Retirement Regrets & Revelations
by SGL Financial
Our 2 Cents – Episode #184
Retirement Regrets & Revelations
We are glad to be back with another episode of Our 2 Cents! On today’s episode, Steve and Gabriel share some inspirational quotes of the month and answer some more of the most common “How Do You Know?” financial questions. Then, they explore big regrets many retirees have had. Listen in now using a link below!
- Quotes of the Month:
- “The successful warrior is the average man with laser-like focus.” – Bruce Lee
- “Worrying does not take away tomorrow’s troubles, it takes away today’s peace.” – Randy Armstrong
- How Do You Know?:
- How do you know when you’re financially ready to retire?
- How do you know which retirement accounts (IRA, 401(k), etc.) are the best options?
- How do you know if your retirement plan is tax-efficient?
- Big Retirement Regrets:
- Discover what 5 regrets retirees wish they could change and how to avoid making the same mistakes.
Request Your Free Consultation Today
847.499.3330
Podcast Transcript
Announcer: You’re listening to Our 2 Cents with the team from SGL Financial, building wealth for life. Steve Lewit is the President of SGL Financial and Gabriel Lewit is the CEO. They’re here to discuss all the latest in financial news, trends, strategies and more.
Gabriel Lewit: Welcome to Our 2 Cents. It’s Gabriel Lewit here and Steven Lewit back with another, I think, exhilarating episode for you today. Would you concur?
Steve Lewit: Yes. I thought you were going to continue, so I didn’t say anything. So we had that moment of silence in there.
Gabriel Lewit: That’s okay. Maybe a moment of silence is all right.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. I’m pretty excited about today’s topic, so-
Gabriel Lewit: Well, you picked them.
Steve Lewit: Well, I picked-
Gabriel Lewit: And you’re like a celebrity here today in the podcast room because you picked the topic for today.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. Folks, I normally delegate this responsibility to-
Gabriel Lewit: Actually, I think I take it over.
Steve Lewit: I think you took it… I actually think you took it over.
Gabriel Lewit: I enjoy it. I enjoy it.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. He does. Yeah.
Gabriel Lewit: But you did pick a very good choice for today. We’re going to talk about… Just to give you a scoop in advance, we’re going to talk about the 10 big regrets of retirees.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. And the reason I picked that is last week I got three or four communications about, “Gee, I wish I had done this.” And then I saw this article and I said, “That’s perfect.”
Gabriel Lewit: “Perfecto.”
Steve Lewit: “Perfecto.”
Gabriel Lewit: Yes. And we of course missed you last week. Steve and I were at probably I think our last business conference of the year.
Steve Lewit: No, we have one more in October.
Gabriel Lewit: Maybe. Or maybe you’ll just go to that one. But anyways, yeah, we couldn’t do a podcast from California. So we’re back here in action this week and we are excited to bring you more financial news, ideas, strategies and random tidbits that we talk about.
Steve Lewit: And I’ll tell you, we missed doing the podcast. Gabriel and I were having coffee one morning-
Gabriel Lewit: I think we felt depressed, right?
Steve Lewit: Well, I wouldn’t go quite that far.
Gabriel Lewit: “Something’s missing today.”
Steve Lewit: “Something… Yeah. I feel my heart is empty.” No, it wasn’t that bad folks, but we did talk about it, but we couldn’t get it done long distance.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. Exactly. All right. Well, to kick things off for today, I thought I would give you a quote of the week or month if you will. Okay? So these are always a little bit fun. I don’t think we’ve done this in a little while. So today’s quote says… Are you ready for this?
Steve Lewit: Yes.
Gabriel Lewit: I always think these are a little out of left field for you. “The successful warrior is the average man with laser-like focus.” Who said that?
Steve Lewit: Yes. That was said by-
Gabriel Lewit: Can you guess who said that?
Steve Lewit: Luke Skywalker.
Gabriel Lewit: Bruce Lee. Close.
Steve Lewit: Oh, Bruce. Bruce Lee said that?
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah.
Steve Lewit: Say it again. Read it again.
Gabriel Lewit: “The successful warrior is the average man with laser-like focus.”
