Financial Freedom with Dependents

It has already been shown that it is not that hard to retire young. If the person you marry is also adopting similar lifestyle then it is also easy for both of you to retire young together. But what if you have people who are financially depending on you ? How would you achieve financial freedom with dependents ?

Before I go on, I have to apologize first I don't have an easy to follow solution for this; not like Wealth Pyramid or Personal Finance in 1 picture. Because the answer was already given before this question is asked. And the ability to achieve financial freedom with dependents is really within you yourself as a person, not really a finance issue to start with. Give me a chance to explain ... because most people will not like this.

Through out the whole personal finance concept promoted in MalPF, it has never questioned you how you spent your money. As a matter of fact, the very first thing is to put aside some money systematically and then its up to you what you want to do; But you can only use up to what you have left. MalPF never question you buying that car, phone, liquor, smoke etc. MalPF just want you to do all those things within your means.

So systematically it doesn't really matter how you use your money, not even if they are for your dependents which is a much better cause than above examples. As long as you stay within your ability ( left over after saving ), your personal finance system should continue to work as is.

There are a few common mistakes we commit in practice ( real life );

1. We treat our dependents as separate entities. While of course we are different people but since financially they depend on us, their expenses are really our expenses. All combined expenses should not exceed what we have left.
   
   
2. We over reach our dependents needs. The fact that we 'allow' them to 'become' our dependents mean there are some emotion connection in between. This 'feeling' always get in to ways affecting our judgement what our dependents real needs are vs their wants.
   
   
3. We ourselves fulfill our own luxury wants before our dependents needs. We can pamper ourself in whatever way we want but we should do it within our means. If there is no money left after settling our expenses ( including your dependents'), then we need to venture into solutions without money. ( There have already been stories shared before how things get done without money )

It was hinted before that young people who has expensive hobby don't get retire early, those who are more creative with their hobbies do. The hobby itself may be the same. Its the way they think about the hobby and what they do about it. Some think they have to BUY, the others try to GET/TRADE/DEAL however way they can come up with. Indirectly, they learn new skills that they can apply in other aspects of their life. Directly they full fill their own wants within their means - and hence did not need to scarify their personal finance system.

Although hobby and dependents are TOTALLY different in all aspects. But our reaction to them are actually similar or relevant. We were 'attracted' to do things beyond our means. If we do that in our early years we will end with less. If we first do it within a control manner (left over money), then perhaps we can do it more often and longer through out the journey.

Its NOT a matter of right or wrong. Its just that you can only choose one. If you decided to go beyond your means NOW for whatever reason, you should also be very satisfy with the price you pay in future. Or else don't BUY it!

Lastly be reminded that income is a pre-requisite in MalPF system. So no matter how you setup your ASS ( Automated Saving System ), increasing your income will increase the chance you can full fill your dependents and your Wants. So instead of letting dependents to push you to go beyond your means, why don't channel those drives into making more income !? Then you may be able to get the best of both worlds.

Ok, I apologized before. Now I have to do it again because I lied earlier. There are actually easy to follow actions you can do to still achieve financial freedom with dependents. But this article is more important than that and further more those easy to follow stuff may only be applicable to some people - and time travel starts to get in MalPF. Yea crazy I know! Thats why I didn't want to tell that story.

Relates stories :

Gabriel had kids yet he retired rather young

Ah Yung has no money Nor is she NOT free from finance issues

if Your finance all about Money ?

How To Double salary in 10 years, country wise.

Malaysia is aiming to increase its average salary from $2,000 to $4,000 in the next 10 years. How can that be done ?

First of all, using rule of 72 you can estimate that doubling in 10 years would mean a continuous compound raise of 7% annually. Or a total of 72% increment within that 10 years. For example, it doesn't matter if the increment is from 2.72% to 11.72% adding 1% annually OR it went from 11.72% to 2.72%, either way will result a $4,000 monthly salary in 2010.

While it may sound tough to double a person's salary in 10 years but there are a number of ways this can be achieved rather easily country wide;

1. Increase Inflation

By decreasing supply on purpose, prices increase. Where does the extra money go to ? It goes to people who produce the supply. It may sound weird but when done properly, all the extra money collected from the consumers will be passed down to the workers themselves. This way, although items price increase, your salary increase as well. Nothing in life actually change, just that the numbers get bigger. This method work best with monopoly in place, as in all consumers are also the same workers for that few same companies.

How much inflation rate do we need in order to achieve this ? Properly 10% a year for the 1st 7 years (2011-2017) and then back to a very low figure in the last 3 years (2018-2020). It will take a while before the effect of inflation hike is brought over to salary increment. Furthermore, we can't have a high inflation rate approaching 2020.

