Given the fact you are past 55 yrs, have some savings and EPF tucked away, here are some tips to survive your retirement
1) take up some skills to do part time work – this will offset some of your daily cost
2) put away your EPF for reinvestment via fixed term deposit or other investment portfolio earning at least 3.6% p.a.
3) downsize your living arrangement. If the kids are grown up and are still living with you, either they pay their rent and boarding like tenants. OR better still, sell the family home and live in a 2 bedroom flat. The surplus from the sale should be put away for your medical expenses. Make sure your have public transport nearby. Give up the car. That will save you heaps of money from petrol expenses, maintenance costs, tolls, parking fines and insurance. If you need to go anywhere, better to hire a car for the weekend than to own one. Then you will have no obligation to maintain something that depreciates.
4) Review your living expenses. Cut out stuff that you can do without. Make sure you cover expenses for medicine, housing, electricity, grocery, transport and put the rest away for a rainy day. Cut out the following – festival buying, birthdays, holidays, newspaper (better to go to a community library than to buy a paper or a book), visit internet café rather than subscribe to online service, Astro pay tv and also telephone (get a mobile telephone with prepaid telephone costs – (refill when empty and use sparingly for emergency. You can SMS for free and take calls but be careful of making calls to other states).
5) Learn to be independent to take care of yourself. For eg. Prepare food at home rather than eat outside will save you ringgit for your medicine. For eg. Learn to take care of your clothes – sew up damaged clothes is better than buy a new one. Learn to grow vegetables and herbs in your small patch. You can use empty boxes as garden beds and get good topsoil from nursery. You can do home composting to fertilise your soil. This will reduce your vegies bill – also good for your health seeing that some vegies suppliers used chemicals excessively.
6) Learn to be courageous and try to use generic products for your everyday use – like shampoo, soap, detergent, toilet paper, towels, slippers, t-shirts. Spend on branded goods for skincare, medicine and essentials. The rest of the grocery items can be generic or no-brand.
7) Eat and drink at home. This will save you ringgits immediately.
8) Sell off the stuff from your house if you do not want them. Less clutter around the home is healthier and with the space saved, you can perhaps organise better for your living space.
9) Learn to take care of yourself – health is important whether you are rich or poor. So take time out to exercise and eat properly. Reduce the amount of food taken per meal but increase the meal times so that you eat regularly but with smaller portions.
10) Learn to compare prices and do research before you purchase.
Thursday, February 28, 2008
Monday, February 18, 2008
Top 10 reasons why people spend more than what they earn
Top 10 reasons why people spend more than what they earn
1) to impress others - live it up at all expense
2) adopt a fatalistic view of life - i do not know what happens tomorrow so today i spend everything and enjoy life to the fullest. Live a life like a man on a death sentence or about to be hanged
3) a generational habit - what the family did has impact on the behaviour of the children. Well, sometimes not. The parents may have saved every sen but the children being pampered, spend everything like there is no tomorrow
4) the attraction of easy financing via credit cards and personal loans schemes.
5) once a person gets a job or a loan or funds, the first thing is to get an expensive car with all the bells and whistles to impress girls and neighbours & colleagues. But the wallet is empty, so there is little or no money to fill the stomach with good nutrients.
6) people more likely to spend on clothes, latest hair styles, shoes, perfume/cologne (sometimes you think the bottle must have been broken to splash so much on your body) than health, personal hygiene and food. So the attitude is to look outrageously “cheap” but have poor diet, lack of hygiene, poor health due to fast food and snacks that have no nutrients.
7) spend today for what I earn today. I will spend tomorrow for what I will earn tomorrow. A simplistic and casual view of a worker. Do people want to be employees forever? Do they want to work the same job for the rest of their lives? This is not 1950’s or post war syndrome but this is the 21st century where knowledge is endless and one must update with the latest know-how. I digress on how much one invest on increasing one’s knowledge. Any comments on this?
8) lived a life minding other people’s business. So one spend a majority of the waking hours and money trying to outdo what others have – must have latest gadgets, electronic appliances, furniture, golf membership, massage chair, maids, piano, plasma TV, pots and pans, kitchen utensils, shoes, leather goods, pets, hair and cosmetics goods, auto accessories, garden stuff, ASTRO, latest car model, magazines, snack food that has lots of preservatives, colour and cholesterol, DVDs, CDs and lastly, more exercise equipment that no one use. This is a waste of resources, time and effort while the returns of the investment may be superficial but the amount spent is substantial to justify for the purchase of a submarine!!
