be accounted for and finally because each of us have our own preferences income goals saving patterns Etc I always felt it's important to have a customized fire implementation plan rather than picking something off the shelf which is why I created my own fire calculator which gives a clearer picture of how much I need to accumulate when can I idly retire how much withdrawals can I do on a monthly basis and at what point and in what circumstances my retirement money can run out so this obviously starts with the inputs and you need to type in your current age the age at which you want to retire and of course your life expectancy which I hope is strong and long then comes your current portfolio of Investments and this includes your mutual funds fds ppf EPF gold and other stuff and as a best practice kindly exclude the cost of the house where you will be staying post your retirement if you're still working then input the monthly savings and the annual increase you foresee input the expected returns from your investment the capital gain tax that can remain at 10 percent and finally have a view on how much will your expenses be in the first year of retirement and the expected household inflation rate and once we have these numbers keyed in as I have shown in this example the resulting output should clearly tell us three things one the amount of investment Corpus we need at the time of retirement which in this illustration is 2.2 crores at the age of 40.

Secondly we now have Clarity on how much can be spent on an early basis which starts from 12 lakhs so that's one lakh per month and it increases by eight percent every year and thirdly we get to know how sound or unsound this entire construct is like in this case our calculation shows that I'll run out of my money by the time I am 64 years old which is another way of saying that I need to rework my fire math which can include an increase in the monthly savings and the growth rate I can also consider extending my retirement age to a higher number let's say 45 years and finally I I can be a little careful with my expenses and instead of spending a lack of rupees maybe I can make do with 90 000. so there are many permutations and combinations you can look at but my suggestion is try to be a little conservative in your estimates especially when it comes to return on investment the inflation rate and the post retirement monthly expenses now for your benefit I have enclosed the link of this worksheet in the video's description it's a downloadable sheet all the formulas are open so feel free to change the numbers improve the formula if required add your own customization if it helps you but have a clear idea on when and where you need to be on the path to financial Independence so when I first heard and read about fire I was not a big fan of it I mean saving 50 to 7 20 percent of one salary is almost next to Impossible and I would have shut sharp had I not realized that as a method fire is quite flexible and can be used in many different ways so the calculator is one way and you can make a customized version of it but then there are more strategies there are more variants of the fire strategy and if you are interested then do read up on lean fire fat fire Coast fire and a few more of these in related articles that I've Linked In the video's description the point is and I myself realized a very late in life that many of us don't know when to retire how much is needed to retire which is why we continue working in a role or occupation that we don't enjoy much and that's where I think fire as a strategy might be the solution and it's just three things right increase your income and savings lower your expenses and get your Investments right so read up more about this concept in the Articles and websites I've added in the description and I sincerely hope you practice some sort of fire going forward if you found this video useful then do press the like button do subscribe to my channel share this video and I'll see you three days from now until then foreign

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Warren Buffett: Why Most People Should Invest In S&P 500 Index

why have you advised your wife to invest in index funds after your death rather than berkshire hathaway i believe munger has cancelled his offspring to quote not be so dumb as to sell she she won't be she won't be selling any berkshire to buy the index funds all all of my berkshire every single share will go to philanthropy so that i don't even regard myself as owning berkshire you know basically it's it's committed and i've i so far about 40 percent has already been distributed so the question is somebody who is not an investment professional will be i hope reasonably elderly by the time that the uh estate gets settled and what is the best investment meaning one that there would be less worry of any kind connected with and less people coming around and saying why don't you sell this and do something else and all those things she's going to have more money than she needs and the big thing then you want is money not to be a problem and there will be no way that if she holds the s p of virtually no way absent something happened with weapons of mass destruction but virtually no way that she will shall have all the money that she possibly can use to have a little liquid money so that if stocks are down tremendously at some point they close the stock exchange for a while anything like that she'll still feel that she's got plenty of money and the object is not to maximize it doesn't make any difference whether the amount she gets doubles or triples or anything of the sort the important thing is that she never worries about money the rest of her life and i had an aunt katie here in omaha charlie knew well and worked for her husband as did i and she worked very hard all her life and had lived in a house she paid i think i don't know eight thousand dollars for 45th and hickory all her life and uh because she was in berkshire uh she ended up she lived in 97.

she ended up with you know a few hundred million and she would write me a letter every four or five months and she said dear warren you know i hate to bother you but am i going to run out of money and and i would i would write her back and i'd say dear katie it's a good question because if you live 986 years you're going to run out of money and and then about four or five months later she'd write me the same winner again and i i have seen there's no way in the world if you've got plenty of money that it should become a a minus in your life and there will be people if you've got a lot of money that come around with various suggestions for you sometimes well-meaning sometimes not so well-meaning so if you've got something that's certain to deliver you know it was all in berkshire they'd say well if warren was alive today you know he would be telling him to do this i i just don't want anybody to go through that and the s p will be a i think actually what i'm suggesting is what but a very high percentage of people should do something like that and i don't think they will have us i think there's a chance they won't have as much peace of mind if they own one stock and they've got neighbors and friends and relatives that are trying to do some like i say sometimes well-intentioned sometimes otherwise to do something else and so i think it's a policy that'll get a good result and it's likely to stick charlie well as becky said the wonders are different i i want them to hold the berkshire well i want to hold the berkshire too no i bet i mean i i i don't like them i recognize the logic of the fact that that s p algorithm is very hard to beat in a diversified portfolio of big companies it's all but impossible for most people but you know it's i'm just more comfortable with the berkshire well it's the family business yeah yeah but but it uh i've just i've seen too many people as they get older particularly being susceptible just having to listen to the arguments of people coming well if you're going to protect your heirs from the stupidity of others you may have some good system but i'm not much interested in that subject [Laughter] okay you