Will this help us ? Well no, I have already said Nothing in life actually change, just that the numbers get bigger ... on everything.

2. Foreign Exchange

Believe it or not, it is entirely possible that by simply doing NOTHING, our country wide average salary can become double in the next 10 years. Notice that our finance minister is using USD as a benchmark for this target. Today 1 USD = 3.3 MYR. If USD continues to devalue and the exchange rate become 1:1.65 in 2010, then by having the same MYR 2,000 salary, we would have already doubled our salary from USD 606 to USD 1,212.

How possible it this ? Well, it is almost a certainty the trend IS CORRECT. The power switch from west to east has not only already occurred but it has been strengthening now. It is only a matter of how big a scale it will switch.

Will this help us ? Hell no. It would have helped if we BUY things from USA. But the fact is we BUY mostly from the EAST and we will buy MORE from within the EAST. A small currency rise on the EAST may knock us out of the game easily. We are anchoring on the wrong currency for our future planning.

3. By making a few people even RICHER

This is an average game. Simply by making today's millionaires into billionaires, it will easily pull up the average and skew the figures. How is this done ? By issuing more mega projects to turn key contractors, hiring super consultants to tell us what common senses are, setup independent groups for special projects etc.

Will this help us? Well, some of us maybe. You just need to get on the bandwagon as front seat as possible.

4. By giving FREE money to VERY POOR people

Just like above, pulling the other end of the graph can bring up the average as well. Despite qualification and ability to perform, we just simply increase basic salary for all those who are earning below $2,000 a month now. For the others who really can't fit into this category or still has very low salary, put them OFF work completely. They will receive FREE support from the government on their daily needs. By knocking out these VERY LOW SALARY figures off the chart, the average will rise too.

Will this help us ? Oh yea, quite a lot of us I guess. But if you are already one of the average guy to start with, not too poor not too rich, you are pretty much still on yourself. Lets just hope by giving out FREE money, there will be less crime !?

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Now although all above may sound too extreme and may even be read as a joke, but I assure you 10 years later, we WILL achieve our 2020 goals and a combination of all 4 methods mentioned above WILL be used, partly or as a whole.

And here below I present you NEM fashion !!

2010 Inflation vs life style change

In 2009, Dung, Mat and Ahmad's personal inflation rates are 4%, 24% and 2.5% respectively representing the Rich, the Average and the Poor. Unfortunately this year we can't do a 1 to 1 comparison because Dung's business has expanded into main land China and his life style has drastically changed. Mat lost his job and now float between temporary freelance works. Ahmad on the other hand has ventured into politics and sort of get himself 'upgraded' into the Average arena. Unfortunately, none of their personal inflation rate can be used to represent our 'typical' experiences. All of them are going through a 'transition' in life rather than reflecting the general senses of inflation. But perhaps you are experiencing a transition in life too ?

When one is calculating his own personal inflation rate, it is important to differentiate value and cost. For example, a plate of used to be $1 fried mee is now $1.50; that would be a 50% increase as in it has inflated by as much as 50%. Like wise, if the $1 mee is now much smaller plate, it has inflated as well. But if you are no longer eating fried mee at a street stall, instead you pay $10 for a dish of mee in a nice deco restaurant nowadays, your inflation rate is NOT 10X ! You are merely having a change in life style.

The rise of cost on the same value is inflation. Inflation does not usually apply when you are comparing 2 different things with 2 different values.

2010 is an interesting year. While inflation was on the rise in 2009, inflation has finished rising in 2010 especially after March. If you do your grocery in hypermarkets, you may have already observed a rise of 15-30%. Certain goods haven't had an increase in price for the past 3 years, hence averaging out would annualized to a 6-9% inflation rate.

If you do your grocery in a wet market, the worst is over. Most of the stalls which haven't gone bankrupt yet have found new supplies. Most of the selling prices remain the same as last year. Generally the inflation remains stable at 3-5%.

Local or individual grocery stores on the other hand are still facing challenges. Some of them who manage to find wet market's supply chain manage to stay more competitive than hypermarkets. Others are struggling wondering if they should just close the store or relocate.

Night clubs, bars, restaurants and places for The Rich remains similar by large. Most of them face reduce in sales and therefore beef up their marketing and promotion deals to play catch up. There aren't much change in price. But one may find these service providers start to charge for all the little things that were used to be free last time.

