Threads we think could be moved to the Early Retirement Board

Thrugelmir

atush wrote: »

and people have been talking about Britain becomming another Japan for over 5 years now. And it hasn't happened yet.

So everything has been fixed?

atush

Goldiegirl wrote: »

Sounds a bit cliquey to me


I have read Marine Life's thread - but it's not the sort of diary I wanted to do, that's why I went elsewhere

Not cliquey at all.

In any case, post your diary. I would read it.

atush

I don't really see why you seem so antagonised by the idea of separating out a section.

Antagonized may be a little strong, and I am no friend of James. However, I do think that separating the section would mean you dont see new posts to those threads like you do when they are here. And that would be sad indeed.

There was a bru haha on the savings forum (where people talk abt saving into cash S&S and ISAs so might suit you) where some were complaining abt diaries clogging things up, but i didn't agree. I thought they should stay.

atush

Thrugelmir wrote: »

So everything has been fixed?

I dont recall saying that, could you quote?

What I think is there has been economic growth and sometimes stronger than expected. Which isn't the definition of stagflation i learned in econ 101.

Thrugelmir

jamesd wrote: »

7.3%, ignoring dividends. Now notice from the bottom of this post that a person using equities from 1945 to 2013 would have had 23 times as much money as using cash.

It's also worth noting that the FTSE has a strong bias towards natural resources companies including oil producers and hence has suffered disproportionately from the oil price drop. It's one reason to prefer a global fund over a UK one for core investment holdings. An oil price drop is a good thing in general, but not so much for the FTSE with its bias.

So is short-termism on plans that typically last decades and have to provide an income for many more decades.

Pick a month and make an equity-based investment. Here are your historic chances of having beaten cash, first percentage, or gilts, closer to mortgage rates, the second:

2 years: 67%, 68%
5 years: 74%, 73%
10 years: 90%, 79%
18 years: 99%, 88%

Source for these is the 2013 Equity Gilt Study, page 77. And of course each month is a new period so you end up with a more positive overall picture than even those numbers.

It's really easy when it comes to either FI or retirement planning: invest or lose out big-time. Not impossible with sufficient effort to achieve objectives anyway but there's no need to do it the hard way. As illustrated by these values for £100 invested at the end of 1990 in 2013 from page 79 of the study:

Equities: £614 nominal, £324 real
Gilts: £696 nominal, £366 real
Index-linked gilts: £504 nominal, £266 real

Also worth noting the bull market in bonds/gilts during this period. Don't expect that to be repeated any time soon. Sadly that lacked a cash figure, so here's something for investing from 1945 on the same page, also for £100 starting value:

Equities: £147,384 nominal, £4,379 real
Gilts: £7,078 nominal, £210 real
Cash: £6,215 nominal, £185 real

Use equities or wonder why you're doing so poorly compared to those who do.

Trouble is life gets in the way of your perfect scenario for many people.

a person using equities from 1945 to 2013 would have had 23 times as much money as using cash.

That's a 58 year time span. So how is this person in their 80's,90's?

Pick a month and make an equity-based investment. Here are your historic chances of having beaten cash,

Debt is not cash. Debt is tomorrow's earnings.

Differing views is what makes markets. Leveraging with debt not only magnifies gains but also losses. Having seem the full circle. I know where I stand currently.

edinburgher

At the end of the day Gallygirl made a positive suggestion for a proposed addition to the forums that some people like and some don't.

The rest is just board vs. board willy waggling and is all a bit silly.

I still believe there's a good case for a FI board.

jamesd

mgdavid wrote: »

The problem is that Financial Independence needs to be a *parent* board of MFW. MF is just one objective on the way to FI, Investing and Retirement planning are others. It can and is argued that MFW places too much emphasis on a single approach.

I agree about that relationship, except that becoming mortgage free isn't even necessary to FI or retirement, it's just a way of reducing outgoings and another way that can be more efficient is to increase income.