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6 Retirement Essentials (Most people only prepared 2 or 3)

I'm planning for retirement most people focus 
mostly on marshaling together enough money you   know Financial Resources so that they can last 
the distance and then maybe at the back of their   heads they have some vague plan right perhaps 
two or three things to fill the time with a lot   of the times this is stuff like travel family 
well unfortunately I'm gonna say that's not   quite nearly enough for Preparation we ourselves 
have been retired for two years and going looking   back on the past two years I kind of see like 
six essential things that if you prep for it   beforehand before your retirement starts I think 
this can really make such a positive difference   to your retirement so that's what I wanted 
to bring up and discuss with you guys today   number one first and foremost of course we have 
to talk about money most people's concern is the   amount of money that they have in retirement 
whether it will last them till the end come   comfortably and allow them to afford the Hobbies 
like travel good food Etc but I actually think   after going through the last two years building up 
our financial Acumen is just as important if not   more so what do I mean by Financial Acumen I mean 
stuff like budgeting tracking projecting investing   I mean if you think about it the money in your 
bank account can always be squandered we all   know that story I think more importantly what's 
going to make your retirement more fireproof is   having an ability to generate more money where 
it came from in the first place so the second   essential thing that you can prepare for so that 
you have a wonderful retirement it's definitely   the ability to be self-directing and disciplined 
self-direction definitely helps so much with   spending your retirement days meaningfully right 
after all there are no more like work schedules   or like demands from colleagues or bosses to help 
shape your days anymore you have to be the person   to take charge in retirement there's a study out 
there actually that shows that for happily retired   folks most of them actually have about 3.6 core 
Pursuits that's what they say and the unheably   retired folks tend to have less than 3.6 corporate 
suits coming in at about 1.9 call Pursuits that's   what the study reflected I guess it kind of just 
shows in retirement you really need to fill your   life to the brim and keep busy with activities 
you love and that is a really great formula for   happiness and self-direction will help you 
to achieve that state as well as discipline   because if you think about it like discipline 
directly affects the state of your finances right   it affects whether you stick with your retirement 
planning whether you keep fit and active and you   get to maintain your health in retirement even 
whilst you're left up to your own devices even   to find your cover suits if you don't have any 
when you're starting or in your retirement so   discipline and self-direction will be like 
the building blocks for enjoying your life   in retirement the third essential thing you might 
want to work on and cultivate or happy retirement   is people skills right so studies and research 
have reflected very consistently that the main   determining factor for happiness and Longevity 
for most of us is actually relationships Human   Relationships friendships relationship with 
your spouse and with your family I guess if   you look at most of us you know we all have 
a little need of work on some social skills   in some aspect I mean some of us are a bit shy 
paper hats or graph or maybe socially anxious   working on our people skills really will help us 
to get along and live happily with our spouse and   family members and also importantly to make 
new friendships at whatever age we all know   that making new friends gets a lot more difficult 
as we get older I mean I haven't heard anyone say   otherwise for me personally making new friends 
as I get older is the biggest challenge there's   this huge feeling that nothing can replace 
friendships with people who have known you   all your life but it is also a challenge as I 
have chosen to exercise through Arbitrage in   our retirement and we've moved away from home 
so those friends aren't with us in our present   I find that it takes a lot of intention I have 
to consciously push myself to broaden my Social   Circles and make the effort to get to know people 
on a more intimate basis I am also very happy   to be able to say that it has paid off in that for 
the last two years in Bali I have actually made   two or three new friends that I'm happy to say are 
kindred spirits and not just social acquaintances   so that's very nice and it's a huge Comfort to our 
daily life here in a foreign land away from home   now before we move on a big thank you to 
Mumu Singapore for sponsoring this video   Singapore is an online trading platform for 
stocks ETFs and options I've been using the   MooMoo mobile trading app myself for almost 
a year now and I think it's awesome it's   fast intuitive trading US Stocks is commission 
free plus they give free level to data and many   more perks now for a limited time when you open a 
Mumu Singapore Universal account they'll give you   a year of commission free trading of Singapore 
stocks ETFs and reads if you're trading us and   Singapore stocks just switching to the MooMoo 
app will save you so much money already when   you deposit at least a hundred same dollars and 
start using the mobile app to trade you stand   to receive cash coupons up to 128 Sing dollars 
and even a free Coca-Cola share worth around 87   subscribe two thousand Sing dollars or more into 
funds on the MooMoo fun Hub and MooMoo will give   you cash coupons up to 150 Sing dollars subscribe 
