Lately I feel like I’ve been stuck in a season of waiting. My husband and I have been dreaming of putting down roots in the Pacific Northwest since the first time we visited Oregon seven years ago. While we are just months away from making that goal a reality – we hope to buy a house sometime this summer – we are still in transition. In addition to waiting as we search for the right house, I spent the fall waiting to get an appointment with a doctor about a health concern I was dealing with, spent the winter waiting for medical tests, and am now spending the spring waiting to fully recover from surgery.
It’s not uncommon for couples to have an income gap between partners – in fact, it's the norm. According to data from Morning Consult and Insider, nearly three-quarters of Americans reported they had some income imbalance with their partner before they started dating. And while that imbalance can flip-flop as partners change jobs or receive a raise or bonus, at times it can be significant. This might happen when one partner retires, decides to go back to school, or opts to stay at home with the kids. This might also happen when one partner gets a big promotion or receives a large inheritance. How can you manage your finances so this imbalance in income doesn’t throw your relationship off balance? Consider these steps:
I’m a big fan of the Financial Feminist podcast. A few weeks ago the host, Tori Dunlap, shared a money hack that she had heard about from another financial educator on Science Finance: Before making an impulse purchase, ask yourself: “How many ‘taco dollars’ does it cost?” That particular financial educator really loved tacos, so he judged each purchase by asking, “How many tacos could I buy for the cost of that item?” Concert tickets: 20 tacos. Cupcake: 1 taco. Fancy hotel stay: 83 tacos. Then, he would ask himself: “Is it really worth that many tacos?”
My last post on things that can jumpstart your financial life in 5 minutes or less got me thinking about one of the most effective steps I ever took during our marriage: asking my husband an icebreaker question about our life together. That word icebreaker is key: these are questions designed to get conversation going, not shut it down. And that means the question has to be open-ended and asked with a spirit of genuine curiosity of learning what your partner thinks.
Long-time readers of this blog are familiar with the four money personalities I discuss: the giver, the saver, the spender, and the acquirer. Over time, though, I’ve learned that while people tend to understand the first three, they often stumble over the last one. On first blush, people generally thought the “acquirer” referred to someone who liked to accumulate or collect things. However, that couldn’t be further from the truth. The acquirer was someone focused on how money came into their life, not what was done with the money after it was received.
“Can you tell me if I’m on track for retirement?”
This was the most common financial question I received when I used to lead retirement seminars for people ages 50+. In fact, I still hear this question all the time — particularly from people in their 20s and 30s. Here’s the truth: Retirement is more personal than it is financial, and the amount you need is personal as well. That’s why it’s best to make preparing for retirement a life-long process.
An employer retirement plan has to be one of the most under-rated employer benefits. It’s so often neglected and/or taken for granted. I’ll be the first to admit I treated it that way for the first two years of my career. It wasn’t until I got my second job working for a very small consulting company where I had to negotiate my own retirement package and employer match that I really began to see the importance of this benefit.
Can we all agree that the stock market can be really confusing? Before I started my job as a financial educator, I knew next to nothing about stock market terminology, or how to interpret what I’d hear on the news. Since I’m not planning to be a day trader (and I’m guessing you aren’t either), my biggest goal is to use the stock market to my advantage to increase my retirement savings. Over the last five years, these are the six things I’ve discovered you need to know to be a savvy investor:
By far, the number one question I receive as a financial educator is: “How much do I need to retire?” Sometimes people will even blurt out this question the minute they walk into a seminar, as if there’s one magic number that I can share with them. But the truth is, there isn’t one. There isn’t one magic retirement goal number that works for every situation – in fact, I’d venture to guess that every single person I meet has an entirely different number.
For many of us, an employer retirement account is a given … but what if you’re self-employed? This week’s question comes from a reader who is a freelance actor, and her spouse is a freelancer, too. She wants to start saving for retirement early, but she’s not sure what her options are since she doesn’t qualify for an employer-sponsored 401(k) program.
About a month ago my aunt posted a picture on Facebook of my grandparents before going to prom night at their senior living community. They were each dressed up in their finest and they looked so happy to enjoy the evening with each other and their friends. I think this photo is a great representation of what retirement looks like to me. Retirement isn’t about buying a yacht, traveling, or even the ability to sleep in. It’s not about what you’ll buy or even what you’ll do, it’s about making the most of the time you have with the people you love.