There you go, 2010 is a year of stabilizing inflation. But the worst is NOT over yet. When the bail out funds end mid this year, the critical turning point would be if all those dump ass giants can stand on their own. Even if only ONE of them still collapse when the bail out fund withdraw, it will still tear down the whole economy creating the worst recession ever. But its unlikely. The old faulty finance system will most probably stay through out this decade, forex loop holes will continue etc. Perhaps it may crash in 2018 ... but for now, we are off the hook temporary.

Related Posts:

Inflation is an external factor, Living Standard is internal and is the one you have power over with.

Malaysia Best Rates 2010 March 11 update

1 month Fix Deposit

Most banks offer 2.25% now except a few ones. Most of the ones who are still stuck at 2.0% are international banks like Bank of China, JP Morgan, Bank of Nova Scotia and Alliance banks.

1 year Fix Deposit

Highest offered rates is 2.75% by Affin Bank, AmBank, Bangkok Bank, Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ, Deutsche Bank, Hong Leong Bank, Malayan Bank.

Base Lending Rate

Most local banks stand at 5.8% now with Affin offers the lowest at 5.75%. International banks offer lower rate starting from 5.50% by Royal Bank of Scotland.

Saving Accounts

Kuwait Finance House continues to offer highest saving interest rate in its KFH Savings Account-i at 1.5%. This account is also very simple and straight forward.

Other than that, Standard Chartered's Al-Wadiah Savings Account-i offer 1.0% for up to RM 10,000 savings.

CIMB's Air Asia Savers Account and Mudharabah Saving Account-i also offers 1.0%.

Other accounts who seems like offering high interest rate but require high amount of saving are excluded. Some special accounts like OCBC's iQ Saving is also excluded because their offer rate may seems high at 3.28% but their effective rate is hard to simplify for general public. In short, for those accounts, if you use up the benefits they offer then it would be a great deal but if you do not use any of those stuff then its better you stick to a lower but 'real' rate, simpler and more straight forward saving account.

Don't forget you can get a simple widget

like above to show on your blog / web site.

Just visit here to see how.

Car Loan : NEW Car

Maybank continues to offer the lowest car loan rate starting from 2.7%. However, this is NOT a standard rate apply to all applicants. The actual rate can range up to 4.3%.

Bank Muamalat offers 2.85% for both New and Used cars but it requires an admin charges of RM600.

Most other banks rates offer are 3.25% for New cars.

Car Loan : Used Car

CIMB offers the lowest 3.25% used car loan rate.

Most of other best used car loan rates offer are 3.75% by Affin, Hong Leong Bank, Alliance, EON and RHB.

Don't forget Car Loan rate is Fix Term Rate

which is effectively a MUCH HIGHER

than variable term rate

like House Loan and Fix Deposit.

House Loan

Affin remains as the best house loan offer at BLR - 2.3%.

Standard Chartered offers BLR - 2.25%

Most banks offers are BLR - 1.8%.

Multi-tiers house loan offers are excluded because it would be impossible to simplify their pro and cons without knowing the actual details of your particular loan details. Hence, only simple and straight forward house loan offers are compared.

Do NOT Leverage EVERYTHING

There are certain fundamental stuffs that you should do even before you fully understand what they are. That will at least keep you afloat at a certain stage, also often used as resting stage or jumping stone to higher level. Usually this stage is also adequate for young adult to retire early. What goes beyond however will require clear target and solid methods. Some of the easier methods shared before are ;

Stock Investment : When to Buy at What Price

... Why Use EPS and PE

... Where to get these data ?

... Management, the Qualitative side

Guaranteed Property Investment method

One common element to do great thing is the use of Leverage. Unfortunately, a lot of people learn about leveraging before they learn the right method. As a result they simply leverage everything they had.

Leverage is basically maximizing result, no matter what direction it goes. If you have a good investment system, leveraging it would result a bigger profit. Likewise, if you have a bad or no system at all, leveraging on it would only give unknown result if not just worse.

Leverage amplifies both the rewards and the risks. Hence if the risk was not properly mitigated before hand, then the result is always disastrous.

Make sure you have found a good method that you like and have proven working well for you, ie. your cup of tea. Then only apply Leveraging technique on that particular system. Else just DON'T Leverage at all !

One of the most common wrongly leverage stories come from property investment.

go on without a goal, but for how long ?

One of the weird concepts presented by this site is that you don't have to have a goal in your personal finance. It would be like an anti good finance practice, as guilty as Rich Dad asking us NOT to save in his Conspiracy publication.

Lets get straight to the point then. If I really don't know what I want in life or always fail to stick to the same goal, does that help if I keep on searching my goals and therefore should do nothing about my personal finance until I find the right goal ?

I think the hint should be clear. There is really nothing wrong or as a matter of fact, much better if you also start saving and save automatically while you are looking for your goal.