Steve Lewit: Okay. Bruce, you’re right. That’s a little out of my… I’m not sure I’m buying that.
Gabriel Lewit: You know what’s funny. I know I asked you who said this and you didn’t know, but my son has been on a kick lately where he’ll say, “Dad,” because he loves soccer, which is awesome. He’s like, “Dad, name a soccer player from Ecuador.” And I’m like, “I don’t know.” “Dad name a soccer player from Italy.” I’m like-
Steve Lewit: And he knows. Folks… He knows them.
Gabriel Lewit: He knows all the top players from every country, and this is his favorite game lately. I’m like, “Dude, you got me beat. I don’t know any of these people. Give me England or Portugal for Ronaldo and I’m in good shape, but that’s…”
Steve Lewit: Then it’s all over.
Gabriel Lewit: He’s like, “I can’t give you just the easy one.” So anyways. Yeah. Maybe you won’t guess this next one either because I didn’t even know who it was without looking it up, but, “Worrying does not take away tomorrow’s troubles. It takes away today’s peace.”
Steve Lewit: That’s a good one. I like that one. Yeah.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah?
Steve Lewit: Yeah. That was Gandhi.
Gabriel Lewit: No.
Steve Lewit: That was Winston Churchill.
Gabriel Lewit: It wasn’t Gandhi. It was Randy.
Steve Lewit: Well, I just got a few letters-
Gabriel Lewit: I think it’s Gandhi too, by the way.
Steve Lewit: I got a few letters.
Gabriel Lewit: Think you said Gandhi?
Steve Lewit: Gandhi.
Gabriel Lewit: Gandhi. Randy.
Steve Lewit: Randy? Randy.
Gabriel Lewit: Randy Armstrong.
Steve Lewit: Oh, Randy, not Gandhi. Armstrong. Right. Randy Arm… Who is Randy Arms-
Gabriel Lewit: Producer Gabby’s going to have to Google this.
Steve Lewit: Producer Gabby has to Google Randy Armstrong.
Gabriel Lewit: I always think I should check these before I use them because in case there are some weirdos.
Steve Lewit: I’ve heard that stuff-
Gabriel Lewit: Oh, he’s an American musician and guitarist.
Steve Lewit: Okay. But I’ve heard that stuff before. You’re like, “Why are you worried? Tomorrow’s tomorrow? What are you worried today? You’re missing today because you got worries tomorrow.” But you know what? It’s hard not to worry about tomorrow.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. So at the conference we were at, folks, by the way too, there was a great speaker. I thought he was great. Steve I think liked him.
Steve Lewit: Yeah, I did. I did.
Gabriel Lewit: But basically, what was his whole mantra? It was…
Steve Lewit: “Enjoy the ride.”
Gabriel Lewit: “Enjoy the ride.” Yeah. He’s like a notable famous speaker apparently, gone all around the country and the world speaking at big conferences and his whole… He has like six books and his whole theme was… I’m paraphrasing here, but yeah, “Don’t sweat the small stuff. Enjoy the ride.” Kind of like the… You’ve never seen the movie Yes Man?
Steve Lewit: No, I never saw that.
Gabriel Lewit: I think it was with Jim Carrey, right? Yeah.
Steve Lewit: Is that where he always had to say yes?
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. He has to say yes.
Steve Lewit: Yeah, I did see it. I did see it. Yeah, it was funny.
Gabriel Lewit: And that’s kind of reminded me like this because he’s giving these examples of he’s on vacation and he’s trying to drive there and get there and we’re was so focused on the destination and then his kids are like, “Oh, I want to see the giant ball of yarn. Let’s go see the…”
Steve Lewit: Yeah. But his wife convinced him to do that and he said it was the best vacation he had. They never got to their destination, but their kids-
Gabriel Lewit: The kids would always be like, “Let’s see this. Let’s do this.” And you’re always focused on getting to… Which to be fair, I would be like that too.
Steve Lewit: Yeah, I would.
Gabriel Lewit: “We got to get there on time.”
Steve Lewit: Yeah. “We can’t stop there. We got to get there.”
Gabriel Lewit: So that’s your third quote of the day? “Enjoy the ride.”