9) a bad habit of collecting debts from one credit card and then get another credit card to pay off a debt of the previous card loan. How familiar!! This is a straight road to poverty and hardship.
10) a series of “bad luck” – a friend complained that he has too much debts due to the recent flood that affected his business, then his wife was diagnosed with breast cancer, one of his children was expelled from school due to drugs activities, his mother has died recently and his car was totally wrecked due a hit and run incident. What can you say? Poor chap had to find money for his wife medical bills, get his children back to school and also for a secondhand car. By the way, he had no savings because he poured all his money into his business and his wife did not work while they were married. I remembered he used to holiday twice a year to Taiwan, Hongkong, China and Hawaii for golf. I wonder if he had scaled down his expenses now. A lesson for everyone is – when you receive your pay packet, set aside a portion for bad weather and rainy days. An old saying goes “good things trickled down like a spit, but bad things poured down like bucket loads of rain”. So be aware that your earning capacity can change any time due to all sorts of reasons – some may be out of your control.
><(((:> ><(((:> ><(((:> ><(((:> ><(((:> ><(((:> ><(((:> ><(((:>
1) to impress others - live it up at all expense
2) adopt a fatalistic view of life - i do not know what happens tomorrow so today i spend everything and enjoy life to the fullest. Live a life like a man on a death sentence or about to be hanged
3) a generational habit - what the family did has impact on the behaviour of the children. Well, sometimes not. The parents may have saved every sen but the children being pampered, spend everything like there is no tomorrow
4) the attraction of easy financing via credit cards and personal loans schemes.
5) once a person gets a job or a loan or funds, the first thing is to get an expensive car with all the bells and whistles to impress girls and neighbours & colleagues. But the wallet is empty, so there is little or no money to fill the stomach with good nutrients.
6) people more likely to spend on clothes, latest hair styles, shoes, perfume/cologne (sometimes you think the bottle must have been broken to splash so much on your body) than health, personal hygiene and food. So the attitude is to look outrageously “cheap” but have poor diet, lack of hygiene, poor health due to fast food and snacks that have no nutrients.
7) spend today for what I earn today. I will spend tomorrow for what I will earn tomorrow. A simplistic and casual view of a worker. Do people want to be employees forever? Do they want to work the same job for the rest of their lives? This is not 1950’s or post war syndrome but this is the 21st century where knowledge is endless and one must update with the latest know-how. I digress on how much one invest on increasing one’s knowledge. Any comments on this?
8) lived a life minding other people’s business. So one spend a majority of the waking hours and money trying to outdo what others have – must have latest gadgets, electronic appliances, furniture, golf membership, massage chair, maids, piano, plasma TV, pots and pans, kitchen utensils, shoes, leather goods, pets, hair and cosmetics goods, auto accessories, garden stuff, ASTRO, latest car model, magazines, snack food that has lots of preservatives, colour and cholesterol, DVDs, CDs and lastly, more exercise equipment that no one use. This is a waste of resources, time and effort while the returns of the investment may be superficial but the amount spent is substantial to justify for the purchase of a submarine!!
9) a bad habit of collecting debts from one credit card and then get another credit card to pay off a debt of the previous card loan. How familiar!! This is a straight road to poverty and hardship.
10) a series of “bad luck” – a friend complained that he has too much debts due to the recent flood that affected his business, then his wife was diagnosed with breast cancer, one of his children was expelled from school due to drugs activities, his mother has died recently and his car was totally wrecked due a hit and run incident. What can you say? Poor chap had to find money for his wife medical bills, get his children back to school and also for a secondhand car. By the way, he had no savings because he poured all his money into his business and his wife did not work while they were married. I remembered he used to holiday twice a year to Taiwan, Hongkong, China and Hawaii for golf. I wonder if he had scaled down his expenses now. A lesson for everyone is – when you receive your pay packet, set aside a portion for bad weather and rainy days. An old saying goes “good things trickled down like a spit, but bad things poured down like bucket loads of rain”. So be aware that your earning capacity can change any time due to all sorts of reasons – some may be out of your control.
