50/30/20 rule: why experts got it wrong

Posted by Retire by 50 | Aug 24, 2018 | Personal Finance |

US Senator Elizabeth Warren popularized the 50/20/30 budget rule in her book “All Your Worth: The Ultimate Lifetime Money Plan.” The basic rule is to divide after-tax income, spending 50% on needs and 30% on wants while allocating 20% to savings. Thereafter, experts have been recommending consumers to save 10-20% of their income. Even in Singapore. But I have a different opinion on this and won’t recommend people of all ages to only save 10-20% of their income. Here’s my view. The 50/30/20 rules works when you’re starting your first job For someone who is starting their first job,...

Getting rental income from my rental property in Cambodia

Posted by Retire by 50 | Aug 18, 2018 | Property |

For new readers, I bought a SOHO property at The Bridge, Cambodiaand I saved diligently each month in order to pay for the purchase. After making my final payment for my SOHO apartment, I signed the tenancy lease agreement to officially allow the property developer manage the leasing of my apartment for the next 3 years. In the clause, included a free 3-month rental period for the property developer to renovate and secure a tenant for my apartment. Last week, I finally received my first quarterly rental payment from the property developer. Woohoo! Here’s the breakdown of the charges involved...

Understanding insurance: It’s all about risk management

Posted by Retire by 50 | Aug 2, 2018 | Insurance |

Do you really understand why you need insurance? I don’t want to say that all insurance agents are unscrupulous and money-minded, because I have a few friends who work as insurance agents and are really good at their job. The sad reality is that insurers are dishing out very attractive commissions for insurance products that are designed to make you part with more money than what you have to. They make their products more complicated by integrating elements of investment to charge a higher premium and grow their corporate revenue. For a insurance agent who’s basically an insurer’s sales person,...

My beginner’s guide to personal finance 101

Posted by Retire by 50 | Jul 25, 2018 | Personal Finance |

In online forums and Facebook groups that I’m a part of, it’s heartening to see that many young adults are asking questions about managing their personal finances. How much emergency funds should I have? What type of insurance should I buy? How much insurance coverage is considered enough? Where should I invest my money in? The list goes on and on… In my efforts to help the community, I decided to publish my beginner’s guide to personal finance 101. This is meant for young adults who just started working and want to improve their personal finances. The reason why...

5 Simple Steps To Creating The Budget That Works For You

Posted by Retire by 50 | Jul 20, 2018 | Personal Finance |

Creating a budget can be daunting but it provides the fundamental structure for your financial planning and keeps you on track with your financial goals. Here are 5 simple steps to creating the budget that works for you in an...

Explain the power of compounding to your kid using magic

Posted by Retire by 50 | Jul 17, 2018 | Personal Finance |

Explaining personal finance to kids can be very challenging, especially when it comes to the logic around compounding. Here’s a simple way to explain the power of compounding with your kids. Here’s how the conversation would be like between me and my imaginary son, Tom. Mickey: Tom, what would you rather have, $100,000 or a 10 cent coin that magically doubles its value every day for 30 days? Tom: $100,000, of course! Let the magic begin Now let’s show Tom the difference between the 2 choices. Here’s how the first 10 days would look like: Day 1: $0.10 Day 2:...

3 things I’ve learnt about myself from Seedly’s recent event

Posted by Retire by 50 | Jul 11, 2018 | Insurance |

Seedly is probably the only company that is able to organize a finance event in Singapore that managed to get people in their 20-30s to show up for a 6-hour long event, and make them pay $30 to attend. On a lovely Saturday morning, I joined the bunch of lovely folks from Seedly at their exclusive meetup, Coffee Meets Investing. It’s a one-day meetup that discusses about a variety of topics around personal finance and investments. Decide how much insurance coverage is sufficient for you The recommendations made by Kenneth from Seedly on insurance planning was very similar to my low-cost...

Build a budget with this simple salary allocation budgeting template

Posted by Retire by 50 | Jul 11, 2018 | Personal Finance |

We’ve crossed the middle of the year again and if you’re as lucky as I am, you should have been informed of your salary increment for 2018. This year, I got a small increment of $195 in my monthly payroll so that’s an additional 195 one-dollar soldiers awaiting for deployment every month! I checked my salary allocation budget that I update every year and it looks like there’s no additional expenses incurred so far. That’s good news to me because all the 195 one-dollar soldiers will be deployed to investment wealth accumulation. What’s a salary allocation budget? A salary...