Steve Lewit: “Enjoy the ride.” Okay.
Gabriel Lewit: All right. Now back to our regularly scheduled programming. Last time we were talking about how do you know questions?
Steve Lewit: Yeah, these are great.
Gabriel Lewit: All right. And we had a very long list and we only got through a handful of them. We are going to talk about of course the top 10 regrets or just retirement regrets, maybe not 10. But before we do that, I wanted to finish up on this topic here of how do you knows. Okay? And we talked about how do you know… A variety of questions with your finances last time. I forget which ones we actually talked about, but one of the questions is, “How do you know when you’re financially ready to retire?” I know this one. It’s a softball one to start you off with because I know exactly what you’re going to say.
Steve Lewit: Well, you look at your financial plan.
Gabriel Lewit: Exactly. Yeah.
Steve Lewit: And it tells you if you’re there or not.
Gabriel Lewit: That’s how you know.
Steve Lewit: That’s how you know.
Gabriel Lewit: It really is that simple. So we’re planners. If you’re out there listening and you have not yet created a detailed financial plan model, well, that’s really how you know. I mean, you can use rules of thumb. You can do 10 times, blah, blah, blah, or 80% of your expenses you’ll pay for in retirement. But I’ve found all those rules of thumb, whatever they are, tend to be very inaccurate.
Steve Lewit: Well, there is no rule of thumb. It’s like every person is different. Every lifestyle is different. Every bank account is different. The spending patterns. They’re all different. You know how when you’re ready to retire? You don’t worry… If you’re not worried about it, you’re ready to retire. And then the question is, “How do I not worry about it?” And I’ll throw that softball back to you.
Gabriel Lewit: Well, you look at your plan.
Steve Lewit: You look at your plan. Exactly. Yeah. I mean, then you’re ready to retire. If you’re worried about retirement, then you have to ask yourself, “Well, why am I retiring if I’m worried about it?” or “How can I not worry about it and then I can retire?”
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. So, I think that’s a very easy one to get started with. All right. How about the next one here? “How do you know what kind of retirement account is the best option?”
Steve Lewit: Is this before retirement? When you say-
Gabriel Lewit: Well, yeah, assuming you have your saving. You’re contributing.
Steve Lewit: You haven’t retired?
Gabriel Lewit: You’re saving and contributing to a retirement account of various types. There’s very many out there. SEPs, IRAs, 401(k)s, 403(b)s, Roth versions of all of those, on and on brokerage accounts. You name it. So how do you know what’s the best way to save your money and what kind of account?
Steve Lewit: Well, I don’t know. That’s an interesting question. How do you know that? Well- you’re-
Gabriel Lewit: I have to start it with that because the section is how do you know.
Steve Lewit: How do you know. Well, look, when you’re working, you’re offered different options. Like put money in your 401(k) or your TSP and you know that you should do that. How do you know? Because you should. Because you’re going to need that money sometime in the future. So how do you know which one? I’m not sure people get that many options to do that, other than a Roth. Well, actually there are a few now that I’m thinking about it. You could do an IRA.
Gabriel Lewit: I see you going down the hole, the rabbit hole here.
Steve Lewit: Yeah, I’m down the rabbit hole here. You could do an IRA.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. Let’s say… I mean, should you do a could a Roth 401(k) or a Roth IRA?
Steve Lewit: You could do a Roth. Or you could use specially designed life insurance to save money. And that’s like a retirement account. An annuity is a retirement account. So how do you know? Well, I hate to say this again.
Gabriel Lewit: No. Don’t say that. We’re going to be more…
Steve Lewit: I’m not going to say it again.
Gabriel Lewit: So, I would say you start off by looking at things like your tax bracket. Okay? So Roths are tax free, whatever kind of Roth account or pre-tax accounts are before tax. Depending on your tax bracket, that could really be a key determining factor for you. If you have a Roth option that you’re eligible for, that’s the next question. Did you know if you are eligible for it?
Steve Lewit: That’s first. Can you?
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. There’s income limitations and deduction limitations for certain income levels.
Steve Lewit: And then what is your tax bracket too?
Gabriel Lewit: That might just rule them out for you if you’re over certain limits.
