crylam

It is hard to not worry about the safety of our inner-connected world. Malware, ransomware, hackers, phishing, trolls....the list of people and organizations who want to make our life difficult, dangerous, and expensive seems to grow as quickly as algae in a backyard swimming pool. On average, there are 244 new cyber threats a day. I am a humble example, as my post of a few months ago made clear when a hacker broke into my computer. Your patient information from your health insurer, or financial details ripped from your credit card company are fair game. Disabling a hospital's admittance system for an entire country happened this past summer. And, don't even get me started on Equifax. Making money off my private information, giving me no way to "opt out," and then losing it all. Enough! If you follow even the most basic of common sense steps, the odds of your home computer becoming someone else's to control are increasingly possible. Those who decided to hack int...

Whether to pay off a mortgage before or just after retirement is a topic I have addressed before. But, it is such a major decision, I get at least one email every few weeks asking my advice. No wonder. With nearly 30% of all those 65+ having monthly mortgage payments, it is important to make the best choice for you.  As I write this, the picture is anything but clear. Plans for a tax cut are bouncing around the halls of Congress. As of now, mortgage interest deductions would be protected. But, an increase in the standard deduction and a change in personal deductions might be coupled with the loss of real estate tax deductions, making house ownership potentially more expensive for some.  So, for purposes of this post, let's stick with how things are right now. After the dust settles in Washington and there is clarity (?) I might do a followup to adjust to the new reality. Retirement brings its own unique set of concerns and decisions. Near the top of many lists is a decision ab...

This will be Betty's last year to endure the swampy water of the Healthcare Marketplace. Ever since 2011 she has had to put up with the same crap....misinformation, provider lists that are wrong, fewer choices. and higher prices.  In 16 months she will be Medicare-eligible....we can hardly wait. Like last year, there is one company in Arizona offering plans for the individual market through the marketplace. Predictably, prices went up 20%. That included a higher deductible, lower hospital cost coverage and a switch to a different hospital system. Whether her primary care doctor or any of the specialists she sees will be under contract for next year is impossible to know until sometime in January, or too late to do anything about it.  We do qualify for a monthly subsidy from the government that keeps the total affordable, even with the large monthly bump in price. But, this turmoil every year is taking its toll on my wife. With lawmakers in Washington unable to either kill...

Last month, a reader suggested I explore the journey of retirees who have lived their life a little differently than many of us. That sounded like a fascinating idea. The problem? My retirement has been pretty standard. While I left the working world earlier than I had planned, I live in suburbia, have a steady life, and rather traditional goals for myself and my family. Something may go wrong at some time in the future, but I am not the person to ask about retirement done "differently." What I can do is share some examples of what a "different" retirement may look like. But, then, the real expert is you. Either you have approached this phase of life on a less-traveled path, or you know someone who has. This should be a an interesting learning experience for us all! I guess this is a natural followup to the previous post about retirement being a personal path. Examples of a Retirement Done Differently 1.  Retire to a foreign country Becoming an expat is the choice o...

This is a phrase I heard someone use at a meeting of a volunteer committee I was attending a few months ago at United Way. I like it. It summarizes an approach to life, especially a retirement life, that I endorse. Let's see where it goes. The first two words, Fail Fast, assumes a few things. One, that trying something new is encouraged, because without trying failure could not occur. That mindset is one that might have served you well during your working career. There are very few jobs where trying to improve something is not encouraged. Maybe you were not in a position to execute an idea, but you could certainly talk to a supervisor or someone else up the chain of command. Your idea to save money, serve clients more efficiently, be more productive, or improve workplace safety would be expressed. After retirement, we are in an even better position to experiment: a different housing or lifestyle setup, a new hobby, a desire to learn to sail, building furniture, making beautifu...

This isn't going to be a post where I pull out all sorts of scary statistics about our lack of savings and the problems ahead as millions of Boomers join the already-retired. I'm not going to give you a detailed plan for having a financially comfortable, satisfying ret irement. There are thousands of web sites, blogs, and books that can help you with financial planning if that is what you decide you need.  What I would like to do is offer some reasons why we simply can't seem to do what we know we must do: save enough for our post-working life. If we recognize what the obstacles are there is a chance that these problems can be minimized. I ran across an article by Jennifer Derrick from several years ago on her web site,  SavingsAdvice.com . She offered an interesting explanation of what may be part of the problem: "It’s only been in the last two hundred years or so that technology and medical care have evolved to the point where we now have the luxury to think about t...

Most of my posts stress the positive nature of retirement. After all, this blog is Satisfying Retirement , not Unhappy Retirement. I am a firm believer in our ability to work toward making a bad situation better. Attitude and a willingness to change can often work wonders. Even so, there are times when your retirement doesn't live up to your dreams or expectations. Despite your best efforts, fate has dealt you a difficult hand. Try as you might, things seem to have gone off track. It may be a health problem that doctors can't seem to solve. Whatever you have tried doesn't seem to have worked well. Maybe your relationships have taken a turn for the worse. Sometimes being close to someone 24/7 reveals cracks in the foundation that weren't noticeable  before.  Your dreams of travel have bumped up against the reality of your resources. A trip to the South Pacific has to be replaced by a three day trip south of your hometown. The idea of seeing the cou...