at least 100 Sing dollar us to Momo cache plus   and they'll throw in an additional tensing 
dollars cashback altogether that's 368 Sing   dollars worth of Welcome rewards absolutely free 
just for using the Momo app so if you're actively   investing anyhow I recommend checking out the 
MooMoo ad using my link in the description below   now back to the video the fourth essential 
thing that you can definitely work on and that   will benefit your retirement tremendously it's 
actually courage you're definitely gonna need lots   of courage in retirement and I guess this isn't 
a skill exactly it's kind of more of a quality   but in retirement you need a lot of courage 
to even plunge into retirement you need the   courage to you know take that leap of faith to 
stop putting it off due to fear of the unknown   feel or financial insecurities so then it's all 
about courage at that stage not let fear and   insecurity rule your life and your decisions it 
is also the courage to recognize that in life at   the start at the end in the middle the Domino's 
you need are never all nicely lined up you know   at some point you just got to jump into it and 
then learn to cross the obstacles as they come   so for retirement long term I guess the 
biggest issue most commonly is always money   but my perspective on this is that hey budgets 
can always be reduced money can always be earned   or recouped or whatever happens so I still 
think that you know it is actually beneficial   to Advocate an approach whereby you get to 
a point where you feel that you have most of   your Ducks lined up you've planned well you've 
prepped for it grab hold of your courage with   both hands and then take the plunge people tend 
to think of retirement as the end but it's not   it's the start of a new phase where you should be 
trying so many new things new Pursuits new ways   to live and for each of these new adventures 
you're gonna need courage to take action and   once you have taken the plunge you'll find the 
next fifth thing very very useful and that would   be a mentality of resilience especially in early 
retirement there are a lot more decades ahead of   you you know and therefore a lot more chances that 
they things can go wrong whether it be down to bad   financial planning or perhaps an unexpected Health 
catastrophe or even sometimes natural disasters   whatever comes I guess you will always need that 
strength of Will and the resilience so that you   can roll with the punches and then get back up 
you want to know that you have the mental strength   that even if things go pear-shaped you won't just 
give up and lose hope and certain Corner you've   got to Marshall what you've got inside you go out 
there find Solutions perhaps if necessary you've   got to go back to work but know that later on 
you can return to retirement and try again so the   sex essential thing that I believe will benefit 
everyone in retirement is to cultivate an attitude   of gratitude we all know life is a very long 
journey hopefully at least and so much of what   we Chase using most of our years actually doesn't 
really matter in the big picture once you have   taken a step back and then at that point is when 
you start realizing the earlier you cultivate and   attitude of gratitude and that appreciation for 
the simple little things that are probably around   you everywhere every day the happier you probably 
will be and it sounds silly but it's not really   automatic I mean we all live and grow up and 
work and go to school in a society that kind of   innovates us with messages that we need to reach 
for more have more ambition gives us you know that   High definitions of success in life that we 
have to try to jump to reach and nobody sings   the Praises of the pleasures of a simple cup of 
tea you know the importance of family time with   your loved ones or or just the pleasure of being 
able to take an evening walk on the beach with   your dog so I think that it's very important that 
somebody reminds you that you know you can not   overload what you already have what you're already 
surrounded by growing that muscle of appreciation   so that in each and every moment you are present 
in your own life you see all the little Joys that   you're surrounded with every day and if you 
live life like that I think that will help   you achieve contentment with just the small stuff 
around you and that's what majority of your life   in retirement may be about is just a small stuff 
every day but in my own retirement here in Bali it   is what makes me so grateful and so happy every 
day that I am surrounded by my loving husband   and very interesting and independent little dog 
that's very very cute you know that we have very   comfortable a bit simple house we have the ability 
to enjoy good food even if it's simple stuff   from the war rooms locally we have a garden and 
beautiful things are growing around us every day   the weather is great you know stuff is good yeah 
I think this is one of the most essential simple   things that's often overlooked simply because it's 
a matter of mentality but I believe this essential   quality or characteristic could make all the 
difference for you so these are the six essential   things that I believe are very very important for 
you to cultivate and prepare for in the leader to   actually taking the plunge into a return then I 
think that if you have these six strong skills and   qualities going for you you will be in a position 
much more well placed to make the best out of your   retirement however long that period may be let me 
know what you think of my suggestions whether you   agree or if you think they suck let me know why 
but in any event I really appreciate you tuning   in and sharing my thoughts for this week and 
wherever you are in the world I'm wishing you   a happy Saturday evening and let's speak again 
next week till then you take care and bye for now

