你拥有你要的人生吗？Are You Having the Life You Want?

栽自新洲日报活力副刊2017年11月29日第A10页

人活着的意义是什么？难道就只是天天为了生活而忙忙碌碌？可悲的是这真的是大部分人的生活写照。

The Real Meaning of Early Retirement / Freedom

When talk about early retirement, I come across many books and internet articles on how to achieve this financially.  As a matter of fact, finance is only part of the equation.

Here, I would like to share what is the real meaning of early retirement (at least to me):

1: Am I wanting to have early retirement and why?

A: YES, YES, YES.  I have been planning for this for years and I finally achieved this at the age of 40 financially.  Why?  This is because I would like to have more time to do what I like to do which I can't do so when my time is sold for living.  When I was an full-time employee, at least 8 hours of my day are sold.  Therefore, beside full-time job, I did not have sufficient time for myself as I would be occupied by other tasks in my life (sending/picking up kids to/from schools and/or tuition classes, settling bills and other family matters etc) while I still need at least 6-hour resting time every night.  My life was busy but created no value as I could not enjoy it at all.  Routine tasks had been making me felt so dull.  I could only enjoy my life if I become the master of my time.  That is the motive of me for early retirement.

Miracle of Stable Investment Return

A number of my readers and students are asking for stock investment tip.  Why they do so?  Simply because they are expecting to earn big within short period of time without doing much work.  Accept the fact that there is no free lunch in this work.  What you get is totally depending on what you have input.  You give peanuts, you'll get monkeys.

When we were kids, our parents might keep telling us that we should study hard IN ORDER TO HAVE BETTER LIFE IN THE FUTURE.  In other words, we have been taught on input and output.  The same is applicable to stock investment and there is no shortcut.

你50岁还要烦钱吗？Are you still struggling for money at the age of 50?

栽自新洲日报投资致富2017年11月6日第27页

看了这个报章标题，有些感触。就在几天前，我去了间银行去存放定存。因为我要得到更好的利率，我便向大厅的一位Officer询问。谈好后，该名Officer没让我拿号码排队，而是直接将我的资料及批准的利率交到收银员那儿处理。看来这位Officer的来头不小。在等待定存收据时，我便和她聊了起来。当她问我在哪儿高就时，我说我是自由工作者（Freelancer)。（其实我目前我还是全职工作者。那为什么我会说我是自由工作者呢？那是因为在不久的将来，我将会是我自己的主人。现在是时候让自己习惯这样说了，好让心里有个准备。）那位Officer好不羡慕。她说她也希望能像我一样。后来我才知道那位Officer是原来是该银行分行的经理。

该如何分配：退休基金？孩子教育费？医药费？

栽自2017年10月9日新洲日报-投资致富第32页

很多财务规划师都一而再，再而三的劝大家尽早为孩子的教育费规划。但在很多情况下，人算不如天算。就拿我本身为例。在25年前，我父母因我们三兄弟都想前往澳洲攻读大学课程。老爸老妈没多说一句，拼了命让三个孩子拥有了澳洲大学的学士文凭。至到今日，我们还是对他们为我们的付出感激不尽。

How Much Do You Need???

One day, while chatting with a friend after lunch, he shared with me on how he was dissatisfied with the current corporate management. He is about my age. So I suggested him to quit his job. Yet, he replied, "I am not like you.  I will do so soon after I pay off my housing loan." When I further asked him if he knew how much he needed to be "himself", he suddenly speechless.

真的需要那么多吗？

2017年9月25日，我在一家报章的财经版的专栏里看到一个询问。询问者今年40岁。想在60岁退休并得到财务自由。这位询问者说他们一家四口（两夫妇和两个10岁以下的小孩）月花费为RM6,570。该财务师用5%的通膨率及4%的投资回酬率来加以计算，得到的结果是该询问者需在60岁前拥有近RM590万来应付每年RM21万的生活费。这每年RM21万的生活费并不难计算。只要将现在每月RM6,570的生活费乘以12再以复利5%持续20年既可得到。可为何需要RM590万的退休金才能支撑呢？在计算上，道理很简单。以RM590万的退休金乘以4%的年回酬率就可得到。该询问者目前只拥有不到RM50万的投资加现金。也就是说他必须在20年里多存RM540万。是的，该顾问的确是说需要多RM540万，也就是半个RM1,000万（不是RM100万）。对许多人而言，若半个RM1,000万那么好存，那全世界将没有穷人。

你“要”的是什么?

一天中午，我和一位好友同事用餐时，聊起下属管理的话题。原因是他有一位经理下属，非常自我到目中无人的地步。她以自我为中心的态度已让许多人不敢恭维，甚至连公司高层都睁一只眼闭一只眼。无可否认的是我们的高层无视员工的心理而让事件自然平息。其实他们没看到的是平息的背后是在累积着大量的不平衡。不好好地处理这不平衡将会带来不可预知的后果。钻不出牛角尖的就会耿耿于怀，又或是与之为敌。恶性循环将持续下去直到崩坏。