The best financial consultants will always advice people seeking for
their advice to start planning and saving for their retirement as soon
as they have a stable job. As such, even if it's your first time to
work, even if you're just in your early 20s, you should already have a
retirement plan and you are already setting aside money monthly for your
retirement fund.Unfortunately, not all people heed this crucial advice. Many employees always find ways to postpone working on their retirement plan. And before they know it, it will only be 10 years before they have to retire. And usually, planning and preparing 10 years before your retirement is usually not enough for anyone to prepare sufficiently.
However, this doesn't mean that you give up preparing for your golden years and simply wing it once you stop earning a fixed monthly income. Below are some helpful tips and pieces of advice for people who are near their retirement age so that they can still live comfortably in their golden years:
Prepare your cash reserves or emergency fund. Financial advisors say that you should have at least three to six months of your normal income in an account that is safe and easily accessible. This means having some money deposited in your savings account for all planned expenses. For example, if you know that you need to replace your roof in a few years' time, you should be setting aside money for that in your savings account.
Resolve your outstanding credit card debt, medical bills, and loans. You should reduce and eventually eliminate all these debts and loans so that your income can be channeled into your personal saving and investment funds which you can use once you retire. Consider checking the interest rates on your credit cards and other loans to see if you can find lower rates as well.
If you have kids, make sure you have already started saving for their college tuition funds. Financial advisers actually say that you should start saving as early as possible after your kids are born, even if you can save only a small amount. As your income rises, you can increase the amount you save for their college funds.
Make sure you already have a retirement plan. Finally, aside from the retirement funds you can expect from work or from the government, consider making the maximum allowable contributions to an individual retirement account. You can get more details about these retirement funds that you can still contribute to from your local financial advisors since different countries, banks, and financial institutions usually offer different schemes or programs regarding retirement funds.