Would you retire in Cambodia?

Posted by Retire by 50 | Jun 12, 2018 | Personal Finance |

In my last post, I wrote about how my first property investment has finally completed and with that, my 3 years of scrimping and saving to pay for the purchase has also ended. Hooray! Recently, I saw a photo of the actual building in a property investment website so I thought I share it with you. I find that it looks quite similar to the artist’s impression in the brochure. What do you think? I’ve signed the lease agreement with Oxley to allow them to manage and rent the property on my behalf since I’m not retiring that soon. It does feel...

I’m going to play the 30-day Minimalism Game

Posted by Retire by 50 | Nov 16, 2017 | Personal Development |

Joshua Fields Millburn & Ryan Nicodemus from The Minimalists created this game called the 30-Day Minimalism Game that helped thousands of people worldwide declutter their homes. How to play the 30-Day Minimalism Game The game is a way of getting rid of the excess, the stuff that no longer adds value to one’s life. Here’s how it works. On the first day of the month, you get rid of 1 thing. On the second day of the month, you get rid of 2 things. You get the picture. Anything can go! Clothes, furniture, electronics, tools, etc. By the end of the month,...

Why I chose AutoWealth to set up my first Robo-Advisor investment account

Posted by Retire by 50 | Oct 23, 2017 | Investing |

A number of robo-advisory startups have sprouted in Singapore in the last 2 years. They provide financial advice or portfolio management online with moderate to minimal human intervention in exchange for lower management fees. Most of the decision making is based on mathematical rules or algorithms. I’ve been monitoring startups like AutoWealth, StashAway and Smartly who are competing in this space since they started and now, they have all obtained their respective MAS licences to operate (except Smartly who collaborated with VCG Partners Pte. Ltd. a MAS licensed fund manager in Singapore to manage your money). With the right regulations in...

Expense Report: September 2017

Posted by Retire by 50 | Oct 11, 2017 | Saving & Spending |

Summary Expenses clocked a new high this month as I had 2 weeks before I transitioned to a new job. I took some time off and travelled around China, meeting old friends before the new job kicks in. Total expenses for July: $4,411.63 (including fixed expenses of $957.95) Details Food: $443.86 Groceries: $13.50 Transportation: $118.29 Shopping: $1120.19 Entertainment: $180.35...

How I saved money on my Hulu and VPN subscriptions in 2017

Posted by Retire by 50 | Sep 1, 2017 | Saving & Spending |

This is an update on how I saved money on my Hulu subscriptions this year. Its slightly different from the Hulu savings tip I posted in a few years ago and in this post, I will also cover on VPN subscriptions as well. In 2014, I blogged about how I saved money by purchasing disconted Hulu gift cards on eBay to pay for my Hulu subscription. That’s one way to get around paying for monthly Hulu subscriptions because I don’t have a US credit card. That ship has already sailed and if you do a search on eBay, the Hulu gift...

Save money by tracking your subscriptions with TrackMySubs

Posted by Retire by 50 | Aug 28, 2017 | Saving & Spending |

In the last 2 years, businesses have been transitioning their products and services from a ‘pay once and use forever’ business model into a subscription-based business model. For me, I’m using subscription-based services for almost everything in my daily life. Here’s a some of the subscriptions I’m paying on each month: Microsoft Office 365 Netflix Hulu Spotify Premium SingTel fibre and mobile Personal insurance Mortgage loan All of them are paid automatically with my credit card, which is great because I don’t want to spend time making regular payments all the time. The downside of this is that I tend...

Fixed Expenditure Update: 2017

Posted by Retire by 50 | Aug 15, 2017 | Saving & Spending |

Here’s an update to my fixed expenditure for 2017 with some changes to my expenses liabilities. Mortgage: $828 $879 (CPF) As I move to the 3rd year of my bank loan for my HDB flat, the monthly mortgage repayment amount has increased from $828 to $879. Still within my monthly CPF contribution with some surplus so I’m comfortable with that. Parent Allowance: $600 My mother retired many years ago after her leg started giving her problems. On top of the monthly payouts from her CPF account, I have been giving her some allowance each month. $500 $600 isn’t very much but that...

Author: Retire by 50