Blog Day 11

Give something away:  a printable, a mini class, a tutorial you did on You Tube, or sound advice about something your readership might benefit from.

So I missed the last two days, no biggie.  Just get back on the horse and ride on, my friend.  So I don't have a printable or a class to give away, and I've never made a tutorial on You Tube (probably couldn't afford the camera), so maybe I can come up with some sound advice.  Let's see...

When I was younger and just starting out working and starting my career, I didn't make lots of money.  I always made enough to get by, but because I didn't have a college degree I didn't get top salaries.  I had to struggle every month to make sure all the bills got paid.  Oh, some months the PG&E bill didn't get paid until the following month, because I saw an outfit that I wanted to buy, so the bill was put on the back burner. Or maybe the phone bill got postponed for another month so I could take a weekend away someplace.  Heaven forbid there was money to put into a "retirement" account.  Thinking about age 65 back in my 20's was unheard of for me.  I wouldn't seriously think of it for another 19 years or so.

By then I was raising my daughter as a single parent, had astronomical day care and commute expenses and really didn't have any extra monies to put into a 401K.  At that time I worked for a company that matched what I put in, so I started with 2% of my salary going into an account.  My thought was that if I didn't do it, I'd never have any money to retire.  So you make adjustments and put that money away every month.  The next year I bumped it up another percent, so 3% was going into my account.  After a couple of years, the company automatically bumped it up a percent every January, assuming I would get a raise and could afford the bump.  I didn't always get a raise, but I kept up with the increases, finally putting in 10% before I lost my job.  The company matched my contributions by 6%, which was very generous (but they made huge profits which they didn't share with all the employees, only the "preferred" ones, of which I was not one, and didn't pay their employees the going rates, so this was a nice perk).  After 24 years, my boss told me I didn't know how to do my job, put me on a 2 month performance plan, and told me every week what I did wrong...the only thing she told me I did right was plan the potlucks!  So they covered their bases, wrote me up weekly, and one day slapped me in the face and showed me to the door.  I was devastated.  I filed for unemployment, which was nothing, looked for a replacement job (I was 61 years old) and struggled month to month not sure what was going to happen.  Really, the vibe I got from everyone, including the unemployment office, was "who do you think is going to hire a 61 year old?", really.

I took my sister up on her offer to talk to her financial guy and look into retirement.  I took all my information to him and we worked out a plan, and here I am retired.  It could be better, I could have more money in my account, but I'm dealing.  I am blessed to be where I am, but for the grace of God.  My advice to anyone is to start saving as early as possible, don't wait.  You never know what the future will hold, but you might as well agree it will be expensive.  So the earlier you start saving for retirement, or anything else like an unexpected expense, sock that money away as soon as you can.  It will relieve a lot of worrying and stress in the future, believe me.