Episode Transcript
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Intro/Closing (00:03):
Welcome to the
Real Talk Retirement Show, where
we explore the financial sideof retirement and beyond.
Whether you're currentlyretired or planning for the
future, we offer real, relatableconversations about money and
personal finances.
Most importantly, we dive intoall these topics using Real Talk
.
Now, let's get real about yourmoney and your retirement.
(00:23):
Now, let's get real about yourmoney and your retirement.
Brian Graff (00:28):
Well, hello
everybody and welcome back to
another episode of the Real TalkRetirement Show.
We are Brian Graff and TracyBurke Happy to be with you again
today.
And you know everybody, there'sa lot of curiosity when it
comes to money.
You know, a lot of people thinkI wonder what others are doing
with their money, right, I mean,I think that's pretty common
(00:49):
and a natural thing for us allto wonder from time to time
what's everybody else doing?
And you know, tracy, wouldn'tit kind of be nice to sit down
with an ultra wealthy person and, you know, ask them how they
got where they are now, like,what did they do?
What were the keys to theirsuccess?
Or, on the flip side, maybeeven have a cup of coffee with
someone who's made some mistakesalong the way but came out okay
(01:10):
on the other side, to see whatthey did to make appropriate
adjustments.
Isn't that kind of somethingwe're all interested in
exploring?
Tracy Burke (01:16):
Yeah, absolutely
Brian, and we talk about keeping
up with the Joneses at pointsright, you want to sort of
benchmark how you're doing withothers, and so it is good to do
that, and most of the time Iwould say it's good to do it
right, because we can then thinkabout or learn what to do and
maybe what not to do, and we canalso always get new ideas and
(01:37):
new ways to look at it.
But the other thing we justhave to be really careful about
is, of course, everybody'ssituation is different, right,
the Joneses that live next doorto me.
They're a completely differentsituation than I am, so you
don't want to go too far downthat path.
But again, like you said, it'sgood to look at whether it's the
trends, but ultimately focus onwhat's best in your situation.
Brian Graff (02:00):
Yeah for sure,
tracy.
We at Conrad Siegel, we're justkind of curious about overall
how people are feeling abouttheir financial wellness and
their different financial habits, how that all might impact
their eventual retirementsavings.
So we're definitely curious.
So what we decided to do waslast year and I'll timestamp
that with 2024, in casesomebody's listening to this 10
(02:21):
years into the future.
But in 2024, we ran a surveyand heard from over 400
respondents of all ages.
Some people had just a littlebit of money saved for
retirement.
Other people had quite a goodchunk saved.
But across the board and we didfind some interesting trends
which we can really learn from.
And that's going to be kind ofthe theme of today's
(02:41):
conversation.
We're going to talk about allthose key points.
So, tracy, if you wouldn't mind, do you want to kick us off and
talk about our first key pointtoday?
Tracy Burke (02:49):
Yeah, Super excited
about today's episode in
particular, because when we takethese surveys or you hear all
these surveys I always sort ofdraw to them and try to get a
sense well, what's everybodyelse thinking about right from
that one everybody else thinkingabout right from that one.
So the first area that welooked at is really around
(03:11):
stress or anxiety around yourfinances, and, of course, many
of you are probably thinking,yeah, many of us go through a
lot of stress or anxiety when wethink about our own finances.
So that was one of the itemsthat this study looked at and
the results are, you know.
It found that 45% of therespondents said that their
finances caused anxiety and, asBrian, you just said, you know,
(03:36):
these are people with a lot ofmoney, people with less money,
people that are further along inlife and in retirement, people
that are still working, butalmost half of the people are
stressed, which probably isn't agood thing from that
perspective.
But even you know, taking astep further and maybe a little
bit more concerning 26% saidthat the financial stress
(04:00):
impacted their focus andproductivity of what they're
trying to do Now.
A couple episodes ago, we talkedabout how emotions impact money
and investing and, of course,stress is that big emotion that
really we're often hearing aboutand thinking through.
(04:22):
So, you know, can look at a lotof different ways from this
standpoint.
Right, Some people might bethinking, well, my goodness, how
am I going to afford rent or mymortgage this month, you know?
And others might be thinking,can I retire when I want to, or
am I going to be able to retire?
And then folks, you know, maybethat have more considerable
(04:44):
wealth.
Well, there's other stresseshow am I going to leave a legacy
, or how do I take care of myspouse or family, or whatever it
might be, when I'm gone?