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Why This Investment System Can Help Retirees Worry Less About Their Retirement Plan

I want to share an investment system for retirees to hopefully assist you as you're thinking about and planning for your retirement we're also going to look at how to prepare your retirement for the multiple potential potential economic Seasons that we may be headed into so we want to look at the multiple seasons and then the Easy System that's going to help lower taxes and then lower risk as well now if I haven't met you yet I'm Dave zoller and we help people plan for and Implement these retirement strategies really for a select number of people at streamline Financial that's our retirement planning firm but because we can't help everyone we want to share this with you as well so if you like retirement specific videos about one per week be sure to subscribe so in order to create a proper investment plan in system we want to make sure that we build out the retirement income plan first because without the income plan it's much harder to design the right investment strategy it's kind of like without the income plan it's like you're guessing at well 60 40 portfolio sounds good or you know May maybe this amount in the conservative bucket sounds reasonable you already know and and you feel that as you get close to retirement that goal of just more money isn't the the end-all goal that we should really be aiming for for retirement it's more about sustainability and certainty and then really the certainty of income and possibly less risk than before the last 30 years uh the things that you did to be successful with the financial side are going to look different than the next 20 or 30 years now if you need help defining the the income plan a little bit then look at the DIY retirement course below this video now once you do Define your goals for retirement and then the income needed to achieve those goals then creating the investment system becomes a lot easier and within the investment plan we really know that we can only control three things in all three things we actually want to minimize through this investment system the first thing we can minimize or reduce is how much tax you pay when investing we had a a client who was not a client of streamline Financial but of a tax firm coming to the the CPA firm in March to pick up his tax return and he was completely surprised that he had sixty thousand dollars of extra income on his tax return that he had to pay tax on right away before April 15th and it was due to the capital gains being recognized and other distributions within his investment account and he said but I didn't sell anything and the account didn't even go up that much last year and I got to pay tax on it but he was already in the highest tax bracket paying about close to 37 percent on short-term capital gains and dividends and interest so that was an unpleasant surprise and we see it happen more often than it should but this can really be avoided and here's two ways we can control tax so that we don't have to have that happen and really just control tax and pay less of it is the goal and I'll keep this at a high level but it'll get the the point across number one is the kinds of Investments that you own some are maybe funds or ETFs or individual uh equities or things like that the funds and ETFs they could pass on capital gains and and distributions to you each year without you even doing anything without you selling or or buying but it happens within the fund a lot of times now we would use funds and ETFs that are considered tax efficient so that our clients they can decide when to recognize gains rather than letting the fund company decide now the second way is by using a strategy that's called tlh each year there's many many fluctuations or big fluctuations that happen in an investment account and the strategy that we call tlh that allows our clients that's tax loss harvesting it allows them to sell an investment that may be down for part of the year and then move it into a very similar investment right away so that the investment strategy stays the same and they can actually take a write-off on that loss on their taxes that year now there's some rules around this again we're going high level but it offsets uh you know for that one client who are not a client but who had the big sixty thousand dollars of income he could have been offsetting those capital gains by doing tlh or tax loss harvesting that strategy has really saved hundreds and thousands of of dollars for clients over a period of years so on to the next thing that we can control in our investment plan and that's cost this one's easier but many advisors they don't do it because it ends up paying them less now since we're certified financial planner professionals we do follow the fiduciary standard and we're obligated to do what's best for our clients so tell me this if you had two Investments and they had the exact same strategy the same Returns the same risk and the same tax efficiency would you rather want the one that costs 0.05 percent per year or the one that costs 12 times more at point six percent well I know that answer is obvious and we'd go with a lower cost funds if it was all the same low-cost funds and ETFs that's how we can really help reduce the cost or that's how you can help reduce the cost in your investment plan because every basis point or part of a percentage that's saved in cost it's added to your return each year and this adds up to a lot over time now the last thing that we want to minimize and control is risk and we already talked about the flaws of investing solely based on on risk tolerance and when it comes to risk a lot of people think that term risk tolerance you know how much risk can we on a scale of one to ten where are we on the the risk factor but there's another way to look at risk in your investment strategy and like King Solomon we believe that there's a season for everything or like the if it was the bird song There's a season for everything and we also believe that there's four different seasons in investing and depending on what season we're in some Investments perform better than others and the Four Seasons are pull it up right now it's higher than expected inflation which we might be feeling but there's also a season that can be lower than expected or deflation and then there's higher than expected economic growth or lower than expected economic growth and the goal is reduce the risk in investing by making sure that we're prepared for each and every one of those potential Seasons because there are individual asset classes that tend to do well during each one of those seasons and we don't know nobody knows what's really going to happen you know people would would speculate and say oh it's going to be this or this or whatever might happen but we don't know for sure that's why we want to make sure we just have the asset classes in the right spots so that the income plan doesn't get impacted so the investment system combined with the income system clients don't have to worry about the movements in the market because they know they've got enough to weather any potential season I hope this has been helpful for you so far as you're thinking about your retirement if it was please subscribe or like this video so that hopefully other people can be helped as well and then I'll see you in the next one take care thank you

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Gold IRA Investing: How To Set Up Your Gold IRA

Hi, Doug here from Investing In Gold Advice
dot com. In this short video I'm going to give you
the resources for setting up your Gold IRA very quickly and easily. It continues to amaze me that so few people
realise that they can include physical gold in their retirement plans, and that many of
those who do assume that it will be a complicated and time consuming process. That just isn't the case, and it's for
that reason that I've written a comprehensive report about Gold IRA's which you can download
within the next few minutes completely free of charge.

I've been successfully trading and investing
in gold since 2003 and I created my website Investing In Gold Advice dot com to share
with you the knowledge, experience and contacts that I've gained during that time. Go there now and you can grab my Gold IRA
Report without even having to submit your email or join a mailing list. Once you've downloaded it you will have
instant access to information about what a Gold IRA actually is and what you can include
in it.

