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According to Emily Brandon in an article captioned “8 tips for people who will retire in 2015-Emily Brandon” “What you decide to do in retirement will have a big impact on your costs and quality of life. "Certainly you will spend less on gas and don't have to spend as much on work clothes, but some people are also going to spend more money now because they have the time and don't just want to sit around the house," says Craig Schmith, a certified financial planner in Durham, North Carolina. "If you've got pent-up demand to travel, especially internationally, and you haven't had time to do that, you need to think about budgeting that in."
In article captioned “4 dangerous assumptions that could hurt retirement plan” ,which appeared in Morning star, Christine Benz noted that ”Continued portfolio contributions, delayed withdrawals, and delayed Social Security filing can all greatly enhance a retirement portfolio's sustainability. Given those considerations, as well as the ebbing away of pensions, increasing longevity, and the fact that the financial crisis did a number of setbacks on many pre-retirees' portfolios, it should come as no surprise that older adults are pushing back their planned retirement dates. Whereas just 11% of individuals surveyed in the 1991 Employee Benefit Research Institute's Retirement Confidence Survey said they planned to retire after age 65, that percentage had tripled--to 33%--in the 2014 survey. In 1999, just 5% of EBRI's survey respondents said they planned to never retire, whereas 10% of the 2014 respondents said that”.
Continuing Benz noted that “With that in mind, there appears to be a disconnect
between pre-retirees' plans to delay retirement and whether they actually do.
While a third of the workers in the 2014 survey said they planned to work past
age 65, just 16% of retirees said they had retired post-age 65. And a much
larger contingent of retirees--32%--retired between the ages of 60 and 64, even
though just 18% of workers said they plan to retire that early. As
Morningstar.com assistant site editor Adam Zoll discusses and observed the following factors, -the variance owes to
health considerations (the worker's, his or her spouse's, or parents'),
unemployment, or untenable physical demands of the job, among other factors.”
The seven major factors that may affect your retirement are as follows:
1Not
saving enough
Almost more than two third Nigerians of working
populations do not have a pension account, including the informal sectors,
those with various state governments and other categories too many to mention.
Also the savings are not enough as people are not keying into voluntary
contributions. What they contribute is basically not enough to carry them.
2
Investment decision Tom Macphail in 10 costly Pension
Mistakes noted that “If you have a pension, have you ever reviewed it? Millions
of people haven't. Moreover, recent research revealed more than two in five
adults (41%) - 8 million people - cannot remember how their pensions are
invested. Why is that alarming? Performance can vary quite dramatically across
investments and even a seemingly small difference could have a significant
impact on the size of your pot” Continuing he stated that these are just
projections. Investments will not always go up in value, they also go down, so
you could get back less than you invested; what is certain is that they won't
perform as predicted. Also, these values are in today's terms, without
considering inflation, which will reduce the spending power of your money over
time “According to several researches, people invest for two basic reasons;
they are follows, to make provision for old age and to be wealthy. Being
wealthy is a function of the state of mind of the owner and the generosity of
the individual.
So many people cling to their money as if their
life depends on it. While some are willing to give almost half of their
possessions but that is not our subject of discussion.
Venita Van Caspel according to schuller noted while studying investment “heard a very
startling statistics of every people reaching age 65, only 2 percent were
financially independent” continuing
Schuller op cited opined that Venita was raised in a Christian home
without money, which she claims gave a health respect for a dollar.
From the startling revelation, it all means that
many are bound to fail should they kept deaf ear to investment.
What the article is saying is that apart from your
pension contribution, you can also embark on one or two investment instruments
to protect your age.
And in embarking on investment, it is wise to
consult the professionals in that field, these investment advisers, analyst are
able to study investment trends and be able to make informed decisions to that effect.
3 Fraud Schuller
(1988:112) noted that success without social respect can be an ultimate and
dismal failure.
Old age has one problem according to psychologist,
it tend to make old people vulnerable to issues of money making, as they have
dream idea of trying to achieve what they fail to achieve during their working
career. They now want to achieve it
during old age and by so doing enter into one wrong investment decision
or the other.