You may not understand exactly what Warren Buffet is doing but if you were to just follow exactly what he has been doing, what do you think you will end up with? Well, Berkshire Hathaway investors can tell you that they are very happy with exactly that situation ( at least historically ).

If you have found your goal, congratulation and good for you! Unfortunately due to the way our education system is set up, most of us might just spent our whole lives looking for what truly meant to us. At the same time our lives go on as usual and as real as it could hit us hard. So even if you haven't found your goal, go ahead and ;

• Start saving,
• Save Automatically,
• Save in Fix Deposit,
• Invest in Bond Funds,
• Invest in Mutual Fund using Dollar Cost Averaging.

and if you have dependents, you care about someones or your own future, then buy some insurances too.

MalPF doesn't say you don't need a goal. It says having one goal is better than not having any. And don't procrastinate while you haven't found your goal yet, start some actions. And if you don't know what actions to take before having your own goal, stick to what MalPF gives you, the wealth pyramid.

But there is always a line to draw, differentiate those with goals and those without. If you do not subscribe to Dollar Cost Averaging, stay within Bond Fund and Fix Deposit. If you do not follow some of the stock market investment principals, do not invest in stocks if you don't have a clear goal yet.

So you don't have to have a goal to start something, but eventually you will need a good goal to end great.

A method how to find your life goal

One Goal is better than No Goal

What can I do when bully by the Big Boys ?

Some of the most read articles here is when some of the big finance institutions' bad intentions are exposed.

Credit Card companies will charge interest on the expenses you haven't even made yet

EPF does not really take good care of your money, not all the time

Bank can charge you 2200% interest in 1 month

Malaysia government try to solve credit card debt by adding more debt to it

Bursa Malaysia tells you NOT to invest long term

How Banks call center abuse users

Government allows citizen to reduce EPF and then use Tax to take away even more of people's money

Like wise, Robert's "Conspiracy" and a few other gurus who talked about how sick today's finance systems are, also receive major big hits. Its just fun, eye opening and jaw dropping to learn these news!

So what can we do about it ? Robert's suggestion is to join the big boys playing the debt game and his instrument is property investment. Obviously that is not the 'solution'. That is just him sharing what he does best. Unfortunately property investment is NOT an instrument that can be used by mass market ( everyone ). Just take a statistic of all Robert's subscribers and see how many get what they want. Do pay attention to his early franchisees results.

One of the concepts preached by this site is Scoping. For example;

It is important to understand that Income is a pre-requisite of Personal Finance but NOT a part of it. Hence it does NOT matter how much you earn, you should have a good Personal Finance Profile.

Following that same scope, it doesn't matter how RICH a person is, he may lost everything if he does not have a solid personal finance concept.

Personal Finance is personal, its NOT economy, its NOT company finance etc. Its just You.

So no matter what is happening around you, if it didn't affect you. You just read, learn and have some fun cursing them. If some of the big boys did bully you, stay cool, play victim contacting them and minimize damage as soon as possible before stay away for good.

It may sound sad or passive but its really not. Its just about being smart and get things done. When the big boy forces you to pay RM50 credit card fee, you can stop the credit cards. When EPF wants to scam your home loan money, you can choose lump sum payment. When government tricks your EPF, you can submit request to continue contribute maximum. It is as straight forward as that.

Get the scope right that your personal finance is all about you. Do something for yourself first. Then when you still feel like wanting to do more for the greater self. Then by all mean, gather a group, sign a petition, run a parade whatever etc. But that is NOT your personal finance duty. Its the greater you. Don't let the greater you ruin your personal finance. Because the journey of greater you is long and tedious. You will need multiple recharges before you reach the end of the journey. And keeping the scope clear will allow your personal finance to comfort and pamper you along the journey.

Numbers for Ron's case

Ron's story is in previous post. Basically his is a all look good case. See below blue circles that he is going to have multi millions to collect even if he stops working now. And all he shorts is only less than $1 million ( red circle ) for his kid's education.

But if you run a proper cash flow analysis. His EPF money is not touchable until age 55. So his main source of income is from KLSE investment but all those money will run dry before his kid can graduate.

One of the things he can do is to sell his house 1. Doing so may allow his kid to finish with a degree. But that will only prolong the kick-out-of-retirement scenario for a couple of years only. He still cannot last until he gets his EPF yet. As a result, still have a cash flow problem.

It turns out that if he stops working now and if his kid really go oversea to study, he will have to sell his new bigger house 2 and move back to the older smaller house 1 when his kid go abroad. It will be his own judgement whether this is a good retirement arrangement or would it be a reduction life style he wishes not to occur.

click here to see the full spreadsheet

Ron isn't my contact, I just read his case from kclau's blog. So assumptions used in this spreadsheet may or may not apply to him.