Steve Lewit: That’s right.
Gabriel Lewit: How much are you looking to contribute? If it’s over 7,000 for example, then you might want to go to the 401(k)s and 403(b)s because you’ve got higher contribution limits. But if you’re only going to contribute, say, 7,000 for you and your spouse each, 14,000 total, you might be better off in the Roth IRAs because you have better control and better selection of investment options. Do you get a match amount or not get a match amount? So yeah, all these factors will very quickly come into play and making it… Obviously saving anything anywhere is good.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. And part of that is also your belief about the future. If you think taxes are going to go up in the future, then you want retirement accounts that will be non-taxable in the future. So that simple question, which I thought was kind of like-
Gabriel Lewit: Started off simple, right?
Steve Lewit: Yeah. It’s like, “Wow. What do you mean?” But actually there’s a lot of options.
Gabriel Lewit: People say I have this unique ability of over-complicating things.
Steve Lewit: Well, no. Well, my unique ability is over-simplifying things. So we’re a good balance, man.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. All right. So let’s do maybe one or two more of these and then we’ll put this one to bed and move on to greener pastures here. Let’s see. Did you have any on the list that you liked, Mr. Lew?
Steve Lewit: Well, I have to consult the list here because I haven’t looked.
Gabriel Lewit: Okay. All right.
Steve Lewit: I wish I knew what we did last time.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. Well, I think we did… Did we talk about fees last time? I think, yeah. I think we talked about fees last time.
Steve Lewit: Well, one of my favorites is on here. “How do you know your retirement plan is tax efficient?” Taxes for me is an ongoing topic that I focus on in all of our seminars and webinars because when you look at your wealth building after you retire, 65 and over wealth building, it’s not from investments. It really… A lot of your wealth building, greater part of your wealth building, comes from how efficient you are on taxes. And the question is, how do you know if you’re tax efficient?
Gabriel Lewit: I got a simple answer for you.
Steve Lewit: I’m afraid.
Gabriel Lewit: You look at your tax plan.
Steve Lewit: Well, you do. Yeah. Well, I was trying not to say that.
Gabriel Lewit: Is that not the… Well, it is the answer actually. Well, I would say you need a tax plan and we can help you with those by the way, of course. But what is a tax plan? It tells you when to take what amounts from which accounts up to maximize your tax brackets and it’ll help you assess if you’ve got future tax bumps or IRMA spikes. IRMA is income-related monthly adjustment amount for Medicare if your income’s above a certain level. And you can manage those by controlling your withdrawal strategy.
Steve Lewit: So, I would approach that answer a little bit differently saying the same thing that you’re saying is that if you don’t have a tax plan, you know that your portfolios, your income, your future wealth is not tax efficient.
Gabriel Lewit: Well, it could be randomly. I mean, I’ve encountered maybe one client in my life who all their money was in Roth, so guess what their retirement withdrawal plan looked like.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. But how-
Gabriel Lewit: They were going to pull money from a Roth, and it’d be pretty tax-free. But that’s pretty unusual.
Steve Lewit: How often do you see that?
Gabriel Lewit: I just said, very rarely. So it’s more complicated when you get into taxes and withdrawals versus saving. So this is going down the mountain when we were talking about which accounts to contribute to. That’s like going up the mountain, accumulation.
Steve Lewit: That’s part of it. Yeah.
Gabriel Lewit: Decumulation in retirement. So that is where a tax strategy, being very purposeful, what you do, how you do it, where you take from what account and when will be the difference between saving 10s or 100s of 1000s of dollars or not and leaving that to the IRS.
Steve Lewit: I love the word purposeful. So folks, you can ask yourself a simple question, “Have I explored all the different opportunities for tax savings and efficiencies inside my portfolio, outside my portfolio, in my income planning and in my legacy planning? Have I explored?” If the answer is no, I’ve touched this and that, then there’s efficiencies that you’re probably missing in your financial plan.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. Yeah. But yeah, that’s really key there, being tax aware and coming up with a tax strategy and those are things that we find a lot of people struggle with on doing that themselves. Well, I would say I think we tackled many of these. There’s so many more we can touch.
