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Afford Anything | Make Smart Money Choices

Ask Paula: I Spent Ten Years in School, and Now I’m Behind on Retirement Savings

Afford Anything | Make Smart Money Choices

Paula Pant | Cumulus Podcast Network

Entrepreneurship, Investing, Business

4.73.6K Ratings

🗓️ 13 May 2019

⏱️ 66 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

#193: Lori is behind on retirement savings, as a result of being a full-time student for more than a decade. She makes good money and lives frugally, but she’s aware that she’s behind for her age. What should she do? Sierra wonders whether she should apply her savings towards paying off her mortgage or building investments. Jenessa plans to retire at age 35, and she’s wondering if the 4 percent withdrawal rule applies for such a long time horizon. Her friend swears that it’s designed to cover a 30-year retirement, not a 60+ year retirement. Is that correct? Jacqui is 24 and recently married. She’d like to open a 529 College Savings Plan for her future children, which she doesn’t plan on having for another 8 to 10 years. Should she do this? David is on-track to reach financial independence at age 50. He would like to start adding bonds to his taxable brokerage accounts. How should he manage this? Mikayla lives in Atlanta. Her employer gives her a stipend to use public transportation. This money can only be used for that purpose. She’s thinking of getting rid of her car so that she can start using public transit, and applying the cost-savings of getting rid of her vehicle into a downpayment fund for a future home. Should she do this? Former financial planner Joe Saul-Sehy and I answer these six questions on today’s episode. For more information, visit the show notes at https://affordanything.com/episode193  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0

You can afford anything but not everything.

0:10.5

Every decision that you make is a trade-off against something else and that doesn't just

0:13.6

apply to your money, it applies to anything in your life that is a scarce or limited resource,

0:18.0

which could include time, focus, attention, energy, absolutely any limited resource that

0:23.3

you need to manage.

0:24.6

And so that leads to two questions.

0:26.7

First of all, what's actually important to you?

0:29.2

Second, how do you live that out on a day-to-day basis?

0:33.3

Answering these two questions is a lifetime practice.

0:35.1

There are no simple answers.

0:36.8

That is what this podcast is here to explore.

0:39.0

My name is Paula Pat and I am the host of the Afford Anything Podcast.

0:42.6

With me today is former financial planner Joe Saul C. High to help answer questions that

0:47.7

come from you, the community.

0:49.7

Hey Joe, what's up?

0:50.7

Paula, you are up?

0:52.7

I am, I'm up, I'm awake.

0:54.6

That is fantastic.

0:55.6

It's always good when you wake up for another day, isn't it?

0:58.2

Absolutely, something to be grateful for.

1:00.2

Especially when we get to spend time answering people's fun questions, which I love coming

1:04.9

here to do.

...

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