So, again, it's really sort ofthat balance sometimes between
what now and later and how we'represerving investments and how
that retirement income is to begenerated.
But, again, stress is a factorthat a lot of people are going
(05:09):
to and the survey showed almosthalf of the respondents that
financial stress is making animpact in their life.
Brian Graff (05:17):
Yeah, that's a
pretty big number and whether,
like you just said, stress canmean something different for
everybody, I'm certainly notimmune to it.
I don't know about you, tracy,but we both have multiple kids
and you know, even when you feelreally good about your career
and your job, money is alwaysgoing to be an issue.
From time to time it'sunavoidable, but it's a big
number and you know, when wethink about stress it all ties
(05:39):
into again the term financialwellness.
I know it's a jargony term, butit's super popular in our
industry over the last 10 yearsor so.
When you think about financialwellness, it's just kind of our
way of saying how well are youliving today versus also being
prepared for the future?
How are you balancing that?
How are you juggling that?
How are you feeling about youroverall financial state?
(06:01):
So when we asked people in thissurvey you know how financially
well that they felt on a scaleof one to 10, the average score
we got was a 6.6.
Now, I know these scales arerelative and, tracy's, a six
might not sound bad to you,right?
Hey, that's above average, butto me, you know, if I rated my
wife's meatloaf a 6.6, I don'tthink she'd be too happy about
(06:23):
it.
It's not a number that givesyou the warm and fuzzies, right,
right.
So I think, regardless thosefirst two numbers, you know the
45% of people feeling anxietyaround their finances only about
6.6 out of 10 feelingfinancially well.
You know, people are stressedand the best, we're average.
We feel average.
(06:44):
So what can we do about that toget those numbers, your
financial wellness score, closerto like an eight or a nine or
even, one day, a 10?
What are some things we can do?
Tracy Burke (06:55):
Yeah, sure, and
some of these assumptions that
we had there.
We looked at the respondentsthat weren't stressed about
money and felt financially well,Of course, if that's the goal
of not being stressed, wethought let's break this apart
and figure out what are thefolks that are saying they're
not stressed, what are theydoing?
(07:15):
And this is sort of the itemsthat this study came out with.
So it's really four things.
The first one is that they hadan emergency savings, you know,
a backup plan.
Generally, we advise that folksshould have three to six months
of living expenses build up intheir emergency expense.
(07:37):
You know, emergency reserves,emergency savings, that rainy
day fund.
For some people in someprofessions maybe it should be
more than six months of expenses, but that three to six month
range and that just providesthat sort of peace of mind or
that feeling of, hey, I have acushion there in case something
happens, in case that emergencyhappens, right.
So that's the first one.
(07:58):
The second one is that theyhave an actual written budget,
something that they can go offof.
I would guess and this was nota survey question here, but I
would think that most people donot have a written budget in
many aspects of life.
Sometimes, as you get close toretirement, more people do it
(08:21):
just to get a sense of whattheir true expenses are.
But having that documented, awritten budget, is something,
that roadmap, a spending roadmap.
The third area, really in asimilar area, a documented
financial plan, something that'swritten down as well.
And here's the plan we're doing, whether that's with my
(08:45):
investment portfolio, whetherthat's my 401k or other
investments I might have.
It could also be in terms ofinsurance.
What is my plan for riskmanagement?
The types of insurances that Ineed could be, you know, or
certainly cash flow, all thosedifferent components, but having
some type of a financial planin place that you can follow
(09:07):
those people with you know thatthat did not indicate that they
had much financial stress, hadthose.
And in the fourth, one, more ofthe folks in this category also
work with a financial planner.
Now, a financial planner isprobably going to help you with
items one, two and three rightthere, right, Especially the
second and the third area.
The third area, in particular,that financial plan.
(09:29):
But that's some of the resultsthere that we saw in this study,
Brian, for folks that claimthey don't really have much
stress on their finances.
Brian Graff (09:39):
Sure, and I know
they sound.
Some of them might sound alittle bit obvious, tracy, but
they're important to keep inmind and they can be difficult
too.
So, like the emergency fund isa good example, a lot of people
that are living paycheck topaycheck.
They do the math on that.
I think three to six months, Imean, that's a that's a lot of
money to set aside.
But what we would say is youknow, start, just get started.
Even if you have to put in ahundred dollars in your
(09:59):
emergency fund this month andmaybe work your way up to 500 or
a thousand dollars, boy, won'tthat come in handy, you know, if
you have to get new tires onyour car rather than going to
that credit card.