It answers the most Frequently Asked Questions
about Gold IRAs. It explains all the benefits to be gained
by including physical gold in your retirement plan. It explains the procedures involved in setting
up a Gold IRA. Actually I do that by giving you a step by step walkthrough of how I set
my own one up. Then finally it shows you how and where you
can get free expert assistance to get started right away with your own Gold IRA, and how
you can save all the initial set up fees.

To get this free report go to Investing In
Gold Advice dot com. Simply click on the link below now..

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5 Best Fidelity Index Funds To Buy and Hold Forever

– In this video, I'm gonna go through the five best Fidelity funds to buy and hold forever. Now you're going to notice that all of the Fidelity zero index funds are missing from this top five, because they aren't really what they appear to be on the surface. Later in the video, I'll send you to another video I made uncovering their dirty little secret. First up is the Fidelity
500 Index Fund, FXIAX. There's only a few funds that I would consider foundational fund that most people should hold.

And if you prefer Fidelity funds, then this would be one of them. FXAIX tracks the S&P 500, which is made up of the
500 largest U.S. stocks, based on market cap. All a market cap is is the total number of outstanding shares multiplied by the price of the stock. These 500 stocks represent about 80% of the U.S. market cap. So these companies are what really moves the price of the overall stock market. To put it into perspective, there's about 4,300
publicly traded U.S. stocks. That means once we remove the largest 500, the remaining 3,800 only account for 20% of the total U.S. market cap. Everyone loves to talk
about the upside potential, and we'll cover that in just a minute. But I personally like to call out the downsides as well, because what you do during those times will have the biggest impact on your future returns.

Because the Fidelity 500 Fund has only been around since 2011, we'll be looking at the S&P 500 drawdowns to get a larger sample size. The largest drawdown started in 2007, due to the financial crisis. This fund would've seen a 51% drawdown, which means that if you
had $1 million invested, then at one point, it would've
been down to $490,000. This portion of your portfolio would've taken about three
and a half years to recover. The next largest drawdown was in 2000, where it had a drawdown of 45%, and took a little over
four years to recover. The third largest drawdown was in 2020, due to the health crisis, where that drawdown was 20%, and took four months to recover. A four-month recovery period is comical, so do not expect that
happening in the future, because they're not very common. Although past returns are irrelevant, because we are investing for the future, they're always good to be aware of. After taxes and sales, FXAIX has had a one-year return of 9.5%, three-year return of 15%, five-year return of 13%, and 10-year return of 12%. This is one of the lowest-cost
S&P 500 index funds, coming in at an expense
ration of .015% per year.

For everyone $1,000 invested, you're only paying 15 cents per year. These are everything with investing, because they eat into your returns, so keeping these as low as possible is extremely important. If you look at the sector breakdown, 28% of this fund is held in technology, followed by financial services, healthcare, and consumer cyclical. While some might say that
it's overweight in technology, that's only because those
companies are so dominant. This is the nice thing about a fund that tracks an index. There's no opinions about what should or shouldn't be added, because the market and
size of the business determines that for you. If the businesses in one sector start to shrink in size, then this fund will reflect that and replace those stocks
with what should be there.

The top 10 holdings are made
up of a ton of companies most of you recognize: Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, and Alphabet. These 10 make up about 30% of the total Fidelity 500 portfolio, which is perfectly fine because they're all solid companies. And when they eventually shrink in size, they'll automatically fall down this list and be replaced with
the next best company. The Fidelity 500 Index is for anyone who is looking to match the performance of those largest U.S. companies. Because they make up 80% of
the total U.S. market cap, they're what really moves the market. This index fund has a nice
mix of large cap stocks that are at the upper limit
between value and growth, with a leaning more towards growth stocks. This is good if you're looking to invest for portfolio growth with the safety that comes along with those larger, more stable companies. If we take a look at the stock weighting, 39% are large cap growth, 26% are large cap blend, and 19% are large cap value.

The downside of this fund is that you're missing out on those mid and smaller-cap stocks. While it's not a huge downside, it's still something to be aware of. If you are enjoying this video so far, then help support my dog
Mali and this channel by hitting that thumbs up button. If you're someone who
wants to take advantage of those 500 stocks, plus the additional thousands of stocks traded on the stock market, then you'd want to think about investing in the Fidelity Total
Market Index Fund, FSKAX.

Before we get too deep into it, I'll have to admit that I
am biased towards this fund and any other total U.S.
stock market index fund, so keep that in mind while I'm going through
this one specifically. FSKAX does exactly what the name says, invests in the total U.S. stock market. That means your money is invested among pretty much every
U.S.-based stock out there. At this point, it's made up of a little over 4,000 companies, and growing every year as more businesses go public. Since it holds that many stocks, your money is diversified among large-, mid, and small cap companies. When you invest in an
index fund like this, you're betting on the future
of the U.S. as a whole. I know there's a lot of
tinfoil hat people out there who are all doom and gloom
about the future of America. But as long as the businesses
behind these stocks are continuing to innovative,
make money, and grow, there's nothing to worry about. There are naturally going
to be a ton of losers among these 4,000 stocks, so that's why it can beneficial to place bets across the board by investing in this type of fund.

