You bought a new car and 4 other signs that tell everyone you’re bad at maths

1) You’re bad at maths because you bought a new car

Quite a few of my friends read my blog. Some of them like Wendy* are even on board with the whole save enough to retire really young idea, but maths isn’t her forte as the following conversation should show:

Wendy: Can you believe Bill* just bought that big BMW*. So stupid, he makes less than I do. What do you think it cost?
Patrick: Well it was about 2 years old, so it’s probably worth around R300 000.Be like Bill, buy used cars.
Wendy: R300 000! I’d never spend that on a used car. I’d much rather get a new one for that price. What an idiot.
Patrick: Well the minute you drove out of the showroom in a new R300k car you’d lose R60 000. After one year of owning it your total loss would be around R90 000. After a year of owning his used car, Bill would only lose R30 000.

Conversations like that often have a lot of uncomfortable silence following them, especially when Ms want to be frugal bought a brand new (though much cheaper) Kia a few months back.

*Names and even cars have been changed. I’ve learnt my lesson on using even relatively similar examples before.

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How much to save each day to retire with R10 Million

Teaching for moneyDear Investor Challenge,

I’d like to be rich one day. Properly rich, not just the “If you have a roof over your head and food in the fridge you’re richer than most of the world” rich, but actually very wealthy. A millionaire just won’t cut it, I’m aiming for a huge stash of cash. R10 million should do quite nicely.

I’m in Matric at the moment, and I have a part time job waiting tables on weekends. I make a fortune there, at least a couple of hundred a shift…

Next year I’m starting a teaching degree. I know it doesn’t pay well, but it really is what I want to do. The reasonable hours and long holidays are also going to be a bonus too.

So what are my chances of getting to R10 million with the totally shameful teachers salary I’m expecting to earn one day?

Teach to be

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The fantastically simple rule of 300

Dear Investor Challenge,Early retirement plan

This work thing can be a royal pain in the ass sometimes. People are supposed to listen to me, but I really get no respect. When I wanted to sign a new deal with the Russians, my accountant stopped me. He did the same thing when I asked him to fund my girlfriends travel company, now she’s all upset with me too. Then a couple of months back I was told that I’d have to pay for my swimming pool and farmyard, even after they were all promised to me as perks for a job well done, it’s totally ridiculous!

Now last week my three best friends decided to leave my business. I’m going to miss them so much, they were always so generous, and then just the other day, even the youngsters around here said they want me out. It just feels like everyone around here hates me. There’s really no reason for me to stay here anymore, which brings me to the point in this letter.

How much money do I need to have saved up and invested before I’m good to go? I really don’t want to come up short and have to try live on that measly excuse for a state pension we have.

Mr Anonymous

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The cheesecake powered cash printing machine

Giant cheesecakeI have a machine that prints money. It’s legal too, and operates on nothing more than cheesecake. That’s right, nothing but pure cheesecake. I have two others that operate on a combination of cheesecake and a teeny tiny amount of electricity. My brother has two of these, and I’m buying one for my wife now too so we can use ours together. These machines are really quite common, I’ve been trying to get Orca to buy one that would run on beer, since he often has a surplus of that 🙂

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7 Financial products so bad they should be an April fools joke!

The most useless sign everIt’s April fools day, but since I’m still upset that I fell for two of them (Heyneke Meyer returning as springbok coach and myBroadBand launching uncapped fibre for R99 a month) I thought I’d spare you any more stupid practical jokes.

Instead, I’m offering you an antidote to the madness. A kind of an unApril fools joke. I’m going to list out the top seven financial products so dumb, we should all be wishing they were practical jokes instead of reality. So let’s count them down:
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Only idiots still own Unit Trusts

Fund managers

Fund managers

OK hands up, who still owns unit trusts? My goodness there are a lot of you on that side of the screen. Unfortunately there’s one on this side of the screen too. And another in the family, hi mom! We’re all a bunch of idiots. Great big foolish money hating idiots. I’m a completely self taught idiot. Nobody does that anymore, we all use coaches and gurus called financial advisers to guide us into idiocy. Before I graduated to idiocy I only used to save and not invest, so I was a moron then. One day soon I plan to leave idiocy behind and move on to madness. Madness is the Cum Laude of intelligence.

So why is it that I’m calling us a um, what is the collective noun for idiots? If we were American I’d vote for a trump of idiots, but since we live in  Mzansi maybe it should be a malema of idiots, or perhaps a kraal of idiots. Back on track now, why do I think that ETFs are the holy grail and that unit trusts are the financial equivalent of a Kardashian? Well there are two main reasons I dislike unit trusts, and as someone who gets weird satisfaction in pointing out my current and former reasons for idiocy, I’m going to elaborate on both. Continue reading

It’s all about the timing… Or is it?

In August, my beautiful new wife and I eloped to Paris to have a combo wedding and honeymoon. It was just the two of us, so we didn’t have to worry about what colour the napkins should be. We also didn’t have to worry that mad uncle Eric would drink too much and try join the band, or that someone would knock over the ridiculously ostentatious wedding cake. I was also fairly confident that I wouldn’t end up in a runaway bride skit, because I’m not Richard Gere!

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Can you de-complicate personal finance?

Dear investor Challenge,

Why are your posts always so damn complicated. You keep posting numbers and graphs, but I’m not a numbers girl, unless of course you’re cute in which case my number is 555… Why don’t you come out with some financial advice for dummies like me? I want finance de-complicated.

The names Blonde, Jane Blonde.

Good call miss Blonde. You know, I think this whole industry is built around making people believe finances are only for accounting nerds, or worse, actuaries, but to be quite honest, there’s nothing complicated about it at all. In fact, I’m pretty certain that all the experts and snake oil salesman specifically designed it as a giant smoke screen to keep you thinking it’s complicated so they can keep their high paying jobs, six figure bonuses and holiday homes in Umhlanga, all thanks to the money they take from us while we’re not paying attention. Mark my words, the only interest the majority of financial product sales people have in your wealth, is in how much of it they can transfer to themselves as fees for a service probably badly rendered.

Ignore them. Everything you need to know is so simple anyone can take control of it. So here it is, the three most important rules of personal finance: Continue reading

Can you retire before 40?

I have a great job, but I'd rather be here...

I have a great job, but I’d rather be here…

It all comes down to how much money you need. If you can live on R178 500 a year, or R14 875 a month, then it’s easy. Need more than that? Well if you’re married, you can double that, and more than likely not double your costs. You should hopefully be sharing a room with your spouse, and even if you’re a massive snorer, renting a two bedroom house is still way cheaper than renting two one bedroom houses. Also you can most likely survive with one car post retirement. With all your new free time it would be a good time to start getting around by bicycle. That will also mean you’ll spend far less on health related items. Could you and your significant other live together on R357 000 a year or R29 750 a month? Well you should be able to, after all that’s far more than most South African households live on

So why did I pick those numbers? Continue reading