><(((:> ><(((:> ><(((:> ><(((:> ><(((:> ><(((:> ><(((:> ><(((:>
Wednesday, February 6, 2008
Why you don’t get service?
Reasons why
1. you failed in your first impression test
2. you are too timid, no one knows what you want because you sounded too soft and no one can hear you because the background noise is greater than yours
3. you forgot what you wanted after waiting so long in the queue for customer service
4. you did not bring the receipt or sales invoice – next time use your handphone to take pictures of receipts that are above RM150
5. you did not tell the store employees that you bought the item from another store location, so they could not reconcile the inventory
6. your purchase has just lapsed in the store warranty policy – like no refund after x weeks from purchase date
7. you are tame, and too nice for the ppl to take notice. So they fobbed you off to another level for verification of products – make sure the store carry the item
8. you do not look like a lawyer buruk - like demanding attention to every word you said and your looks and demeanour shows you are about to launch an injunction to stop the store from trading business. Must look like someone with authority and oomph. Tip: have some grey hairs and wear those “look over” spectacles (2 lenses for short and long sightedness) to bring a school principal effect.
9. you dragged screaming children to the customer service counter with you because it is the maid’s day off . No one at the store wants to deal with you.
10. you parked in a 20 minutes parking zone and you have to hurry else you will get a hefty fine. So you speak incoherently and so fast that the ppl says “Huh, apa you cakap? Kena korek telinga dulu lah” or “Kita tak jual amende barang tu sejak Siti Nurhalizah kahwin”…Either you slap yourself to slow down or you zoomed off to your car to park somewhere else and queue up again.
1. you failed in your first impression test
2. you are too timid, no one knows what you want because you sounded too soft and no one can hear you because the background noise is greater than yours
3. you forgot what you wanted after waiting so long in the queue for customer service
4. you did not bring the receipt or sales invoice – next time use your handphone to take pictures of receipts that are above RM150
5. you did not tell the store employees that you bought the item from another store location, so they could not reconcile the inventory
6. your purchase has just lapsed in the store warranty policy – like no refund after x weeks from purchase date
7. you are tame, and too nice for the ppl to take notice. So they fobbed you off to another level for verification of products – make sure the store carry the item
8. you do not look like a lawyer buruk - like demanding attention to every word you said and your looks and demeanour shows you are about to launch an injunction to stop the store from trading business. Must look like someone with authority and oomph. Tip: have some grey hairs and wear those “look over” spectacles (2 lenses for short and long sightedness) to bring a school principal effect.
9. you dragged screaming children to the customer service counter with you because it is the maid’s day off . No one at the store wants to deal with you.
10. you parked in a 20 minutes parking zone and you have to hurry else you will get a hefty fine. So you speak incoherently and so fast that the ppl says “Huh, apa you cakap? Kena korek telinga dulu lah” or “Kita tak jual amende barang tu sejak Siti Nurhalizah kahwin”…Either you slap yourself to slow down or you zoomed off to your car to park somewhere else and queue up again.