So take baby steps with allthis stuff.
Maybe you start with a verybasic budget, just kind of a
quick spreadsheet of what youhave coming in in total, what
you have going out, and thenwork on a more detailed budget,
you know, as you find some timein your busy lives.
(10:21):
But get started with thosethings.
You'll benefit from it for sure.
And you know the bottom line isthat what the research told us
by looking at those surveyresults is that people that
really truly felt good abouttheir money and their financial
situation.
Like you said, tracy, they weredoing a lot of those things.
Yeah, yeah, what do you want totalk about next, tracy?
(10:42):
Is there anything else you wantto say to that point?
Tracy Burke (10:44):
Yeah, and I mean so
far we've talked about
financial stress and thenleading towards, you know, the
wellness and sort ofwell-rounded in terms of overall
financial planning.
But we are, brian, after all, ashow about retirement, right?
So let's talk about the actualretirement readiness aspect of
it.
So how did folks feel that theyare ready for their own
(11:08):
retirement?
Now, keep in mind again thatthis study had some folks in it
that were already retired andsome that had not yet retired.
But the great news with thisstudy, it sounds like people are
saving a good chunk of theirmoney, because right around half
of the people we talked to wereactually saving 11% or more of
(11:30):
their income into future savings, early retirement savings and
the best guidance that youalways hear is 10% to 15%.
That's what we often say save10% to 15%.
If you do that of your workingcareer income, saving 10% to 15%
(11:51):
of that income into retirement,you're probably on good track.
Now, that's assuming you'restarting earlier in your career
and not waiting to age 55 tostart it.
Of course, so there's differentdynamics there.
But, again, good news that halfof the respondents were saving
in that range.
So that's good, and you alsomight think that, well, a lot of
(12:13):
people are catching up as theyget older, right, as you get
closer.
Some people feel I'm a littlebit behind, so maybe now I'm
earning more in the later stagesof my career and that allows
them to do it.
But so we dug a little bitdeeper on that very, very
concept and we found that in allage groups there were similarly
(12:34):
high savings rates in terms ofthose working year folks.
So that's great as well, andalso a shout out to young people
, because that's where it counts.
If you can save when you'reyounger, that's only going to
help you as you get furtheralong.
Brian Graff (12:53):
Yeah, and if you
skipped episode number three I
believe it was was in thepodcast where we talked about
the miracle of compound interest, you younger savers, go back
and listen to episode numberthree, because there's some
pretty important numbers that weput out there for you.
Absolutely, just show howlittle bit can really turn into
a lot.
So, yeah, thanks, tracy.
Where it got really interesting, though even though people are
saving well, which we justtalked about doesn't necessarily
(13:15):
mean that they're overlyconfident about being able to
reach their retirement goals.
Because that's what we asked,and we asked people how
confident are you that you'll beable to retire comfortably?
And, surprisingly, 20% of therespondents said they weren't
confident at all.
So one in five just said nope,probably not going to happen.
I'm going to work till I die.
(13:35):
You know, I hear that, I heardthat phrase or that expression
all the time and 48% were onlysomewhat confident, meaning they
just weren't totally sure.
So you take those numberstogether over two thirds of the
people didn't feel really goodabout their ability to retire.
So I think the kind of the keyword here again is uncertainty,
(13:56):
and we talked about this inepisode number one, but one of
the most common questions we getthen is how do I know if I have
enough saved for retirement?
Not being able to kind of getthat in your brain, I think, is
what leads to the stress and theanxiety of just not feeling
sure.
So, tracy, maybe if we can justgo through a quick summary of
some of those recommendationsfrom episode number one, that
(14:17):
would be great.
Tracy Burke (14:18):
Yeah, and again you
have folks getting people
comfortable and confident intheir own retirement readiness
and so forth.
So, yeah, I'll start with someof the folks that are
pre-retiree area.
So these are some areas we'vetalked in previous episodes
about.
But again, figure out what yourretirement number is If you're
(14:40):
still working.
Figure out where you need to beright and that's that roadmap,
sort of roadmap to yourfinancial future and where you
need to be.
And we actually have in ourshow notes we're going to link
it again, but that was adocument that we put out there.
It's, I think, called aretirement roadmap or something
similar to that where you can gothrough and you can map out how
(15:02):
to get to that number, whatyour retirement number is.
The second thing is superimportant as well, brian.
It's figuring out what do youwant your retirement to look
like, and we talked about that,I think, earlier in this episode
.
