Getting 5%/yr you get $50k. You can live forever from $50k, altough modestly. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to get 5%/yr from your investmnts, any good quality bond will yield that.
When hyperinflation hits and the days of Volker come back, buying 30 years bonds sounds pretty darn good. Some ppl. I talked were getting 15% +.
Whoever wrote that article doesnt understand anything about money. They assume that once you save 1 million dollars, you will stuff it in a bank account and just write checks off of it until you die. The average 4 year degree holder will make 2.1 million dollars over their lifetime,so saving 1 million will require a little bit of investing to reach that mark, unless someone is willing to put 50% of their income away every month. You have to really be financially savy if you want to have 2 million or more when you retire (basically have more money when you retire than you actually made in your life!?!) And if you are that financially savy, you are not going to stuff your money into a bank account and write checks off it until you die. You will own real estate or some dividend paying stocks...maybe some bonds too. This information in that article is only good for lottery ticket winners and people that inherited money to understand how long their money will last.
That is true, but you had to have the foresight to lock it in, and things looked bleak at the time. Mortgages were 11 to 12 percent, but I was able to secure what they called at the time "bond money" at 8%, after the prime started dropping. Reagan listened to Volcker, so all the anti-Reagan rants on here are just total nonsense. It was a gamble that paid off. Believe it or not, conditions seem even poorer today. If rates go back to the early 1980's, you can kiss it goodbye. US is in debtor's hell this time around.
It totally depends on your lifestyle. For most people accustomed to living a big city lifestyle, with frequent dining out, travel, etc, I doubt $1mill is adequate, even factoring in some SS and 401k money. You move to some place in florida or arizona, join an expensive golf club, the wife is going to want to take a couple of expensive trips every year, say to europe, you have to pay for medicare supplemental insurance, the local taxes are high, etc, youare probably looking at spending $80- $100k a year. The real wild card is health. You may be fine for 10 or 15 years, but what happens if you have some problems and have to go into a nursing home($100k a year right there)? Medicare doesn't pay for that, or assisted living. By that point your spouse can't handle things and has to pay to get everything done. Maybe both of you have big problems and need long term care. That $1 mill can evaporate pretty fast. That doesn't even account for your kids wanting loans, losing their jobs, etc and expecting you to bail them out because, hey you're rich. A lot of you probably are assuming that making 8-10 percent per year is child's play. After all, there was that one year you made 60%. It may not be child's play in a deflationary world, with 1 % interest rates and no inflation to produce automatic albeit paper gains. It also might not be so easy when you are on the wrong side of 70 and don't want to screw with the market or don't understand it anymore. Why not let your daughter's husband handle it? He just got a job as a broker at the famed firm Shill Securities. Oops, he just lost half your nest egg. Sorry. And don't forget taxes. Hint: they're going up, real fast if obama and his crowd stay in power. Your social security will be taxed heavily because, hey, you're rich. They'll probably impose a steep wealth tax on the...rich, of course. It's a matter of fairness and spreading the wealth. Why should some have so much more? That will certainly be a winning argument among the 40 mill formerly illegal immigrants granted citizenship. Deal with it, gringo.
whoever wrote this article simply wants your money. if you save more you give it to a pension fund who makes a cut from each additional dollar. the same goes for a broker, etc. wall street will always tell you that you do not safe/invest enough while main street will always tell you that you don't consume enough. it is that simple....
I've been to philippines and it really is cheap there although you gotta watch out as if you are white,sometimes you will get charged a "different" price than locals. When I was in boracay there are these little motorbikes (they call them tricycles because they have a little cab you can ride in) and the ones by the hotel cost anywhere from 50 to 150 pesos (between $1-$3) depending on how far you want to go on the island. But if you walk down the road about 50 feet and flag the passing tricycles down, they charge you 7 pesos (15 cents) and take you as far as you want to go as they just drive from 1 end of the island to the other all day. But pretty much everywhere you go, Jeepneys are the same price...about 7 pesos(15 cents) per ride. (jeepneys are sort of like around the town busses) If you need to go further, they have busses. I took one and it cost about $1.50 to go 60km or so. Food is also cheap. I took 2 friends to eat at a fast food place called Chow King. Total bill for all 3 of us...about $3 (and they told me they dont usually eat there because its "expensive") A live-in servant can be had for about $60 per month (although I've seen some that worked for as little as $20) They will do everything from cooking to cleaning, to washing your clothes by hand, to taking care of the kids...and they will be cheerful about it. Here in the states if you paid someone $300 per week to take care of your kids, they would complain and they DEFINATELY would not do laundry or cooking for that.
Right I have thought about it. And then you have those Haiti/Chile moments when SHTF and you will most likely be the first targeted. A good friend rents his place in Whistler while doing that sails his boat around Thailand and does well. The sailboat was built in Thailand too, so labor was cheap. Regarding being overcharged, it happens to all foreigners regardless of skin color. Another friend told me that his elderly friend fakes blindness in cabs to avoid being rip offed, true story.