By Lau

(Or in Singapore terms, Cents Wise Dollar Foolish)

Recently I had sent a friend home and went up to his apartment for a short 20 minute drink. As Murphy would have told me, anything that can go wrong, will go wrong: Saving the trouble of tearing a 50 cent coupon cost me a $30 parking fine (Gentle reminder: these highly trained ninjas catch you when you least expect it).

Well, enough of my sad story, this experience led me to think about two couples in their late 50s I recently met.

Couple A were typical hard core savers. They worked hard their whole lives, paid off their HDB mortgage (which wasn’t very much since they bought their flat 20 years ago) and received a fair amount of CPF at age 55. They do have some cash savings since they have set aside their income consistently, and put it ...