Define Your Future – DYF
Most people are going through life casually passing the time believing that if they save some arbitrary amount of money on a regular basis and invest it with a financial advisor, they’ll have plenty of money to live the lifestyle of their dreams when they decide to retire and the money will never run out. This has proven NOT to be the case with Baby-Boomers for several reasons, but one in particular: They failed to define their future early in their careers and then reverse engineer it to define a plan.
“Vision without action is a dream. Action without vision is simply passing the time. Action with Vision is making a positive difference.” – Joel Barker
If you have NO clearly defined vision of your future retirement, how will you ever know if you’re on the right path to reach your goal or that you even got there? Define your future, DYF, is the first step anyone investing money for retirement needs to do.
When it comes to retirement, you must clearly define the following:
- Age you wish to retire
- You and your spouse’s life expectancy
- Annual cost-of-living for your desired lifestyle
- Estimate this as if you were going to retire today and live the lifestyle of your dreams starting tomorrow. How much income would you need today on an annual basis to realize that lifestyle? (Don’t forget to include the cost of healthcare and taxes)
Once you’ve defined when your retirement will start, how long it will last, and what your desired lifestyle will be, you have successfully defined your future…congratulations! That’s the easy part. Now comes the “hard” part – Ensuring your vision becomes reality.
Today’s ‘Words of Wisdom’ – Define Your Future with a vision to make a positive difference!
Write your answers down as you’ll need them for tomorrow’s blog where we’ll teach you the steps to develop your plan (DYP).