After taxes on distributions
and sale of fund shares, it's had a one-year return of 7%, three-year return of 14%, five-year return of 12%, and a 10-year return of almost 12%. This index fund is extremely low cost, coming in at an expense
ratio of .015% per year. That means for every $1,000 invested, you're only paying 15 cents per year. Looking at the sector breakdown of the Total Market Index Fund, technology is once again dominating at 27% of this fund. The rest of the breakdown is pretty similar to
the Fidelity 500 Fund, with healthcare at 13%, consumer discretionary at close to 12%, and financials at close to 12% as well. Within the top 10 of the Fidelity Total Market Index Fund, we see a ton of names that we recognize, the exact same companies
within this top 10 are in the top 10 of the
Fidelity 500 Fund as well.

The only difference is how much money is allocated to each company. With the Fidelity 500 Fund, 29% was in the top 10. Within the Fidelity
Total Market Index Fund, there's only about 25%
allocated to those top 10. A lot of this has to do with the fact that FSKAX has over 4,000 companies to spread your money across, while the 500 fund only
has to spread your money across, of course, 500 companies. The Fidelity Total Market Index Fund is for the person who wants this ability that comes with investing in
those biggest 500 companies while still gaining exposure
to those up-and-coming, mid, and small cap stocks as well. As you can see, this index fund is considered a blend between
value and growth stocks, with a tilt more towards growth.

While most of the weighting
is in the large cap area, we see that about 18% is in mid caps, and 9% is in small cap stocks. Just like the Fidelity 500 Index Fund, the Total Market Fund is one
of the foundational funds that should be a part
of everyone's portfolio in some form. I personally don't think it makes sense to hold both of them at the same time, because there is some portfolio overlap. Once you have your U.S.
investments covered, the next best fund is the Fidelity Total
International Index Fund, FTIHX. And this fund is currently made up of over 5,000 stocks.

The Fidelity Total
International Index Fund is just like the Total U.S. Index Fund, except the International fund holds stocks that exist
outside of the United States. This fund seeks to
provide investment results that match the total return of foreign developed and
emerging stock markets. FTIHX specifically tracks the MSCI All Country World Index ex U.S., which covers about 85% of global equities outside of the United States. By investing in FTIHX, your money is diversified among different countries, regions, sectors, and even currencies. Since this fund has only
been around since 2016, I looked at the drawdowns from a global ex U.S. stock portfolio. The largest drawdown started in 2007, of course, due to the financial crisis, and ended up down 58%. It took a little over
eight years to recovery. The next largest drawdown started in 2000 due to the dot com crash, where it dropped by 47%, and it took about two and
a half years to recover. The third largest drawdown was in 1990, where it saw a max drawdown of 31%, and took three years and
four months to recover. One-year returns are negative 1%, three-year returns are 6%, and five-year returns are 5%.

Since this is a newer fund, we don't have enough data to
get out to the 10-year returns. The expense for this
Total International Fund is one of the lowest in the industry, coming in at .06%. That means for every $1,000 invested, you'll only pay 60 cents per year. The sector breakdown is a lot different when we compare it to
those first two U.S. funds that we looked at. For this international fund, we can see that the
majority of the holdings are in financials at an
almost 19% allocation, followed by industrials, tech, then consumer discretionary. The top 10 holdings only
make up less than 10% of the overall holdings, which is night and day compared to the first two
U.S. funds that we looked at. For those U.S. funds,
if you don't remember, the top 10 made up about
30% of the holdings. I don't see an issue with this, because there's a little more risk when investing in companies outside of the United States. A lot of these companies
you probably recognize, but once we get out of these top 10, you probably don't recognize
a lot of the companies within this index fund.

When we look at region breakdown, about 70% of the money is diversified among European and
emerging market companies. The Fidelity Total International Index is perfect for someone who
wants to get that broad exposure to anything outside of the U.S. As with any stock-based index funds, there are many risks to be aware of. Those can range from political, economical, regulations, currency, and interest rate risk. The good news is that FTIHX is more concentrated in
stocks that are larger, with a blended mix
between value and growth. The Fidelity U.S. Bond Index Fund, FXNAX, is perfect for the conservative
side of your portfolio. At this point, it has about 8,400 holdings from 593 issuers. It tracks the Bloomberg
U.S. Aggregate Bond Index, which holds a mixture of U.S. treasuries, corporate bonds, and
mortgage-backed securities. Max drawdowns for bond index funds look drastically different
from stock-based index funds, which is exactly how things should look.

The largest drawdown
started at the end of 2020, where it was down 7.77%, and it still hasn't recovered. The second largest was in 2013, where it went down 3.87%, and took nine months to recover. The third largest was in 2016, where it was down 3.5%, and it took nine months to recover. For a one-year period, this fund is down 2.74%. Three-year returns are at .87%, five-returns are at 1.08%, and the 10-year return is at 1.21%. The Fidelity Total U.S. Bond Fund is extremely low cost at .025% per year. That means for every $1,000 invested, you're paying 25 cents. This bond index is mainly diversified among three different types of bonds. 39% is in U.S. treasuries, 27% are in mortgage-backed
security pass-through bonds, and 24% are in corporate bonds. If you are someone who is building a three-fund portfolio, then you're going to need a bond fund. Now this is a great index fund to fill the gap in that type of strategy.