Steve Lewit: There’s a bunch more. Yeah.
Gabriel Lewit: But I’d like to move on to our other main topic for today. But real quick, a little sidebar here. If you have questions on tax planning or, “How do you know X, Y or Z?” or any questions we didn’t get to, call us, 847-499-3330, or go to sglfinancial.com, click Contact Us and schedule a time for an awesome first introduction call.
Steve Lewit: Hey. Is today National Financial Aware… What is it, Gabby?
Gabriel Lewit: It’s Awareness… Yes. National Financial Awareness Day, which is not to be confused with the recent National Financial Independence Day.
Steve Lewit: Which we talked about. Freedom. Freedom.
Gabriel Lewit: So, you can be both independent and aware.
Steve Lewit: So today is about awareness, folks. Yes.
Gabriel Lewit: Yep. So we’re broadening that with our podcasts. We’re doing our duties.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. We’re going to do 15 minutes of meditation at the end of this podcast to become more aware.
Gabriel Lewit: Perhaps I will not join you for that.
Steve Lewit: Right. I don’t think anybody will.
Gabriel Lewit: All right. All right. So real quick actually also one more sidebar before we talk about retirement regrets. I wanted to… Last time we talked about scams and things of that nature and things to be aware of. I’m not going to get back into that, but I just saw an article that I think is important for people to know, but apparently four months ago, a notorious hacking group claimed to have stolen all of the Social, and I said all, of the Social Security Numbers for essentially 2.9 billion people and is selling them on the black market. And the reason this is important is a lot of times people… Obviously you should be protective of your Social Security Number and personal information, but there’s a very good chance that your information, and this is kind of ratifying this thought, is probably already out there on the dark web.
Steve Lewit: I believe that.
Gabriel Lewit: Being sold and resold.
Steve Lewit: I believe that. Absolutely. Yeah.
Gabriel Lewit: So, everyone’s like, “How do I protect my information? How do I protect my information?” One thing I think you might already want to conclude, “My information’s probably already out there.”
Steve Lewit: Yeah. So what do you-
Gabriel Lewit: Not that you shouldn’t still be protective just in case, but the bigger question I think becomes, especially with this information out there now, 2.9 billion people, all their data and names, Social Security Numbers, dates of birth, apparently, we’re all part of this and there’s a class-action lawsuit being filed now… Well, anyways, you’re now more about, “How do I protect my credit and monitor my credit?” because people already have your information.
Steve Lewit: Is this an advertisement for LifeLock? LifeLock?
Gabriel Lewit: It’s not. No. It’s just an awareness message-
Steve Lewit: National Awareness.
Gabriel Lewit: For financial. Sure. That goes well with that.
Steve Lewit: But LifeLock’s a pretty-
Gabriel Lewit: Wasn’t my intention, but…
Steve Lewit: LifeLock’s a pretty good deal though.
Gabriel Lewit: But you want to have some sort of credit… I think the easiest thing is have a credit monitoring service. So if you’re concerned about this, which I think you should be… You should be aware of what’s going on with your credit. You can’t stick your heads or heads for multiple people out there under the cover. Okay?
Steve Lewit: Unless you’re an alien with two heads.
Gabriel Lewit: Because it’s out there. All right? So I think being aware of this. What can you do? You can monitor your credit with various apps. So if a new account gets open, they typically alert you. I use Credit Karma. It does of course try to upsell you on credit cards and stuff all the time, but I don’t do that. I just use it for the credit score and the monitoring and the alerts.
Steve Lewit: I use that too. They are terrific.
Gabriel Lewit: You can of course go the extra excessive step if you feel it’s important of locking your credit or freezing your credit. It’s a little beyond the scope of today’s call or podcasts or show. You could also make sure you annually check your full credit report. All right?
Steve Lewit: And that means the full… Not just the score, folks. That means-
Gabriel Lewit: Not just the score. The full report.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. Everything. It’s got your whole history in there.