It's not all about keeping upwith the Joneses, right,
everybody is different, and whatmy retirement might want to I
(15:23):
want it to look like might lookdifferent than yours or somebody
else's, and that's fine.
But having that thought throughand knowing what you want that
to be is super important.
So, yeah, brian.
I would say those are some ofthe key takeaways for
pre-retirees.
No-transcript.
Brian Graff (15:43):
Yeah well, we
talked just a few minutes ago
about the importance of havingthat financial plan, that
financial blueprint.
So don't just create that atage 55 or 60 and just you're
done.
You want to revisit thatfinancial plan every year for
the main reason of confirmingyou won't run out of money.
That's all of our goals to haveenough money to live a
comfortable retirement.
So you know, map all that out.
(16:04):
There's a lot of goodbenchmarks out there and
percentages and maybe withdrawalrates and things you can look
at, but one of the ones werecommend again, going back to
episode number one of the RealTalk Retirement Show, we talk
about kind of having like a 5%guardrail when it comes to your
withdrawal rates.
So it's definitely important tohave some numbers, work on a
plan, revisit that plan and,just again, make sure you won't
(16:27):
run out, because if you feellike you're heading in that
direction, what adjustments areyou going to have to make then
in your life to ensure that youstay on track?
We don't want anybody runningout of money.
Tracy, right, that's our-.
Tracy Burke (16:37):
I would agree with
that.
Brian Graff (16:39):
Right, and then to
go along with that.
You know.
Also, stop at some point onceyou're in retirement and say to
yourself am I living my idealretirement in a financial sense,
right, and in an emotionalsense too?
Is this what I thought it wasgoing to be?
And, like we said, it's nevertoo late to make adjustments,
pivot, contact an advisor, talkto somebody, go over what your
own goals are and find a way tomake that happen.
(16:59):
Okay, so always reevaluatewhere you are with things again
financially, which is our focus,and of course, emotionally as
well.
So that's just a little bit ofinformation or some guidelines
for pre-retirees and folksalready in retirement.
I think we can move on.
And this is a reallyinteresting area to me, tracy, I
(17:21):
think when we talk about thedifferent genders, right.
So can we talk a little bitabout the difference between?
Tracy Burke (17:25):
men and women when
we did the survey?
Yeah, when we did the survey.
Yeah, and let's stay infinancially speaking terms of
difference between men and women, because I know sometimes
you'll say some stuff that mightget you in trouble at home,
brian, so we'll try to keep thisinside the lines.
Brian Graff (17:36):
Good idea.
Yep, that sounds like a goodplan.
Tracy Burke (17:40):
So the good news is
, in this survey, when we were
looking at the genderdifferences there, it certainly
appears that, at least withinrespondents, that women are just
as likely to have positivefinancial habits as their male
counterpoints.
Some of those areas that welooked at before from a
budgeting standpoint, from anemergency savings from
(18:01):
retirement readiness that wasreally great to see that there's
you know, both seem to have.
There's no lag in one area orthe other.
Everybody's sort of inconjunction with that.
Brian Graff (18:14):
Yeah, not
surprising to me at all, tracy,
because, as we always say, womenare generally smarter than men
making better decisions.
Agreed, yeah, we're notsurprised at all to hear that,
but listen, if you don't want tohear about this from two guys.
Our colleague, catherine Azles,has started a community for
women specifically to talk aboutmoney, and she calls this
community in this newsletter.
She has purse-spectives, right,so a little play on words there
(18:37):
.
Think about a purse as ahandbag, so purse-spective.
I think that's really, reallyclever, and we're going to put a
link to that in our show notesas well.
So if you'd like to subscribeto Catherine's newsletter and
join that community, please doso, and I don't think she'd
frown on any of us men joiningas well too.
Just to you know, get some tipsfrom the smarter gender, as we
say.
So definitely check that outand subscribe.
Tracy Burke (18:59):
Yeah for sure.
No, that's fantastic.
So the one difference or thegap that we found and this, you
know, could be humorousdepending on how you look at it
a little bit but is inconfidence.
So you know, overall women wereless confident and sometimes, I
think you know us men tend tobe overconfident in a lot of
(19:20):
things.
My own wife tells me that quitefrequently, so you know that
just that's a sort of how Ithink some folks are wired.
But in this study it did sortof reflect that women were
generally less confident thanmen in their retirement
readiness and really overallability to manage finances.
