a little bit scared

Getting my financial life in order will hopefully stop the fear. The fear that wraps around my heart every time I see an article like this in The New Daily last week, talking about how tough it is for female pensioners.

They have no super, don’t have their own home (which as I discovered in working out what I need for retirement in my posts here, here and here is vital for retirement), and can’t afford Australian rents.

They forgo even grocery shopping, trying to make ends meet.

I always assumed I’d one day have a home that couldn’t be taken away from me and financial security, but I’ve not worked to make that a reality.

So when I see articles like this in the papers and it scares me, that I am these women.

I’m a few years younger sure, but I’m single. I can’t rely on a partner to walk this journey with me. I can’t rely on a salaried position until I’m retirement age. I’m not going to get an inheritance. (My family loves me, there’s just no money.)

I have to work this out or I’ll be the one with nowhere to go, no home, no money, no assets. I teeter between being terrified and being incentivised to do better.

Dealing with the fear is an ongoing process, but there’s a few steps that are helping me:

• knowing what I’m dealing with (what I need to have)
• knowing where I’m starting from (my current assets, savings and knowledge)
• acknowledging how far I’ve come
• having goals
• just bloody starting.

I have goals now (a house and having a minimum $250,000 in super or reducing my eventual reliance on the aged pension by having more than $1 million) and I’ve started making efforts to meet them.

I’d cleared my consumer debt before I started this blog and paid off my car loan (early!) so now it’s time to snowball that success into my biggest challenge, adjusting my current lifestyle and spending to allow me to actually have a lifestyle and spending in retirement.

The image on this post is by Leio McLaren on Unsplash

The New Daily, June 8, 2018: https://thenewdaily.com.au/news/national/2018/06/08/struggling-pensioners-retirement/