Gabriel Lewit: You can get that for free each year. Again, you can just pretty much email us if you’re wondering, “Where do I get that for free?” Because there’s some fake links out there. You want to use the right one. But ultimately that’s the idea. Assume your stuff is out there and just be proactive about monitoring and checking because this article basically pretty much all but assures most people’s information is probably out there now in the dark web.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. I’ve thought that for a long time. So I have LifeLock and I have Credit Karma and I check it every month and yada, yada, yada. But you never know. We just had a client I believe that got their stuff stolen and it’s a pain in the yoo-hoo.
Gabriel Lewit: Yep. Yep. So that was all just a little PSA, public service announcement and make sure on Financial Awareness Day, you are aware of these things.
Steve Lewit: Wait a second. Why are they laughing at me-
Gabriel Lewit: Let’s not go back there.
Steve Lewit: For saying yoo-hoo? Well, that was nice.
Gabriel Lewit: We’ll move on.
Steve Lewit: Okay.
Gabriel Lewit: All right. All right. So talking about regrets, financial regrets for retirement.
Steve Lewit: How about podcast regret?
Gabriel Lewit: In particular. Okay? So this article summarizes from a variety of different studies. Seriously, let’s move on. I’m going to kick you under the table here. You’re not paying attention, Mr. Lewit.
Steve Lewit: I’m sorry, folks. I got distracted.
Gabriel Lewit: All right. So this is your article by the way. Okay?
Steve Lewit: This is my article. I love this article.
Gabriel Lewit: So, do you want to intro this?
Steve Lewit: Yeah. So as I said, I was… Well, it wasn’t last week. It was the week before actually. But I had a series of clients and it was like Nostalgiaville. And they’re saying, “Gee. I wish I met you 10 years ago,” or, “I’m pretty upset with myself for not saving enough as we were going along.” And then I came across this article that said, “What are the biggest regrets?” And I thought that would be good to share that because I’m sure everyone that we’re speaking to has some retirement regret.
Gabriel Lewit: So, what do you like most on this list? What do you consider to be the biggest regret that you see most commonly of these available options?
Steve Lewit: Waiting too long to plan.
Gabriel Lewit: Waiting too long to plan?
Steve Lewit: Yeah. It is absolutely… Look, we face this every day. Folks will come in and say, “I’m retiring in two years,” or, “I’m retiring in a year.” And then we get into a conversation. And our job is to show folks how to build wealth, and we show folks how to build wealth. And almost every time will say, “Gee, I wish I had met you 10 years ago.”
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. And I mentioned this is all from an article with surveys and data. So this says from the 24th annual Transamerica Retirement Survey of Workers, that’s a mouthful, baby boomers were a median age of 35 before they began saving for retirement outside of their workplace account. And they missed many years of compounding gains on their savings. And also from another asset management firm research piece from Schroeder’s, many are… 63% in fact of retirees wish they had done more planning before retirement, is what their most recent survey said. And more than a quarter of retirees who haven’t saved enough attributed it to not planning ahead according to a working paper on financial regrets from the National Bureau of Economic Research.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. Planning is one of those things is like getting your will done or your powers… “I can get to that. I’ll do it next month or next year. I have plenty of time.”
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. And then plenty of time turns into, “I still got a good amount of time.”
Steve Lewit: “I got a year left.”
Gabriel Lewit: “I’m still okay.” And then, “Oh, wow.”
Steve Lewit: And then all of a sudden time creeps up on you and it’s like, “Hey. I’m retiring in three years,” or two years or next year. And there you are.
Gabriel Lewit: We liked this article. I liked it. I think you picked a good one because I like validating things with data. Not that I think our listeners, you guys out there are like, “Him and Steve just makes stuff up,” but we don’t, and a lot of this is from our experience or in this case from surveys of 1000s of other people just like you. And I think that helps to really put some of this stuff into context and perspective.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. I think data is very important because there’s a lot of theories, opinions and beliefs that are not data-justified about money and finances. And folks, you know if you know us, that we are quite data-oriented. We like to look at the evidence. And based on the evidence, which is data and experience, that’s how you make good financial decisions.
Gabriel Lewit: Yes.
Steve Lewit: He said.
Gabriel Lewit: Concur. All right. You want to pick your next one?
Steve Lewit: No. You do. You go.
Gabriel Lewit: No. I’m letting you steer the ship here, man.