Goldiegirl wrote: »

I wanted to have a diary to chart my progress. ... This board is good for facts and figures and advice, but it's not so good about day to day living and feelings. ... This board was so not the place for a diary, so I went to MFW where I was made very welcome.

I think a place for diaries could be useful for those who like that approach. It's perhaps worth noting that I supported that as an idea.

Goldiegirl wrote: »

I envisage an early retirement board to be a place for people in my situation, who wanted to talk about their day to day activities in their journey to early retirement or financial independence.

gallygirl wrote: »

Jamesd you were one of the people I thought of as being a source of very useful advice, including why focusing on the mortgage was a bad idea, and I don't really see why you seem so antagonised by the idea of separating out a section. I've always seen this board as a helpful and friendly place and to be honest your attitude has taken me aback. I'd have thought you'd be more against the board being potentially 'clogged up' with diaries where new requests for help could be overlooked?

The planning part is at the heart of retirement planning at any age. Remove that from this section and it would remove both the motivating factor for making the pension contributions in the first place and the basis for working out how much to pay in. That's a pretty fundamental thing to take out.

FI and possibly becoming mortgage free are just steps along the way to retirement, all part of retirement planning, though it's perhaps more called lifetime financial planning by financial advisers because it encompasses everything from planning for children to planning for inheritance well after retirement, all part of an integrated and evolving financial plan.

I think that there's something of a lack of an overall long term financial planning home here and that one approach, after discussion over at MFW, might be to make MFW and retirement diaries subsections of a new financial and retirement planning board, using the MFW top slot for it.

I do have some reservations about that because when it comes to short term pensions questions just before retirement people are often also doing financial planning around that so the two tend to go hand in hand. But with that reservation, I think it could be handled if there really was an active long term financial planning section. Still, I'm troubled because pensions are inevitably going to be at the heart of most long term financial plans, even most of those that involve FI before 55. I'm also troubled because when someone new comes along with questions like asking how much they should pay into a pension or whether they should suspend that while accumulating a deposit for their first owned home we have to get into long term planning.

Goldiegirl wrote: »

PS - All my planning has worked out ok - I retire in two days time at the age of 54

Congratulations!

mgdavid

Goldiegirl wrote: »

..........
This board is good for facts and figures and advice, but it's not so good about day to day living and feelings..........

that's a very good point worth highlighting.
I'd go so far as to say that 'over here' the emphasis is on the numbers and making hard-headed logical decisions while ensuring that day-to-day living and feelings don't blow us off course.

atush

Which is why I liked Marines thread and The number, as that brought along more of such discussions. And showed how different peoples aspirations and expectations are.

Daniel54

gallygirl wrote: »

I'm sorry to have upset so many people with what I thought was a sensible suggestion for an area myself and others feel is lacking. Perhaps the fact it didn't occur to me to ask on here suggests this isn't necessarily the right place for it?
could be overlooked?

I wish I'd kept my mouth shut.

gallygirl -you haven't 'upset' regular readers of this board,but maybe I for one was surprised at your perception that retirement planning - which can begin pretty much from the first pay packet and the invitation to join the employers pension scheme - was not a key part of both the questions ( from all ages) and replies we see on this board.

I don't see early retirement ( before 67 ?) as needing a separate board,but the idea of an area for Financial Independence diaries seems to be a highly worthy of consideration - this board is not well suited to such diaries unless they are tightly focussed on the numbers - which is maybe why we only have two of them

The key questions are how much do i need and how do I get there.The Savings and Investments board dovetails with this one in that respect,but I must admit ( not having read it) that I had thought the MFW board was exactly that - a group of like -minded people focussed on paying down their mortgage as a priority.

Glad you didn't keep your mouth shut -lifetime financial planning is an important subject and may be a worthy umbrella for some of the current boards

As a non sequitur,the board I really feel needs re-domiciling to the Essential Money part of the forum is the Deaths,Funeral and Probate,which is currently orphaned out in Marriage and Relationships ,even though the main topic is…money.