Why First Impressions are Deadly Wrong
We generally tend to judge ppl by their outward appearance especially at the first instance - eg. shoes, watch, handphone, hairstyle, smells, handbag - leather or fakes, shirts, et al. I had an incidence when I checked into a Hotel along Jln Raja Laut. There were 2 ppl at the frontdesk - a female and a male Malay employees. I was dragging along a full suitcase of books & clothes, one hand with the taxi receipt and another hanging onto the printout of my booking. I had prepaid my hotel accommodation by the way. All I need was to fill out their customer forms, perhaps a credit card copy for other expenses. The male employee was in a double breasted suit. I was in a T-Shirt, Bermuda Shorts, closed up shoes, no watch (cos mine was stolen), my hair was cut short. I had just alighted from a taxi – so you can imagine the state I was in. I was treated with silence- as if I was invisible, until the female employee said “Boleh saya tolong?”. I said, sure. I proceeded with the usual routine forms until the male employee stepped in and said “ Ada awak buat booking ker?”. I showed the printout and said I had prepaid my hotel room. He appeared to be deaf and said “Macam mana nak bayar?”, eyeing me with hardened eyes and unsmiling face. I nearly dropped dead. How would I resolve this? I could play hardball or go soft or else blur sotong to make the situation more worse. Instead, I calmly said “Ini bil sudah bayar – prepaid”. He said “Mana boleh bayar kalau awak belum pakai bilik?” – Hmm, this sounded like a segment from a TV comedy show – Pi Mai Pi Mai Tangtu or Fawlty Towers. So I slowly explained that I had a great uncle who had “oredi bayar the bil sebab dia takut saya tak ada duit”. I smiled while I said this and waited with baited breath to see the Malay guy’s face. He sort out went silent and must be thinking “Heh, dia nak main aku ker?”. Then he said, “Bagi credit card nak sain”. I then took out my wallet and flashed out my Gold American Express Card. He then went like a stunned sotong, just standing there, almost fell off his perch. He quickly regained his composure and went all smiles and sickly sweetly said, “Oh American Express card, cakap lah awal-awal, boleh saya bagi senang service. Mari saya siapkan ini”. The female employee next to him was trying not to laugh loudly. She held her hand to her mouth to stop from guffawing with laughter and falling off her perch too. What is it with these ppl? Do first impression really counts with these hospitality staff at a posh hotel in KL? Who hire these ppl? Why do we face humiliation with these poor customer relations when we could go elsewhere? Why do I always have to defend my rights as a person and a customer? Why do I need to flash my Gold Amex card or BMW car keys to assert myself? What if I limped into the reception with a pair of crutches (I had a minor surgery due to an accident previously in sports)? Would these ppl eyed me with suspicion and called the guards to tahan me? Thank God my legs were OK then and I was walking unaided.
Well, I stayed one night there and checked out the next day. I checked in at Hotel Legend the next day. I am a regular traveller to KL and tend to stay 2-4 days every 2 months for business meetings. Over the last 9 years, I have not seen any improvement on how we treat each other, customer or no customer. I guess if they think you look out of place, they will treat you poorly like a beggar, a person who has no charms, no money, no class and no standard, and also no Gold American Express. What has the world come to? Do share your story here if you wish.
Well, I stayed one night there and checked out the next day. I checked in at Hotel Legend the next day. I am a regular traveller to KL and tend to stay 2-4 days every 2 months for business meetings. Over the last 9 years, I have not seen any improvement on how we treat each other, customer or no customer. I guess if they think you look out of place, they will treat you poorly like a beggar, a person who has no charms, no money, no class and no standard, and also no Gold American Express. What has the world come to? Do share your story here if you wish.
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
Who To Avoid and A word of CAUTION
Yes, I do agree with you. I stay away from ppl who:
1) starts to creep up close onto me without saying what s/he wants - except my cat
2) starts calling "terms of endearment" without any real need to – like when I am on my way to the toilet or photocopier. What? You want me to tapau ar? Sorrilah, wrong station or port of call. Now bug off.
3) starts to charm their way to me by making me coffee even though I don’t drink instant or 3-in-1 coffee bags. So there, I have let the world know of my coffee habits.
4) starts to deliver mail into my inbox tray even though the stuff were last year’s news and basically junk. Just an excuse to creep by my office to smile warmly and say irrelevant talk and cheesy smile. I usually tune out mentally and pretend that Ella is blasting her rock music in my office. Then I usually squint and say I need to go because my left ear need cleaning.
5) cleans my desk without my asking for it or knowledge. What? Am I so untidy or are you looking for something or are you worming your way into my good books? My good book (singular) is a tough list and many have fallen off due to their evil ways and evil intentions or lack of ethics or lack of integrity.
6) starts to bring food from home to my desk and says “oh, I made this and I though you may like it” when I do not have a sweet tooth, do not partake food in the office, hates coloured or preserved food, do not take snacks or food in-between meals, do not drink socially or otherwise, do not smoke and hates smart alecs who assumes that I am one of them. I usually says “Thank you but no thank you. However, please feel free to share with ppl outside on your way out” and then direct them out of my office space. If ppl want to share drinks or food with me, they shall soon know that I am not one who is hungry or starved for their offerings.
