“Exactly What Do You Think Is Happening Here Captain?”
“Fists in the air in the land of hypocrisy.”
Raise your hands if it’s hard to determine where I come down on some of the issues I address in this blog. You’re not alone. I do it on purpose. The way I see it, for some topics, all I can do is describe the problem and provide some options to solve it. The choice is yours as to how to use the information I provide. I was reminded of that this past week as I interacted with several of my Golden Albatross Facebook group members about topics I should include in a money manifesto if I chose to write one for the blog. Continue reading →
Anybody else exhausted from Part 2 of the Pension Series? I know I am. At 3200+ words it wasn’t concise. Amongst all those words, you may remember my promise to help you determine your pension’s worth in future posts. Well, the future is now, or at least partially. Unlike Part 2 though, I intend to break up the discussion over the next several posts. How many? I don’t know yet; at least two, maybe more. Since calculating your pension’s worth is more of a “how to process”, I hope the articles don’t need to be overly verbose. I understand people don’t have time to read 3200+ word posts every week, and frankly, I don’t have the time to write them.
Calculating Your Pension’s Worth … Ain’t Like Dusting Crops
For this post, I will examine the three key inputs in determining your pension’s worth. I will also examine some of the basic mathematical formulas used to calculate your pension’s worth. I will keep it simple because I am not a math genius by any means (liberal arts major here!), and more than likely you are going to use a pension calculator to make the calculations anyway. However, you should understand the inputs and formulas because like Han Solo said in Star Wars: A New Hope: Continue reading →
Over the past two work weeks, I helped financially counsel a fellow officer whose residual financial issues from the Great Recession stood to impact his career. There we were, almost 10 years from the start of the downturn, looking at foreclosure documents starting in 2009. He’d only settled the foreclosure within the last year, and the DoD wanted answers. In some ways, I could hardly believe it. In other ways, it was a sobering reminder about the lasting impact that event will have on American society for years, possibly generations, to come.
It also proved an interesting glimpse into another financial way a life. I found a life almost alien to mine because decades ago my fellow officer chose to build wealth through rental properties. Despite my personal negative history with a 2004 property purchase (as related previously on this blog), I hold no ill will for those who choose property investment as a method for building wealth. If it works for them, that’s great. However, my comrade-in-arms had specifically chosen a highly leveraged method for acquiring rental properties. As I questioned him on the simple details that he should’ve known from using this strategy, I quickly realized he lacked the acumen for it.
I just realized the serendipitous nature of the topic I chose for this Labor Day weekend’s post, which is pension safety. Of course, for my one international reader, I refer to U.S. Labor Day. Don’t confuse it with the rest of the world’s International Worker’s (Labour) Day, otherwise known as May Day. The U.S. celebrates its laboring workers in September due to May Day’s association with the Haymarket Affair and the Communist Party. There’s no way this Cold War kid would celebrate some Commie Red version of Labor Day. Of course, now I feel torn between shouting either “WOLVERINES!” or “YeehaaAAAWWW!” in homage to one of the two greatest Cold War movies of all time. I’ll let you decide which one is laced with more irony. (Grumpus Maximus is an Amazon Associate, see Disclosures for more details.)
Seriously Dude, Wolverines!
Jokes aside, this article marks the start of a new series of posts centered on pensions. My choice of Labor Day weekend to begin this series, while fitting, was coincidental. In all honesty, I don’t plan that far in advance. I decided to write about pensions because I noticed that the blog’s kind of light on pension discussions. That’s not good for a blog “Where Financial Independence (FI) and Pensions Meet to Create a Better Retired Life”. Thus, I felt it was time to rectify that oversight. Continue reading →
Sister, I killed Colonel Grumpus in the Drawing Room with a lead pipe.
Grumpus The Confessor
I have a confession to make. I put off writing this post for a while. When I first started my blog, I had always intended to demonstrate how to test your retirement plan. I wanted to do this by using a high powered retirement calculator. Doing so would complement what I consider the biggest strength of my website: the series of practical “How To” retirement plan articles in the Planning section. However, I needed to tackle some other topics first. I wanted to walk financially novice readers up to a point where they could understand the subject matter of this article. Yet, I essentially hit that point weeks ago, and still, I delayed.
Part of that delay was due to the complexity of what I intended to describe. It’s hard to write effectively about the steps needed to test your retirement plan. A technically savvy blogger would simply post a video of how to do this, but that is beyond my capability at the moment. As a point of reference, I was happy enough when I figured out how to embed a spreadsheet into this post. Maybe someday I will circle back and create a video once I obtain the skills, and find the time. Continue reading →
Do you have a favorite teacher from your time at school? How about one that particularly challenged you to be a better student? It could be a primary, secondary or college instructor who you remember particularly fondly. I had one in 5th and 6th grade (I went to a weird school where we had the same teachers for two grades in a row). Let’s call her Strictus Academicus. She was strict but fair and taught me how to channel my smarts and energy in a positive direction. I thrived under her tutelage, and the academic discipline she forged within me carried on for the rest of my life.
Yep. Just like I remember it.
Much like Strictus Academicus, I am going to break out the ruler and be stern but fair with you. Don’t worry, no one’s knuckles are getting rapped, and no one will be staying after class. However, I am assigning some prerequisite reading and podcast listening. The prerequisites are for those of you not familiar with the difference between Traditional and Roth retirement savings vehicles. Many apologies for doing this, but I cannot allow you to continue reading the bulk of this post until you read or listen to the following articles.
I can hear the groans already. Yet, I need to talk higher level stuff, and if you don’t have the basics down, then I am afraid I will lose you. I may loose you anyways because this stuff is not the most exciting. The knowledge could save you money, time, and hassle though. And I would rather loose your attention out of boredom than confusion. As for your assignment, since other people have explained the basics much better than me, it will be easier if you to simply learn from them. For those of you Roth and Traditional Retirement Account (TRA) novices, see the bullet points below prior to class convening. And don’t worry I was just like you two years ago.
As you see from the title, this post is a continuation of a previous post on the method I use to conduct financial planning. If you haven’t read the first post I suggest you go back and do so. The content below will make more sense if you do. I would strongly suggest you read my article on the need to track your money as well. Without that knowledge you will not be able to make many of the calculations I discuss below.