Don't sleep on bonds, because they still serve the same purpose as they always have, to reduce volatility
within your portfolio. Now this is especially needed when you are getting closer to retirement. I'll have my three-fund portfolio video linked up down in the
description, above my head, and at the end of this video as well. Real estate has had great
returns over the years, so if you're looking to gain more exposure to that asset class on the
Fidelity investment platform, then the Fidelity Real
Estate Index Fund, FSRNX, is the one that I prefer. Time out real quick, because after reviewing
my notes on this one, I am calling an audible in
the middle of this recording to pull this one off of my top five list.

This fund isn't tracking
the underlying index as well as I thought it was. On top of that, the fund manager is trading the underlying stocks like it's an actively managed fund, which could result in higher trading costs for investors like you. The turnover rate is 53% for this fund. This basically means that
they're buying and selling off 53% of the holdings
within a 12-month period. Compare that to the Vanguard
Real Estate Index ATF, where the turnover is only 7%, and I cannot, with good conscience, recommend the Fidelity
Real Estate Index Fund. If you want a real estate
fund on the Fidelity platform, then go with the Vanguard version, VNQ. Be honest, I don't like any of the other Fidelity funds, either, so I don't have a replacement
for the Real Estate Fund. Don't forget to hit that
thumbs up button before you go. My video on why you should avoid the Fidelity zero fee index funds will be linked to your left and in the description of this video a couple of days after
this one's released.

If you prefer Vanguard funds that you can purchase on the
Fidelity investment platform, then, to your left, I'll also have my top five video on those..

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Mastering the FIRE Method: The Ultimate Guide to Early Retirement & Financial Independence

at some point of time you would have thought of retiring early or maybe you're thinking of it now and truth be told retirement is not about abandoning work there are very few who would say I won't work any further but what we yearn for is the freedom to operate to live life in the way we want and that brings us to the five moment now fire stands for financial Independence retirement it's a very catchy acronym and to put it in a nutshell it's a program that's designed around saving aggressively investing in high return instruments like equities and disciplined withdrawals which put together ensures you have enough money to cover your living expenses for the rest of your life and therefore retire early in this video I shall be explaining the concept in Greater details we look at the implementation steps some calculations and why fire needs to be a deliberate part of your financial life this might be a short video but it's a very powerful concept so let's begin the concept of fire was popularized in a book titled your money or your life it was built around self-sufficiency control over one's time moderate consumption and of course living life outside the nine to five for instance this guy Pete atney who is better known as Mr Money Mustache applied the fire principles which allowed him to retire from his job as a software engineer at the age of 30.

He's 48 now and he continues to live comfortably of his Investments after so many years and it's not just Pete there are writers bloggers people traveling the world software developers and even YouTubers who are using these principles to lead a more open life and have attached some articles and videos in the description to that effect some of these stories are really inspirational and it proves the fact that a little bit of planning on the financial side can have a profound impact on other aspects of one's life and in a very positive way now there are three parts one needs to address when implementing a fire strategy the first step is savings and the hardcore fire disciple is expected to save anywhere from 50 to 70 percent of one's monthly income this is of course easier said than done and probably where a lot of people make up their mind that this is not their cup of tea but from what I have read and what I've experienced the saving need not be always defined as a percentage and we can also work with absolute numbers which we'll see when I come to the calculations part now when we hear the word saving our first reaction or response is on reducing our expenses however money can also be saved by upping one's income which is what I suggest and it does make sense right I mean there is a limit to what one can save but income generation has a much longer Runway and in our case it can include taking a part-time job doing some consultancy work asking for a pay hike changing jobs for a better salary reskilling oneself or of course starting a side hustle which can be a mix of active and passive work in fact I have a friend in Bangalore who works as a data scientist from Monday to Friday and then on the weekends he takes classes on an edtech platform and also does some consultancy work to put it in numbers what was earlier a monthly saving of 50 000 Rupees is now easily over 2 lakhs a month and this guy has absolutely changed his life around by leveraging what he knows so he's on fire metaphorically speaking and the the fire strategy encourages us to find creative and better ways of increasing our savings rate the Second Step under the fire strategy is to spend wisely notice I didn't say don't spend I said spend wisely which means you need to identify what is an essential expense and what can be tagged as discretionary now people who practice Fire have a ton of helpful advice for us these include driving a good used car instead of a new one renting versus buying a house cooking at home rather than eating out track your daily expenses cancel unnecessary subscriptions Etc from what I've read these small steps can reduce your monthly expenses by up to 30 percent which if you choose to look at it differently is like getting a 30 incremented salary so you don't have to be stinky when it comes to your expenses but try to be a bit more rational about it and the third and final pillar in the fire system is the investment part now on a basic level the system requires advisors to invest as much money as you can and as early as possible so it's the principle of compounding at work here and this table here is a handy guide to how well your Corpus expands when you give it the necessary capital and a decent amount of time to grow now the fire method keeps this investing part ridiculously simple one you invest some money every month or as we call it you set up an sip a systematic investment plan and secondly this money is invested in a low cost Index Fund or ETF which in our case is either the nifty 50 or maybe a slightly broader Nifty 500 Index so essentially the focus here is to participate in the equity markets rather than actively trying to beat it which by my Reckoning should Fetchers and analyze return of 12 to 13 percent again the idea here is to maximize the returns which is why equities have been suggested but if that makes you a little uncomfortable then you can also settle for a mix of different asset classes which is something I explained in my video on asset allocation a few weeks back yet another investment you can make which is encouraged under the fire movement is on account of passive income dividends from stocks interest from your fixed deposits income from your blog your podcast YouTube channel monetization rental income are just some ways of making an Roi from physical or virtual assets now notice I have put this part under Investments and not income because passive income does require a lot of upfront work but once you do the hard work and you do it well one can expect a continuous stream of income over the next few years which will not only support your early retirement Ambitions but will also act as a safety net in fact there is something called an fi Ratio or the financial Independence ratio which largely means if your passive income is greater than your expenses then you're making some great progress on the path to financial Independence so to sum it up remember fire has three simple principles that you need to work on which is save more spend less and invest wisely if you're getting good value from this video then please do give this video a thumbs up and if you aren't a subscriber yet then do consider becoming one as I can then serve you videos as soon as they are released and also share with you some investing strategies tips and stories that are continually Post in the community section the original fire formula is based on the four percent rule which is the amount of saving you can safely withdraw every year without worrying that your money will run out for example let's say you are 29 years old and your monthly expenses are around 50 000 rupees if you want to retire at 40 then you have 11 years to accumulate a retirement fund so here's the math if household inflation is likely to grow by eight percent per annum then the 50 000 you spend now will rise to 1 lakh 16 000 rupees by the time you're 40.