A word of wisdom: My mum has taught me well not to accept these kind gestures esp if one is not inclined to return the favours. See where this is leading to? Favours. Stay away from being indebted to someone else or you will be wrapped around tightly around their fingers. A bit sad in the world of corporate business and office politics. Stay clean and stay brave. No corruption of any kind – not even free kopi at the local mamaks because I will stick to paying my own bill.
My dad reminded me to be a simple person – stay alert and keep away from evil ppl, stay away from addictions, stay away from “politics”, do not criticise openly, start having a diary to vent your thoughts, stay away from ppl who are always complaining, too cheerful, too naïve to understand, too playful that they do not believe they are wasting their time and stay away from ppl wounded from all these “cloak and daggers” stuff. So who do you mix with? Well, the old, frail, elderly and disabled ppl to start with because generally, they are disadvantaged, more honest, more caring and more blunt than others. However, there is always exception to the rule because too much manja also creates dependency factor. Oh yes, stay away from ppl who are needy and dependent on others for their happiness.
It is good to take up a hobby or start caring for others – animal shelter, hospice teams, care for terminally ill patients or help out in the canteen for disadvantaged ppl. I hate to say this but I learnt more about myself from using my time and energy to help others. My problems are not so bad after all when you see the problems these ppl are facing in their everyday life. I also start a support group for ppl who have fallen prey to loan sharks, bank repossession exercise, poor financial schemes and ripped off with bad insurance policies. So there, there is hope for all of us who feel your pain.
1) starts to creep up close onto me without saying what s/he wants - except my cat
2) starts calling "terms of endearment" without any real need to – like when I am on my way to the toilet or photocopier. What? You want me to tapau ar? Sorrilah, wrong station or port of call. Now bug off.
3) starts to charm their way to me by making me coffee even though I don’t drink instant or 3-in-1 coffee bags. So there, I have let the world know of my coffee habits.
4) starts to deliver mail into my inbox tray even though the stuff were last year’s news and basically junk. Just an excuse to creep by my office to smile warmly and say irrelevant talk and cheesy smile. I usually tune out mentally and pretend that Ella is blasting her rock music in my office. Then I usually squint and say I need to go because my left ear need cleaning.
5) cleans my desk without my asking for it or knowledge. What? Am I so untidy or are you looking for something or are you worming your way into my good books? My good book (singular) is a tough list and many have fallen off due to their evil ways and evil intentions or lack of ethics or lack of integrity.
6) starts to bring food from home to my desk and says “oh, I made this and I though you may like it” when I do not have a sweet tooth, do not partake food in the office, hates coloured or preserved food, do not take snacks or food in-between meals, do not drink socially or otherwise, do not smoke and hates smart alecs who assumes that I am one of them. I usually says “Thank you but no thank you. However, please feel free to share with ppl outside on your way out” and then direct them out of my office space. If ppl want to share drinks or food with me, they shall soon know that I am not one who is hungry or starved for their offerings.
A word of wisdom: My mum has taught me well not to accept these kind gestures esp if one is not inclined to return the favours. See where this is leading to? Favours. Stay away from being indebted to someone else or you will be wrapped around tightly around their fingers. A bit sad in the world of corporate business and office politics. Stay clean and stay brave. No corruption of any kind – not even free kopi at the local mamaks because I will stick to paying my own bill.
My dad reminded me to be a simple person – stay alert and keep away from evil ppl, stay away from addictions, stay away from “politics”, do not criticise openly, start having a diary to vent your thoughts, stay away from ppl who are always complaining, too cheerful, too naïve to understand, too playful that they do not believe they are wasting their time and stay away from ppl wounded from all these “cloak and daggers” stuff. So who do you mix with? Well, the old, frail, elderly and disabled ppl to start with because generally, they are disadvantaged, more honest, more caring and more blunt than others. However, there is always exception to the rule because too much manja also creates dependency factor. Oh yes, stay away from ppl who are needy and dependent on others for their happiness.
It is good to take up a hobby or start caring for others – animal shelter, hospice teams, care for terminally ill patients or help out in the canteen for disadvantaged ppl. I hate to say this but I learnt more about myself from using my time and energy to help others. My problems are not so bad after all when you see the problems these ppl are facing in their everyday life. I also start a support group for ppl who have fallen prey to loan sharks, bank repossession exercise, poor financial schemes and ripped off with bad insurance policies. So there, there is hope for all of us who feel your pain.
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