Many of us know deep down in our souls that we need to plan for our retirement but never got around to doing it. Maybe you are not sure how to calculate the amount you need even if you have a financial calculator infront of you. Maybe you are suspicious of the agent who keep asking to buy his company’s product after calculating the amount you need at retirement. You may even be so confused by all the different opinions given by your family, friends and colleagues!

Why? It is because everyone has a unique retirement plan and sees retirement differently.

That is why you will need to sit down with a financial advisor to discuss your financial plan in great details. Do not skim over any issues or hide any information that you might be embarrased to reveal as this will distort the outcome of your planning.

Retirement is all about achieving financial independence. Financial independence (F I) means different things to different people. F I can mean a landed property / private apartment / HDB flat  fully paid PLUS a predetermined amount of financial assets that can generate a stream of income to pay for the lifestyle that you want.

This lifestyle can be as simple as watching TV at home 24 X 7 with the occassional trip to Malaysia, living a reclusive life away from friends and relatives, while living in a rented 2 room HDB flat with another single person.

Another person may want to live at Sentosa Cove with a super sports car in the garage, a yatch anchored in front of his house, going on exotic holidays every quarter, dining on the finest food and having a fortune to spend.

A pipe dream? Maybe, maybe not. If you start planning now things will definitely change for the better but it is hard work and it takes lots of planning and most importantly you must take action now. Delaying to implement your plan is as good as not planning at all.

Now that you know the importance of planning for retirement, feel free to meet me so that I can help you realise your dream. No fees are payable at the moment. In future, Singapore will definitely follow the way of USA, Australia and UK where financial advisory companies charge a fee on the advice given.

How would you like to assure yourself that upon your retirement you will receive guaranteed monthly income for the next 10 years so that you are able to live the most wonderful period of your life without any financial worries? Imagine, at age 50, 55, 60 or 65 you will be able to eat, walk, run, sight see and do all the things you love to do without any reservations because you know that you are well prepared financially.

The 10 years immediately after your retirement age is what I call the ” Prime Golden Years” of your life! Imagine all the fun and excitement that you are going to have when you are still healthy and mobile, able to do all the things that you have wanted without a single worry about money.

These prime golden years will be the crowning glory of all the hard work that you have been putting all these years since you graduated from school. It is not just how well you started that matters but how well you end after a lifetime of work too.

With an aging population and low fertility rates, Singapore will experience a greying affluent society which will enjoy the fruits of their labour in their prime golden years. Will you be one of them or will you be sitting at home watching TV with your spouse, trying to make ends meet by staying at home all the time?

Success is a matter of choice, not a matter of chance. Make your prime golden years a success by planning for it now!

Call your independent financial advisor immediately and discuss how you may achieve that lifestyle you wanted all these years. Alternatively, you may contact me for a non obligatory discussion at my office. It is free, for now.

I have the answer to achieve your 10 years of “prime golden years”, are you interested?

Have a blessed Good Friday and happy Easter Sunday!

Success is achieved by choice not by chance. Likewise to achieve financial indpendence is by choice, you have to plan for it to happen and not hope for it to happen. As I write this, I am also reminded to review my own plans. There are many ways to skin a cat but you must know how to do it, no matter which way you do it right?

So do you have a plan to achieve your financial independence?

What is financial independence? It is basically to have a house fully paid and an amount of financial assets to provide you with income to enjoy the lifestyle you want till the day you leave this place called earth.

If you do not have an inkling of an idea what you need when you retire, please meet your independent financial adviser and discuss how to set the plan in place.

You should not procrastinate till you are in your late 40s or early 50s, it may be too late to scramble your way out of the deep well you have dug yourself into.If you are in your 20s and 30s, you are well positioned to start now. Even saving $200 amonth is a good start, increase it as your pay increases. Yoou may start with a specific need planning like building your retirement nest egg fund or craete an endowment fund for your child’s tertiary education.

For complete financial planning, please talk to an independent financial adviser like me.

All the best to you!

Some people believe that buying term insurance is the only way to go. Then they will invest the rest in other financial assets. They believe that buying term insurance is the cheapest way to achieve their wealth protection needs. They may be right but it also depends on other unforeseen factors like…

Term insurance has a maturity date. If you need to prolong the protection, you may be put off by the high premiums at the older age. You may not be able to renew a new term as the policy may not have a renewal clause.