Steve Lewit: Okay. I’m going to pick my next one.
Gabriel Lewit: Okay.
Steve Lewit: Okay. Saying yes too often.
Gabriel Lewit: All right. No. Let’s not do that one.
Steve Lewit: Okay. Okay.
Gabriel Lewit: See what I did? You see what I did there?
Steve Lewit: Did you see what I did there? I said, “Yes. Okay. Let’s move on.”
Gabriel Lewit: All right. Yes. So what is the context of that? Okay. Well, all right. So here we’ve got… Hold on. I’m trying to find it. Oh, yeah. One reason retirees may not have saved enough is they were too quick to say yes to requests for money from others.
Steve Lewit: Yes. Yes.
Gabriel Lewit: Steve?
Steve Lewit: And that includes people that are after their money, like brokers and real estate people and so on.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. So this gal here, her name, I don’t know if she must’ve been further up in the article, named Doll, Bruce Doll. Okay. His name wasn’t Doll, Bruce Doll. He says, “I wish I would have said no once in a while, but that’s not who I am.” Okay? And so the Retiree Reflection Survey from the Employee Benefit Research Institute asked retirees open-ended questions what they would’ve changed about their financial habits. And that’s really what came out of this. And some people said they had, this is per the article, deadbeat boyfriends that took a lot of their money.
Steve Lewit: I have a client. I have a-
Gabriel Lewit: Maybe there’s girlfriends too, who knows, to keep that equitable there, but… Less money on friends who don’t pay back was another. So basically people are… Maybe there’s… It doesn’t give all the examples. Kids that, “Mom, dad, I need this, need that, need the other.”
Steve Lewit: “Yeah. I’ll pay you back.”
Gabriel Lewit: So yeah. The point is, when you have money, people oftentimes want some of that money. And if you’re too generous with it, you might not have enough for yourself later on.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. Yeah. So yes, most people want to help other people. They’re very kind. They want to feel good in themselves and they lend their money or give their money and then turn around and they don’t have enough.
Gabriel Lewit: Coming from the airplane that we were just recently traveling on; they’re putting on others’ masks. The whole safety message?
Steve Lewit: Yes.
Gabriel Lewit: Put on your mask before you put on others.
Steve Lewit: Oh, the oxygen mask. Yeah.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. Well, the yes people are putting on others’ masks before their own.
Steve Lewit: Exactly.
Gabriel Lewit: Which is very thoughtful and kind, but…
Steve Lewit: Very nice, but you might die. Right?
Gabriel Lewit: Apparently. Apparently. Yeah. Okay. Yes. Do you have another option here that you like?
Steve Lewit: Underestimating health care costs.
Gabriel Lewit: Okay. Let’s jump into this one here.
Steve Lewit: That’s a big one.
Gabriel Lewit: All right. So according to the Schroeder’s survey, half of retirees thought that Medicare would cover more of their healthcare expenses than it did or does. And 36% surveyed by the Employee Benefit Research Institute said healthcare expenses are a financial worry that keeps them up at night.
Steve Lewit: It’s another extraordinary thing is that it does, especially if you have a parent that you’ve worked through or is currently in a health facility or long-term care facility or having health problems. And all of a sudden you say, “Well, gee. Happening to Mom and Dad. That could happen to me. And where am I going to get the money from? And when is it going to happen?”
Gabriel Lewit: Well, you are blending that with the other regret.
Steve Lewit: The long-term care regret.
Gabriel Lewit: Which was skipping long-term care insurance. Okay? So let’s stay on point here, sir.
Steve Lewit: All right.
Gabriel Lewit: We’ll do that one in a second.
Steve Lewit: We could do the combo plan.
Gabriel Lewit: Well, yeah. So healthcare is different, a little, than long-term care. They are both in the same broad category, but healthcare, they use some examples of people that thought, “Oh, I thought I heard that Medicare was free,” but Medicare Part A is free, but Part B costs you 175 bucks per person.
Steve Lewit: At least.
Gabriel Lewit: So, if it’s you and a spouse and maybe you thought it was free, you have to pay 350 bucks a month minimum. That’s where that IRMA, income related monthly adjustment amount, could also increase that depending on your income levels. And you have to pay for a drug plan or sometimes vision, dental, other kinds of expenses there for healthcare.
