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March 5, 2019
Financial Independence in Australia – Episode 83
Job security isn’t what it once was. The trend toward contracting, outsourcing and the gig economy, combined with technological automation and increasingly, artificial intelligence, means the need for us to be emotionally and financially resilient has never been higher. Emotional resiliency isn’t something I’m qualified to speak on, but financial resiliency – financial independence – is of course … Continued
Investment
Saving Strategy
Self-Employment & Side Hustles
Superannuation
February 13, 2019
Why your parent’s financial plan won’t work for you – Episode 80
If retirement is a decade or more away, it’s tempting to look at your parents and perhaps grandparents in retirement and figure, well, they seem to be getting along fine, I’ll just have what they’re having. But there’s two key factors that have underpinned your parents retirement, that will look vastly different in your retirement – the Age … Continued
Investment
Saving Strategy
Superannuation
February 6, 2019
How to build an Investment Portfolio – Episode 79
In the last post – How to start an Investment Portfolio – we looked at the steps and mechanics involved in creating your first investment portfolio. So we covered – setting your Objectives, determining how much Risk you will take on, your investment Time Frame, and Opening a share trading account. This week we’ll progress from this set-up phase, to explore how … Continued
Investment
January 30, 2019
How to start an Investment Portfolio – Episode 78
This is the first of a two-part series. In this post we will explore what are the actual steps and mechanics involved in starting an investment portfolio? In the next post, I’ll explore how you should go about building your portfolio. I’ve been building investment portfolios for clients for 20 odd years now. What I’m … Continued
Investment
January 9, 2019
When investing, focus on what really matters – Episode 75
I remember reading once the advice of someone who had achieved success in their field. Their key observation was, “in life, you will occasionally be faced with times where you have to make a choice. One path will be easy, and the other harder. I’ve been successful because whenever I faced those choices, I chose … Continued
Investment
January 2, 2019
How to get your partner engaged in your Financial Autonomy goal – Episode 74
A significant reason many people don’t achieve Financial Autonomy is because they get pigeonholed into a certain life. They define themselves in certain ways, and often this flows from the role they’ve developed in their marriage or significant relationship. Some people worry about how their partner will react if they want to choose a … Continued
Investment
Saving Strategy
December 19, 2018
Net Worth – how and why – Episode 72
Remember back in your school days where every few weeks you’d have a test, then at the end of the year there would be an exam. I have kids in high school now and I can tell you the framework hasn’t changed. So why all this measurement? It’s all about assessing progress. If you … Continued
Investment
Saving Strategy
November 28, 2018
Money can’t buy happiness … or can it? – Episode 69
In his thought provoking book The Geometry of Wealth, author Brian Portnoy observes “Does money buy happiness? The answer to that question can be summarised as Yes, Not really, It depends”. Intuitively none of us like ambiguous answers like this, but here, it successfully illustrates the complexity inherent in the question. After all, what … Continued
Investment
Saving Strategy
November 21, 2018
Financial Fundamentals – the 6 essential foundation stones for financial success – Episode 68
Today’s episode flows from a meeting I had last week with one of you guys, a member of the Financial Autonomy community. For reasons of privacy, of course I won’t use her real name, so let’s call her Jenny. It was a first time meeting, and in it Jenny observed that she felt she … Continued
Investment
Saving Strategy
November 7, 2018
The reality of negative returns – knowledge is power – Episode 66
Investment markets don’t always go up. In fact they go down on a pretty regular basis. Is that a shock to you? I suspect not. Yet virtually none of the commentary on investing talks about negative returns – markets going down. But when I speak with clients, especially new clients, usually somewhere in their … Continued
Investment
Superannuation
October 31, 2018
The challenges of investing for children – Episode 65
With the cost of housing continuing to climb, in addition to the rising cost of tertiary education, many parents and grandparents are worried about what the future holds for the young people in their lives. Last week Michael contacted me. He has a young daughter and was thinking of starting an investment for her, … Continued
Investment
Saving Strategy
October 17, 2018
Crackle & Pop! – Why do investment markets have bubbles? – Episode 63
If you’ve ever seen a graph of any share market, you will know that whilst over the long term it tends to go up, the graph isn’t a straight line. Markets will go up, up, up over several years, only to fall back for a year or two, before re-starting their upward climb. Research … Continued
Investment