You may need a short term loan but because a term insurance plan does not have cash value, you cannot take a loan from your policy unlike an endowment plan or a whole life policy.

A term plan is not flexible, you cannot increase or decrease the level of protection when your circumstances change. An Investment Linked Policy (ILP) will be able to do that.

A term plan may not have total & permanent disability (TPD)  claim and you have to pay more premiums to add in TPD. After add TPD, you may want to consider getting an ILP.

As an independent financial advisor, I advise you to sit down with me to discuss what you really need before you decide whether a term plan is the final answer to your needs.

Another alternative is buying a group term insurance plan which is cheaper than a personal term insurance but you must remain with that organisation as long as the term coverage period or else you may not be able to renew it once you leave that organisation.

“What? $300 a day? So good? No way!” You may ask.

Yes, it is true. My colleague told me that her client had cancer and was warded for more than a month. Not only was that person’s hospital medical expenses reimbursed by the insurance company, he got paid $300 a day too! That’s $9000 a month!

It is not that we look forward to getting sick but the thought of being paid $300 a day does provide peace of mind to that person. The prospect of losing his job is very real and with the extra money in his pocket, he can rest easier.

At the same time, I would suggest that he should have a critical illness plan that pays a lump sum of money to help him through at least 5 years without any financial worries.

Please feel free to contact me if you do not any independent financial advisor representative serving you.

Many of us have bought our life insurance policies 5, 10, 15 or even 20 years ago. We would have forgotten what we have bought and quite ignorant of what we have bought over the years. In an unfortunate event of a sudden death or injury where you are unable to communicate with your loved ones, will they know where to find your insurance policies and do they know what to do with them when they find the policy documents? Do they need to read all the documents just to know what it is all about?

Just imagine all the stress and anxiety your family members have to go through just to get through the pile of insurance documents.

Remove this fear and anxiety once and for all. Engage an independent financial adviser representative to review your insurance portfolio and have an insurance summary done up and put all your documents in ONE folder in a systematic order. This way, anyone who takes out this folder will be able to see how much the insurance payout will be immediately. The contact numbers of all the insurance advisers must be clearly visible so that they can be contacted immediately. Always update the contact list should your insurance adviser leaves the industry.

Appointing a trusted independent financial advisor rep as the main contact person will relieve your family of the hassle of getting the claims done professionally and promptly.

Reviewing your insurance portfolio regulary will show up any loop holes in your plans as you progress higher financially or you have a new member in your family. A financial plan is a process not an end product. You may even terminate some insurance plans which have become redundant or become too expensive to keep.

So pick up the telephone and call your independent financial adviser rep to review your insurance portfolio now.

In your life insurance policy documents, you may have noticed these two phrases “waiting period’ and “survival period”. But do you know what it means and what are the implications if you do not meet the criteria set by the insurance companies?

Let’s take a closer look…

Waiting Period – Normally you will find that there is a waiting period of 90 days before you can claim from the insurance companies upon diagnosis of a critical illness. 90 days from what, you may ask? 90 days from the commencement date of your policy or date of reinstatement of your policy.

Commencement date is simple enough, it is the date that the insurance company starts to cover your life after their underwriting department gives the go-ahead. It may be the 1st day of a month or it can be a date that the insurance company decides.

Date of reinstatement happens when you make good the premiums that you have forgotten to pay when it was due, or you did not have the funds to pay the premium. Normally you have 30 days grace to pay your premium. After 30 days, your policy will lapse. To re-instate it, you have to back pay the premiums owed. Once it is paid, your policy will be re-instated. BUT…be careful here…

Your waiting period of 90 days for the critical illnesses start all over again after the reinstatement date! Should you be diagnosed with a critical illness, you will NOT be able to claim from the insurance company! You can appeal but you’d better pray the CEO is in a good mood.

So remember to pay your premiums, use GIRO if possible, so you will never forget. And yes, do make sure you have sufficient funds in your bank account please. especially if you are going to be posted overseas for a long period of time.

Survival period if different. Normally you will see “survival period” of 30 days upon diagnosis of a critical illness is needed before the insurance company will pay. If the person dies within 30 days, the insurance company will only pay the death benefit but not the critical illness benefit.

