I’ve often made reference on My Money Design that time is the only true currency. Even when we think of money as a currency, really all we’re doing with it is buying the convenience of goods and services that we would otherwise have to use our time to obtain. And while as deep or philosophical as I think I’m being, I was pleasantly surprised to come across a movie a movie with a subtle plot that made me think about how our society looks at the value of time and money. … [Read more...] about The Value of Time and Money
retirement
My Post Retirement Ideas for When I Become Financially Free
We spend an awful lot of time on My Money Design talking about not only how to successfully plan for retirement, but even some strategies for how to get there as early as possible. Why? Because I think that financial freedom and the ability for you to choose what you do with your time are some of the most gratifying things you can accomplish in your lifetime. The big question then is: What is it that I want to do with all this time once I finally have it? - That’s a very good question, and not one to take lightly. Having some post retirement ideas and goals for what you’ll do with yourself is just as important as the planning it took to get you there. … [Read more...] about My Post Retirement Ideas for When I Become Financially Free
What is Financial Freedom – The Easy to Follow Explanation
The tagline to My Money Design has always been designing financial freedom. For as long as I’ve been into reading financial books and blogs about money, I’ve seen a lot of them try to answer the question of what is financial freedom. However, I feel as though the weight of this term often gets lost or trivialized. In this post, we’re going to layout a definition for financial freedom and explain where we need to focus in order to achieve it. … [Read more...] about What is Financial Freedom – The Easy to Follow Explanation
Why Care About Money?
Before you can decide how to invest your money or how much to stash away, it’s important to ask yourself the fundamental question: • Why care about money? The answer is harder than you think. … [Read more...] about Why Care About Money?
Adding Your Children’s College Savings to the Budget
Please don’t hate me. I’m very proud that you’ve been following my advice (and the advice of my PF blog constituents) to start saving for retirement, etc. But now we’re going to talk about something that may require you to dig just a little deeper into those pockets of yours: • College “I Don’t Even Have Kids Yet!” Why Do I Care? I know some of you are pretty young and just graduating college yourself, while others of you may have recently got married and just had children. These are all great positions to be because, like most savings strategies, “more time” is our friend. However, this post is going to assume that someday when or if you already DO have kids, that you’ll want to send your little Princess or Jedi (… there’s a Star … [Read more...] about Adding Your Children’s College Savings to the Budget
Which is Better – Term or Permanent Life Insurance? – Part 2
In Part 1, we reviewed the fundamental differences between Term and Permanent Life Insurance. Basically Term is cheaper but it expires and gets more expensive as time goes on. Permanent life is way more expensive, but it lasts forever and has the potential to build up cash value. We concluded with me learning a fact about life insurance that made me question my Variable policy. I’ll explain below what exactly that was and how it caused me to request two new quotes so I could crunch the numbers to determine whether the Term or Variable Life Insurance policy was truly the better deal. … [Read more...] about Which is Better – Term or Permanent Life Insurance? – Part 2
Which is Better – Term or Permanent Life Insurance? – Part 1
Some of you may wonder “What in the world does life insurance got to do with my personal finances?” The truth is that it plays a more significant role in your money than you think for 2 reasons: 1) Life Insurance is about taking care of those you leave behind. Do you have a spouse? Children? Dependents? If something were to happen to you, who would take of the bills? Pay the mortgage so they can stay in their house? Pay for your kids’ college? Life insurance is part of your safety net for protecting those you love. 2) Choose poorly and you can significantly over-pay! There are thousands of life insurance products available, and the costs can vary dramatically. If you learn about what the differences are, then you can select the … [Read more...] about Which is Better – Term or Permanent Life Insurance? – Part 1
Retiring on the One-Million Dollar Myth
I recently read an article on Daily Finance that posed the question of whether having one-million dollars was enough to retire. For many, one-million dollars is perceived as being the classic bench-mark of finally having enough money to retire as well as a symbolic goal for finally “being rich”. But as you can expect, the article posed several questions about whether retiring on one-million dollars had become a myth. Would it be enough to retire or stop working altogether? Where Does One-Million Dollars Get You? Perhaps it’s a sign of the times that our expenses have gotten out of control. Or maybe our society just simply “thinks” they need too much to live comfortably. Either way, we can explore this situation a little further. … [Read more...] about Retiring on the One-Million Dollar Myth
