Save for your retirement while you are still young

For almost all young adults who have just started their first job, or who are just getting ready to settle down and marry, planning for their retirement is not at all in their minds. For those who have just gotten their first job, the experience of receiving your paycheck is a thrilling and empowering feeling. Now you have money to spend for the things you’ve always wanted to get. Billboards and glitzy print ads beckon you to accumulate all sorts of products and services that make you enjoy the life that you feel entitled to. At last!

But, listen, time waits for no one. Sooner or later, you will find yourself with a closet full of out of fashion clothes, outdated gadgets, and toys that you have outgrown. Worse still, you may still have credit card bills to pay for these things, and zero cash saved up for even your next vacation to Boracay. This time will come, if you’re not careful. And believe me, that time could just be around the corner.

If you’re smart, you should begin to plan for your retirement as soon as you receive your first pay check! Here are ten reasons why you should prepare now:

1. If you are employed, and your company is setting aside money for your SSS or GSIS or company retirement, guess what? What your company is setting aside is not going to be enough.
2. Time is in your favor. Who has more time to save for retirement at age 60? You, or your uncle who is 30 years older than you?
3. Because of # 1, you don’t have to sacrifice a lot in order to save a lot. If you and your uncle wanted to accumulate P1 Million by the time you’re both 60, you would have to save a smaller amount regularly, because you have more time to save. Right?
4. You can make more aggressive investments now but get rewarded with higher returns. Usually, these higher risk investments have a way of recovering very well over a longer period of time.
5. Inflation is not in your favor. You know it. Don’t be in denial. It will cost you more to retire than earlier generations ahead of you. So, don’t think that it will be affordable enough for you by that time.
6. You can start small and grow. Even setting aside a small portion of your paycheck each month will pay off in big pesos later.
7. It’s easier to develop the habit of saving while you are young and you have no major obligations.
8. As you accumulate savings over time, your money will start working for you, rather than you working for money.
9. No matter how much you love your parents, do you like the idea of supporting your parents because they failed to save for their retirement? Well, don’t impose your failure to save on your children. They deserve a life of their own.
10. It’s great to enjoy your savings! Imagine the nice and easy life you can enjoy when you have saved enough. If you want to keep working even when you’re old, you will go to work because you like to, not because you have to. And – when you have saved enough to take care of a comfortable lifestyle – you can occupy yourself with work which probably won’t pay much, but which will be fun and self-fulfilling.

source: http://www.save-and-learn.com; photo from www.forbes.com