So what, you may ask? That person is going to die anyway…

A BIG difference, if the policy pays both upon diagnosis of a critical illness AND another payment upon the death of that person. Nowadays, I see alot of insurance companies have this kind of policies.

If you are not sure what you have, I suggest you review your life insurance policies with an independent financial adviser rep soon. Be sure or you may encounter a rude shock one day…

Many of us may not have met an independent financial advisor representative or have not even heard of this term called “IFAR”. I am not surprised as the number of independent financial advisors reps in Singapore may be less than 5000 as compared to the huge number of insurance agents.

If I ask you whether you have an insurance agent friend, I am sure you will know one but most likely you may not know a friend who is an independent financial adviser rep.

So what’s the difference really?

Both can offer insurance as well as investment products. Both can give financial advice, both can calculate your retirement nest egg, both can calculate your child’s education fund needed in 20 years etc…

So where is the BIG difference?

In my opinion, the BIG difference lies in the word “independent”.

Being Independent, gives you the assurance that you are getting unbiased and independent financial advice. You can rest easy that your independent financial adviser rep will offer the most appropriate product to match your financial needs. The IFA company would have done it’s due diligence before approving the financial product to be listed in their “Approved List”. The IFA company is not obligated to market or sell any insurance or investment products at all. In fact, it has the right to reject any product that does not meet it’s house recommendation criteria.

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) conducts numerous checks on these companies, making sure their representatives comply and meet all the rules and regulations set under the Financial Advisers Act.

Being Independent, you will know you are dealing with a professional who takes the job seriously and will not compromise on the high standards set by MAS. Any violations can land the adviser in hot soup and even lose his license to work.

So the next time you meet an independent financial adviser rep, you can be sure you are in good hands.

In Singapore, at the top of every parent’s agenda is their children’s education. It is said that the best gift a parent can give to a child is the gift of an education. But it does not ends here! It is not just any education, but the best education available in the world.

We believe that giving the best education for our children will definitely secure their future as well as ours. Why? Because when our children graduate with a good degree or a Masters degree or a Doctorate, we believe they will secure good paying jobs which in turn means they are financially stable. They will be able to take care of us in case we need some financial help. Right?

Many of us send our kids to tuition centres or send the tuition teachers to our homes for additional lessons. Many children are forced to do their homework as well as attend additional lessons after school. Parents are willing to spend hundreds or even thousands of dollars on tuition. Hmmm…. maybe we should consider a career as a tuition teacher!  Just kidding…

Yes, education is BIG business in Singapore.

Please meet up with your independent financial adviser representative to find out how much you will need to put your children through tertiary education ( local or overseas ). Start planning now or else regret that you did not start earlier and you will feel the heavy burden of taking a loan to finance your children’s education. Do you want your children to start their careers with a loan hanging around their necks?

Talk to me if you are not sure how much you will need to save for your child’s education.

Remember in financial planning, I separate the best from the rest!

Adviser Profile – Stephen Mok (MAS Representative Number: MCH100038921)

Stephen Mok has been in the Financial Advisory industry for the past 11 years and his purpose in staying in this industry is to help people achieve financial security and success. He joined IPP Financial Advisers Pte Ltd on 18 April 2005. He is 48 years old and he is married to Priscilyn and has two teenage daughters, Clarissa and Valerie, aged 16 and 18 respectively. All of them are Christians and were baptised at Agape Baptist Church in 2004.

As the head of his household, Stephen is aware that providing financially for his family needs is very important but character building is equally important. He leads a balanced life style that is not just about work but family unity and spiritual growth are equally important.

Stephen has been running a successful business referral group meeting every Thursday morning for the past 8 years and most of his business have been through word of mouth referrals. He welcomes any business owner to join his group meeting which is held at One Raffles Place.

More details can be found at www.bni-harvest.com .

Stephen has been writing a financial planning blog since 2007 and his blog can be found on the first page of the Google Search Results when you Google search for “ Independent financial advisor” . His blog can be found at www.kairosadvisor.com . The aim of his blog is to educate the public on how to achieve financial security and success without taking unnecessary risks and to make sound financial decisions based on independent and unbiased financial advice.

Stephen would like to take this opportunity to wish you and your family a Blessed and Happy Chinese New Year abounding in good health and prosperity all year round.