One of the potential pitfalls is that I assume he said he earns $6,500 and I assume his current expense is $3,000 a month. But seeing his case, it is most likely that his expenses needed is $6,500. If that is true, he will still be kicked out of retirement even if he sells his big new house when his kid only goes to a university that costs only $1.2 million

One interesting way to solve this could be to rent out the new big house instead of the small one. If the rent can cover the repayment amount, it will be perfect. But even if he can rent for $3,000 and assuming his repayment amount is $3,723 he will still be able to cover his kid's 4 years college cost without selling any of his houses.

When you are serious about your future, make sure you don't forget 2 aspects of the analysis;

1. draw a proper and definite Time line, not just some lump sum comparisons.

2. year to year Cash Flow analysis

I search "cool man" in google image and kclau's picture pops up ...

Ron from KC Lau : case study

This is a case stolen from kclau's blog, I am just busy body giving my view point without anyone asking ... so I apologize first for whatever offence I could have brought. But my intention is just to share my thoughts, nothing more than that.

Ron is 40 years old married with a 10 years old kid, earning $6,500 a month? He has 2 houses 800k with 470k loan and 300k renting for $850 monthly. 840k in KLSE and 460K in EPF. He is asking if (1) he can retire, (2) his kid education plan ok and if he should (3) sell his house to buy stocks ?

kclau basically says (1) yes he can retire, (2) his kid's education is at good hand and (3) don't sell house unless Ron is really good with stocks.

I only agree with (3) respond because a 840k KLSE has already out weight 300k property by almost 3x, so there is really no point to further make it imbalance.

My immediate respond reading Ron's story is that it sounds too familiar. Familiarity with an alarm that is.

I am guessing ....

Ron moved in to his new house only recently ( less than 8 years ). He wanted to get higher loan amount but couldn't due to his income level. He may feel financially quite capable but he also find himself selling his stock investments at times for cashing out purposes.

These are the signs of overspent without consciously knowing it.

A 460k loan, be it been served for a while or new, would take 2,500 to 4,000 repayment monthly. That is 40-60% of the income level. A dangerous level. If the 800k is a typical resident judge, then its an over price of 20-25%. One should use only force sale value when assessing ones' personal finance health level. As a result, this new beautiful home is the main killing point in his personal finance but in return he has a home that he wanted, emotion return is priceless. But due to the same fact, he can NOT retire now. Paying off this repayment amount alone will kill off all his stock investment return in no time. ( check out the fact that even a 12% return is NOT enough to cover a 3% )

The 2nd pit fall is education plan. In 8 years time, at best his 300k education fund may become a 500k fund. But in 2018, a general 4-years-oversea-tuition-fee starts with a minimum of 1 million and above. At age 48, he can't really withdraw from EPF in full yet. Honestly, with this 300k plan, Ron's kid can only have the option to go to a local university ... which even a 100k is adequate. Should Ron not realizing this fact and stop working now, he will lose out all his retirement fund and get back to work at his 50s if his kid does want to go oversea.

The good part is 840k KLSE fund. There may be a few things we can tell from this figure. Ron is most probably an accumulator, he buys and keeps and doesn't sell as much as he buys. Although this is good but on the other hand, if the 840k value is today's valuation then 840k is most probably not a RIGHT value to use to assess his finance health. If he is an accumulator, then he doesn't have a consistent profit take strategy. So by mid year, his value may drop to 600k etc. Basically just like property over valuation, Ron's 840k KLSE value is questionable.

So at the end, my take is that (1) Ron should NOT retire yet, just keep working but keep his option open because now he can freely change jobs as long as the salary stays the same or higher. (2) His kid cannot go to oversea university yet, if that is the option he wants to keep open, he will need to beef something up, ie. allocate his stock investment fund as educational purpose.

Along with other 'typical' assumptions, Its important for Ron to accumulate another 800k in his liquid asset to further strengthen his portfolio.

To further obtain a more precise analysis, Ron needs to identify his family expense ratio and his very own personal inflation rate. Then he should also quantify the true potential capital gain of his both properties. The 300k one will do fine but the 800k one will remain flat. Finally his KLSE strategies and portfolio will play a critical role in his future too.

Hey Ron! You did great ... but not good enough for 21st century. Buckle up and keep doing what you were doing, it seems great so far ...

Don't ignore kclau's last part in insurance advises, your choices are Terms, whole life or investment links. Just in case you hit a "lottery" ... you would want the things still go the way they are suppose to be ...

see The numbers for Ron's case here