Banking – Spectrum Financial Wealth

Have you written a personal financial register, listing your super and non-super investments, your other assets, your income and any debts? This fundamental task for managing your personal finances, investing and saving for retirement would often be left on a must-do-tomorrow list – and perhaps never done. Behavioural economists typically rank investor inertia and procrastination high among behavioural traits that are enemies of investment success. And never getting around to preparing a personal financial register would often be part of that inertia. A personal financial register – updated as your circumstances change – is critical for a range of personal financial issues. These include saving for retirement, preparing a personal financial plan, setting your portfolio’s asset allocation, controlling your spending and estate planning: Preparing a financial plan: A good starting point for preparing a comprehensive financial plan, perhaps with the guidance of an adviser, is to prepare a personal financial register. You can then make more informed and realistic decisions – including about your long-term goals, targeted returns and tolerance to risk – for your financial plan.Setting your portfolio’s asset allocation: An up-to-date list of your super and non-super investments is necessary to set an appropriate asset allocation for your portfolio. Repeated research, including by Vanguard, shows that a diversified portfolio’s strategic asset allocation – the proportions of its assets in different asset classes – is the main cause of variations in its long-term returns.Keeping your personal spending under control: A basic rule for investment success is to try to spend less than you make so as to have money left over to invest. An accurate personal financial register should help you to take a realistic approach to spending given your income and assets.Saving for retirement: A financial register is necessary for estimating how much you will need to save for retirement. You can then plan how to save to meet your savings goals.Spending in retirement: Without a personal financial register in place at the eve of retirement, retirees may have a poor understanding of how far their financial resources will stretch. This may lead to overspending or being too frugal given the state of your finances. And you may miss opportunities to more efficiently manage your investments and spending in retirement.Estate planning: Having an up-to-date personal financial register is a central part of estate planning together with such tasks as making a Will and nominating beneficiaries for your super savings. A financial register should give you and, eventually, your intended beneficiaries a better understanding of your finances. As Smart Investing has discussed, the last baby boomers celebrate their 70th birthday within the next 15 years as a growing proportion of the population reaches old age. This should underline the need to save for retirement and for estate planning – and that should include having a personal financial register. Source : Vanguard By Robin Bowerman, Head of Corporate Affairs at Vanguard. Reproduced with permission of Vanguard Investments Australia Ltd Vanguard Investments Australia Ltd (ABN 72 072 881 086 / AFS Licence 227263) is the product issuer. We have not taken yours and your clients’ circumstances into account when preparing this material so it may not be applicable to the particular situation you are considering. You should consider your circumstances and our Product Disclosure Statement (PDS) or Prospectus before making any investment decision. You can access our PDS or Prospectus online or by calling us. This material was prepared in good faith and we accept no liability for any errors or omissions. Past performance is not an indication of future performance. © 2019 Vanguard Investments Australia Ltd. All rights reserved. Important:Any information provided by the author detailed above is separate and external to our business. Our business takes no responsibility for any action or any service provided by the author. Any links have been provided with permission for information purposes only and will take you to external websites, which are not connected to our business in any way. Note: Our business does not endorse and is not responsible for the accuracy of the contents/information contained within the linked site(s) accessible from this page