Plan Ahead - Start Saving Your Money

    Have you ever thought about how you plan to finance your retirement years?

    Many people don't have a clear idea of how much money they actually have, so it's hard to know how much they might be able to count on when they retire. Finding out what part of today's money can go toward retirement simply means adding up the value of all your current assets.  In this case, "assets" are cash, investments, and anything of value you can exchange for cash, like your house, savings bonds, or even fine jewelry. This figure will be your first important clue.

Recording these amounts could be a pleasant surprise. You don't want to count emergency money and savings for your children's education or a big trip - only money that you are not going to touch for at least 10 to 15 years. For Pre-Retirement planning  don't include any future Social Security benefits and guaranteed pensions because these items are future income, rather than current assets.  Any balances in work-related retirement plans, like 401(k) plans, is counted, however, and you will want to include amounts from current and former jobs. In fact, these just may be at the top of your list of today's assets.

You May Have More Than You Think!

Tracking your money in retirement plans should be fairly easy. If you didn't roll over your retirement plan balance when you changed jobs into a new retirement plan account or into an IRA, or if you didn't take your account balance as cash, you may discover some forgotten retirement assets you have. This is a good time to think about keeping your money with fewer, rather than more, quality financial institutions so it is easier to manage.

Recording current and old retirement account amounts on the Pre-Retirement Savings/Assets Worksheet, is important for a couple of reasons. First, locating an old account could take time. The longer it's "lost," the harder it will be to find. Second, understanding your current financial standing should automatically start you thinking about how to make your money grow.

Start Planning Today!

     Remember you're facing a retirement that's probably going to be longer than your parents' and will involve more uncertainties. This new kind of retirement probably means there are many American workers worrying about, instead of planning for, the future.

     You can make the choice to stop worrying and start figuring. Not only will you come up with facts to work with, the chances are good you might change the way you save. The 2008 EBRI survey also found that 44 percent of people who tried to figure out their financial futures ended up changing their retirement savings plans.

If you are a married woman: In preparing for retirement, women face the very real possibility of spending part of their retirement years without the support of a husband - most likely through widowhood. The loss of a spouse can sometimes mean the loss or reduction of benefits that can place women in financial jeopardy. For that reason, women will need to focus on their financial resources as a single person as well as half of a couple. 

    Consider what happens to your Social Security and to retirement benefits if your spouse dies or you divorce. Know what assets you can count on. Check Social Security benefit documents, retirement plan documents, and wills. Remember that wills are important, but they may not provide the protection desired. Depending on the way assets are titled or the terms of a will, the money women believe they can count on may not be passed to the surviving spouse.

   Whatever stage in your career you find yourself in - its never too early to focus on adding to your nest egg and investing it wisely. Save Your Hard earned money and investing for a secure financial future.  Check out these tips for improving your financial fitness.

True Economy

An excerpt from an article by the legendary P.T. Barnum:

True economy consists in always making income exceed spending.

Wear the old clothes a little longer if necessary; dispense with the new pair of gloves; mend the old dress: live on plainer food if need be; so that, under all circumstances, unless some unforeseen accident occurs, there will be a margin in favor of the income. A penny here, and a dollar there, placed at interest, goes on accumulating, and in this way the desired result is attained. It requires some training, perhaps, to accomplish this economy, but when once used to it, you will find there is more satisfaction in rational saving than in irrational spending.

Here is a recipe which I recommend: I have found it to work an excellent cure for extravagance, and especially for mistaken economy: When you find that you have no surplus at the end of the year, and yet have a good income, I advise you to take a few sheets of paper and write down every dollar you spend. Post it every day or week in two columns, one headed "necessaries" or even "comforts", and the other headed "luxuries," and you will find that the latter column will be double, treble, and frequently ten times greater than the former. The real comforts of life cost but a small portion of what most of us can earn. The great Benjamin Franklin says "it is the eyes of others and not our own eyes which ruin us. If all the world were blind except myself I should not care for fine clothes or furniture." It is the fear of what Mrs. Grundy may say that keeps the noses of many worthy families to the grindstone.

In America many persons like to repeat "we are all free and equal," but it is a great mistake in more ways than one.

That we are born "free and equal" is a glorious truth in one sense, yet we are not all born equally rich, and we never shall be. One may say; "there is a man who has an income of one hundred thousand dollars a year, while I have but one thousand dollars; I knew that fellow when he was poor like myself; now he is rich and thinks he is better than I am; I will show him that I am as good as he is; I will go and buy a fancy car; no, I cannot do that, but I will go and hire one and ride this afternoon on the same road that he does, and thus prove to him that I am as good as he is."

Some families spend eighty thousand dollars a year, and some much more, and would scarcely know how to live on less, while others secure more solid enjoyment frequently on half of that amount. Prosperity is a more severe ordeal than adversity, especially sudden prosperity. "Easy come, easy go," is an old and true proverb. Start Saving Your Money! And Spend Less!