When you’re exploring aged care options for a loved one, the process can seem overwhelming. Here’s how to make it a bit easier. Choosing when to place an elderly relative into a retirement home may be one of the toughest decisions you have to make. And while you want your loved one to be as comfortable as possible in their final years, it’s also important to be financially prepared. With so many choices available and so many decisions to make, it helps to break down the proce

As the holiday season approaches, it’s easy to be distracted from your financial goals. But this is actually the perfect time to put a few simple plans in place for a positive start to the New Year. New Year’s resolutions have a bad reputation, and for good reason. So let’s agree up front that we won’t think of financial preparations for the New Year as “resolutions”. Instead this is a great opportunity to set things in order, re-group and look back to ensure things are on tr

The thought of retirement planning seems to be looming in the back of many Australian’s minds, but is consistently pushed back when life events arise. Retirement planning has recently been highlighted in several surveys, with responding Australians providing worrying results for their futures after work. An ideal lifestyle depicted by many Australians in their retirement may not come to fruition, as a direct result of lack of planning. Australian’s money will be depleted afte

During your downtime over the upcoming holiday period, it could pay to consider how your retirement might look and when it will likely happen, no matter how far away it might be. This helps to answer one of life’s big questions – when exactly will you retire? Fortunately, these days there are a lot of options in terms of timing of and transitioning into retirement. In this story we look at the three big areas of consideration – wealth, emotional health and practical issues. W

While many of us are at the stage where it has become necessary to begin planning for retirement, we all know younger people who don’t quite realise how good they’ve got it. Time is one of the greatest luxuries an investor can enjoy. Consider a $1,000 investment that returns six per cent annually. Without any further investment it will be worth just $3,207 after 20 years, but jumps to $10,286 after 40 years. Similarly, an annual investment of $5,000 at six per cent return is