So annually this comes to 14 lakh rupees and per the four percent rule it's 14 multiplied by 25 which means you need to accumulate a couples of three and a half crores to safely navigate through your retirement years or at least that's what the fire formula says now in my view there are some gaps with this four percent rule that I think we should all be aware of firstly this rule is okay for someone who has factored 25 maybe 30 years of retirement but if the retirement Horizon goes higher let's say 50 years for example then this formula starts getting a bit shaky and I've pinned a research study by Vanguard on this in the video's description secondly the four percent rule is a United States origination of the 1990s and has been tested on a historical basis when the yields on equities and Bonds were sufficiently high now we are not Americans and what works there will most likely not work for us which means there's an asset allocation and a market performance risk which needs to be accounted for and finally because each of us have our own preferences income goals saving patterns Etc I always felt it's important to have a customized fire implementation plan rather than picking something off the shelf which is why I created my own fire calculator which gives a clearer picture of how much I need to accumulate when can I idly retire how much withdrawals can I do on a monthly basis and at what point and in what circumstances my retirement money can run out so this obviously starts with the inputs and you need to type in your current age the age at which you want to retire and of course your life expectancy which I hope is strong and long then comes your current portfolio of Investments and this includes your mutual funds fds ppf EPF gold and other stuff and as a best practice kindly exclude the cost of the house where you will be staying post your retirement if you're still working then input the monthly savings and the annual increase you foresee input the expected returns from your investment the capital gain tax that can remain at 10 percent and finally have a view on how much will your expenses be in the first year of retirement and the expected household inflation rate and once we have these numbers keyed in as I have shown in this example the resulting output should clearly tell us three things one the amount of investment Corpus we need at the time of retirement which in this illustration is 2.2 crores at the age of 40.

Secondly we now have Clarity on how much can be spent on an early basis which starts from 12 lakhs so that's one lakh per month and it increases by eight percent every year and thirdly we get to know how sound or unsound this entire construct is like in this case our calculation shows that I'll run out of my money by the time I am 64 years old which is another way of saying that I need to rework my fire math which can include an increase in the monthly savings and the growth rate I can also consider extending my retirement age to a higher number let's say 45 years and finally I I can be a little careful with my expenses and instead of spending a lack of rupees maybe I can make do with 90 000.

So there are many permutations and combinations you can look at but my suggestion is try to be a little conservative in your estimates especially when it comes to return on investment the inflation rate and the post retirement monthly expenses now for your benefit I have enclosed the link of this worksheet in the video's description it's a downloadable sheet all the formulas are open so feel free to change the numbers improve the formula if required add your own customization if it helps you but have a clear idea on when and where you need to be on the path to financial Independence so when I first heard and read about fire I was not a big fan of it I mean saving 50 to 7 20 percent of one salary is almost next to Impossible and I would have shut sharp had I not realized that as a method fire is quite flexible and can be used in many different ways so the calculator is one way and you can make a customized version of it but then there are more strategies there are more variants of the fire strategy and if you are interested then do read up on lean fire fat fire Coast fire and a few more of these in related articles that I've Linked In the video's description the point is and I myself realized a very late in life that many of us don't know when to retire how much is needed to retire which is why we continue working in a role or occupation that we don't enjoy much and that's where I think fire as a strategy might be the solution and it's just three things right increase your income and savings lower your expenses and get your Investments right so read up more about this concept in the Articles and websites I've added in the description and I sincerely hope you practice some sort of fire going forward if you found this video useful then do press the like button do subscribe to my channel share this video and I'll see you three days from now until then foreign

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