So I know that's something thathere at Conrad Siegel we've
(19:43):
been having some initiativesabout and trying to increase
confidence for everybody, butespecially in that women
community.
And, like you said, you knowCatherine is doing some great
work at our firm in that area.
But you know, a couple otherthings that we've been trying to
put some emphasis on is, youknow, one is education, and we
think that that is really a keypart of it.
(20:04):
You know, when anybody feelsinformed you're more confident.
That's pretty clear.
So just trying to put yourselfin situations where you can
learn more about it is certainlygood.
The second area is thatcommunity and this really goes
along with that perspectivesgroup that Catherine leads.
(20:27):
It's just finding part of thecommunity and being around
people that you trust that youmight be taking, you know,
financial advice and and allthose things from uh, yes, it's
simple to google or now chat,gpt or whatever you want to do
to find information that's outthere or to ask questions or to
(20:47):
do some of your own research.
But of course, there's a lot ofarea of opinions that can be
out there and finding somebodythat you can trust on that area
is so important.
So just being around peoplethat you you know, that you
trust and talk about these typeof things, that can certainly be
a you know, certainly go a longway, brian.
Brian Graff (21:09):
For sure, Tracy.
Yeah, and, like you said, thosethings are great Google
searches, chat, GPT but there isnothing like that trusted
friend or family member havingthat cup of coffee and talking a
little bit about finances tothe extent you feel comfortable
with that person.
You just can't overemphasizehow important the human element
is for all this stuff.
So it's great to have somebodyon your side.
(21:30):
So I hope everybody enjoyedtoday's episode.
I think it's some reallyinteresting numbers out there.
And remember, it's great tolook at trends and what other
people are doing, For no otherreason, just to be able to say
you know what?
Ah, you know what.
I'm not alone.
I was worried about all thesethings, but so is everybody else
too.
But again, keep in mind we'vesaid it a couple of times
(21:51):
everyone is different and justbecause somebody is in one
certain situation, you know, itdoesn't mean you're going to be
negatively affected by thatsituation as well.
Tracy Burke (22:00):
Yeah, and Brian, I
would say, you know, if we can
share, as we always do, someaction items, there's really,
when we really tore apart thisstudy, there was four items that
came up, and these are fouritems that we've already talked
about a little bit today, butjust in the recap here uh,
people that felt better abouttheir financial future generally
(22:21):
had an emergency savings, youknow, in place.
We talked about that three tosix months, had some type of a
budget in mind, preferably a, awritten one, but at least some
type of a framework in terms ofhow they're spending their money
.
The third area is having afinancial plan.
To a large extent it does nothave to be a full-blown
(22:41):
financial plan, but you know, atleast thinking of all those key
areas under your financial hood, so to speak, and having a plan
in place.
And then the fourth one, as weshared earlier, is working with
a trusted financial planner,somebody that's a professional
in those areas.
I would assume that most peopledo have a medical professional,
(23:03):
a medical doctor, that they'regoing to, and maybe that's once
a year, hopefully for checkups,or obviously some folks that you
know from a health standpointmight need to have specialists
are going a little bit moreoften, but from your finances.
It's also good to work withthat professional and be working
with financial planner.
Brian Graff (23:21):
Yeah, great, great
advice.
And remember we're here to helpwith all this too.
That's what Tracy and I do, andour great team at Conrad Siegel
, so please always feel free toreach out to us with questions
or comments.
You can get a hold of us atpodcast at conradsegelcom.
We are here to help.
And please again, everybody, ifyou're enjoying our content we
(23:42):
really hope you are Please sharethe podcast with your friends,
with your family, and, if youreally liked it, please
subscribe and give us afive-star review and we'll keep
this little project going,because I know Tracy and I are
both having a great time doingit.
Tracy Burke (23:55):
Yeah.
Brian Graff (23:56):
All right.
Well, thanks everybody.
Until next time.
Good luck with your finances,and we're here to help.
Have a good one.
Intro/Closing (24:04):
Thank you for
tuning into today's show.
Thank you for tuning intotoday's show.
The Real Talk Retirement Showis created and produced by
Conrad Siegel, an advisory firmthat specializes in helping
people prepare for retirementand beyond.
If you want to learn more aboutour work or meet the team, you
can visit conradsegelcom.
Information on this show is foreducational purposes only and
(24:26):
should not be consideredpersonalized investment, tax or
legal advice.
Before making decisions, youshould consult with the
appropriate professionals foradvice that is specific to your
situation.