Whatever they have not achieve they tend to believe
that retirement fund will afford them that opportunity, by so doing they enter
into wrong hands who will fleece them of their hard earned money. The result is
that most of the retirees return back to work in order to survive and enjoy
their old age. But what these scammers do not know is that wealth do not bring
happiness as it is stated in Ecclesiastics 5 verse 10-11 “ How absurd to think
that wealth brings happiness, the more you have, the more people come to help you
spend it and continuing in Ecclesiastics 5 verse 12, 14, it sates “
But the rich are always worrying and
seldom get a good night sleep” Riches are sometimes hoarded to the harm of the
saver, or they are put into risky investment that turn sour and everything is
lost”
And continuing in Ecclesiastics 5 verse 19 and 20,
“And it is good thing to receive wealth from God and the good health to enjoy
it” “To enjoy your work and accept your lot in life- that is indeed a gift from
God, people who did this rarely look with sorrow on the past, for God has given
them reason for joy”.
And so in making wealth, it is pertinent for us to
have that God given joy that gives one happiness-
a lasting happiness.
Anything short of that may not augur well
especially for con artist as Robert Kiyosaki in his book Rich dad Poor dad,
noted that there are so many ways, one can be rich, and he included the
following, through inheritance, playing lottery, investing or by being a crook
or an outlaw but there is a price, you risk going to jail. Kiyosaki (1995:351) continuing he stated that ‘A great
story must interest , excite and cause people to look into the future and dream
a little, there should also be integrity behind the story, because our jails
are filled with great story tellers without integrity”.
4 Health
The desire of every pensioner is to take care of
his or herself during old age, but is it
the retiree financially stable to
shoulder such responsibility , bearing in mind that the period 60 and above
comes with various lingering issues including medical health problem.
The medical and health challenge is of varying
dimensions, high blood pressure, stroke, obesity, heart attack, cancer of the
breast, prostate cancer that and other
medical issues comes with old age.
With the developing state and coupled with the
inability of the African governments to have a viable medical programme for old
people as prevalent in other continents like Europe, North and South America,
Asia , Australia etc. Africa countries with the exception of few African
countries like South Africa, Egypt etc have not been able to develop a medical
programme for old people and senior citizen. Even where it is said to be
existing, there are bottlenecks, corruption and other vices militating against
it.
So what do they do in such economy where there are
little on non existing medical program for old people, what will the old people
do in such a situation, will they resort to the little or no contribution of their pension pot.
5 Alienating family member – One of the major disaster of retirement is a life of solitary confinement, human being are gregarious, people tend to be happy when they associate with like minds. Even on a cosmetic level, people that value association spends most of their valuable life Face booking and engaging in other social networks, and that has accounted for the increase in social networks channel.
It becomes more rewarding , when a retiree is in good relationship with family members especially their wives and children .The more a retiree stay connected to a happy love life, the better for him. In a research carried out in the United States has it that people tend to be happy when they are married than when they are not. And as they say that divorce is more devastating; coupled with the financial implications and the legal battle that comes with it. It went on to say that people are more likely to commit suicide when they are disconnected with their love life or life partner. But I will also add that men are likely also to commit murder when they are disconnected from their love life and the emotional torture of such act can also drive them to take their own lives.
6 Negative
attitude
Maintain
a positive attitude towards life and pension inclusive; according to book of job
what people fear most always comes to them. And according to Robert Schuler, in
his book , “the power of positive thinking “ he noted that one of the basic ingredient of success is
maintaining a positive outlook to life, believe that you will make and you will
make it, believe that you will not , and you will definitely not”
Therefore
maintaining a positive attitude in all aspect of life is pre requisite for all
facets of life and Le Boeuf (1987:21) noted that “your world is a mirror and
your mind is a magnet what you perceived in this world is largely a reflection
of your own attitudes and beliefs. And life will give you what you attract with
your thoughts. Think, act and talk negatively and your world will likely be
negative. Think, act and talk with enthusiasm and you will attract positive
results.
7 Marrying a new wife.
The
danger of marrying new wives during retirement leads to the following Alienates
the first wife and set aside the existing will as the law of interstate states
that marrying new wife set aside the existing will. It will also brings
collusion between family members, There is also the pressure of meeting up with
financial and emotional needs of the new partner, and the extreme part is
meeting the sexual needs of a teenager have driven most men to a point of
taking sexual enhancing drugs, and these drugs increases the risk of high blood
pressures , hypertension and even stroke.
And
according to Eileen Sweeney (1979:31) in her book titled “Another country”
Sweeney noted that “marriage was something more rounded than mere infatuation,
and once a man had built his home, things were different with him. He must
still need his home and would never be the same without it”
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