Steve Lewit: Exactly. And then some folks will buy dental insurance and eyesight… Not eyesight, glasses, optical, whatever they call it.
Gabriel Lewit: Vision.
Steve Lewit: Vision insurance. And they submit their bills and they find out it doesn’t cover very much.
Gabriel Lewit: Right. So you’ve got to have extra money available for the healthcare costs. And really that’s just a little bit of knowledge and education I think goes a long way there. As well as skipping long-term care insurance was a regret, which of course I know you were halfway through. We want to pick up on that a little bit? What you were saying about people you see your parents going through it or friends with parents going through it?
Steve Lewit: Well, most people don’t buy long-term care for two reasons. One, it’s expensive. The old kind of long-term care is expensive. There’s an alternative out today, which uses actually life insurance that becomes a long-term care policy that most people that are buying long-term care today are using for themselves. But most people don’t buy it. The people that have a parent that has gone through a long-term care or home healthcare situation, they buy it. So it’s a matter of understanding what really happens when there’s a long-term care. It’s a burden on your family. Will it be a burden on your family, on your kids? Will it wipe out a good portion of your savings that could go to your children? What’s really going to happen? And most people really are not aware of it. It’s one of those things, “Well, I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it.”
Gabriel Lewit: Well, more than a quarter, over 25%, said that they regret it. Probably the ones that realized they needed it or would need it or what they had wasn’t enough. And unfortunately, when you get to that point where you realize all that, it’s too late. And so…
Steve Lewit: Well, that’s the thing. If you say, “I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it,” and then you get there and there’s no bridge.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. No bridge to cross.
Steve Lewit: No bridge to cross.
Gabriel Lewit: Okay. Last one before we wrap up here for today is owning two homes was a regret for many people. All right. They found Carol Walsh, a lady here, 71-year-old retiree in Port St. Lucie, Florida, said, “I found owning two places was a lot of work and money.” Okay? And sometimes people think that owning two homes is the dream. And then they realize, “Oh, I’m in Illinois and my Florida home’s air conditioner just broke or something. Power went out,” and you got hassles and the headaches for having properties in multiple spots that you’ve got to handle.
Steve Lewit: Or “I use it three months out of the year and I don’t want to rent it for six, seven months, have somebody else living there. Now it’s a cost that I got to endure and I’m only half-time or part-time.”
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. So that’s another common regret. And I’m sure there are more. And of course if we think of more, we’ll jot them down so we can share them with you on the show. And what’s the purpose of going over these? Not to just sound negative and talk all about the sad regrets that people have, but we can learn from these. So if any of these trigger anything in you about concerns, thoughts, worries, what ifs, “Should I do this? How do I plan for that?” that’s what we’re here for.
Steve Lewit: That was my hope, not that we beat ourselves up for making mistakes, because we all make mistakes, but it’s like you said, Gabriel, if something, a little tweak in yourself says, “I really should look at that.”
Gabriel Lewit: Squeaky heel on your shoe…
Steve Lewit: Yeah. Something like that.
Gabriel Lewit: When you’re walking. Nobody likes those.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. I hate those, but, “I really should look at that.” If you feel that and that thought runs through your mind, give us a call. And Gabriel’s going to give you all the contact information.
Gabriel Lewit: Of course. 847-499-3330 or go to sglfinancial.com, click Contact Us, or email us, info@sglfinancial.com.
Steve Lewit: Another superior segue by Penny number two.
Gabriel Lewit: Mr. Lewit.
Steve Lewit: Yeah.
Gabriel Lewit: Well, have a wonderful rest of your day, night, evening, weekend, you name it. We can’t wait to talk with you on the next show.
Steve Lewit: Look forward to it. Everybody, stay well.
Gabriel Lewit: Bye now.
Steve Lewit: Bye.
Announcer: Thanks for listening to Our 2 Cents with Steve and Gabriel Lewit. For any questions about your finances, give SGL a call at 847-499-3330 or visit us on the web at sglfinancial.com. And be sure to subscribe to join us on next week’s episode.
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