Who Said You Need Millions? Retirement Strategies For The Rest Of Us

Read an Excerpt

[Excerpt from Introduction]
In 2008, the first of the 76 million people born in the baby boom generation will turn 62 and be eligible to collect Social Security. If you're a member of this generation, you know that retirement is something that you fully expect to do. The problem is, you haven't done a lot of planning for your retirement. Well, it's time to start.
Like most in the baby boom generation, you're probably not broke, but you're not some dot.com billionaire either. Most likely you don't know what real retirement in America looks like. Or what it will take for you to retire. How much are you really going to need? Millions? What do you know about investing? How are you going to develop your plan? What happens if something goes wrong?
Don't have the answers to these questions? Well, this book can help!
To retire, you'll need a personal financial plan for your future. If you're lucky, this future could last for 40 years or more. Developing a plan sounds complicated, but it's not as difficult as you might think. Retirement is about more than saving as much money as you can. It's about using the resources that you have wisely. Retirement is also not a one-size-fits-all proposition. There are as many retirement lifestyles as there are retirees.
Within the pages of this book, you'll find what you need to get you started on your road to a successful retirement. We'll start the journey by looking at what retirement is and whether it's really for you. The reality of retirement may be different than you imagined. Then we'll consider some financial topics like achieving financial independence, basic investing, living on less, and determining how much you might need. Butdon't worry. These topics aren't as daunting as they might sound.
Next, we'll look at the resources you can tap for your retirement like Social Security, pensions, home equity, and savings plans like 401(k) and 403(b) plans and IRAs. After that, we'll examine some topics that you'll need to know about when you're actually living in retirement, such as getting health care insurance, minimizing taxes, and disaster recovery options in the event your retirement plan doesn't go as intended.
Finally, we'll walk you through an exercise in developing a personal plan. At the end of the book there's a bibliography of resources you can turn to for more information. Additional resources to help you find directions on your road to retirement are available at whosaidyouneedmillions.com/.
There's no time to waste. Let's get started.

[Excerpt From Chapter 1]
What Is Retirement Worth to You?
Many people tell me they started thinking seriously about retirement or the possibility of working less when they were in their forties. They didn't discuss it at the corporate water cooler as they did sports scores or last night's prime-time TV episode. Usually, they talked about it away from work, in quiet whispers among close friends. Many expressed the hope of retiring before age 55, since early retirement has now become part of the American dream, like owning a McMansion and driving a fancy car.
In the last few decades the entire concept of retirement has changed a bit. No longer are retirees always imagined as people late in life enjoying a glass of cold lemonade in a rocking chair or reading a good book in bed while soaking their false teeth in a glass on the nightstand. Today, people believe they'll be younger and more active when they retire and that their retirement will last longer than it did for past generations.
The media and organizations in the "retirement business"-mutual funds, insurance companies, real estate developers, and the like-have picked up on this change and are trying to sell their products with packaged images of this new concept of retirement. These marketing efforts tap into a true need. Many people think they're in a rat race, and they want to get out of it. They're looking to retirement as a means of restarting their lives or shifting in an entirely new direction, away from work that has become drudgery. They want the freedom to do what they want, go where and when they want, and not be a slave to someone else's agenda. Some people dream of a retirement in which they work at something more meaningful, perhaps in a different role or for not as much money. Others want to volunteer. Still others want to travel or just do nothing. The common thread is that they want to dictate the terms of their life, not have those terms dictated to them and they want to do it sooner than their parents did.