Capital Advisor » Finance

Marriage and Finances: Me or the World?

Vinaya HS — Thu, 09 Sep 2010 18:30:10 +0000

If D, through her finances, can help someone truly in need or make someone happy, she will go out of her way (including entirely dropping her own financial plans) and do her bit. Her philosophy is that if your money can make your present a better world (qualitatively, not quantitatively), then that’s where you should channel your money.

I, on the other hand, have a plan for each and every rupee in my finances. My plan first and then the world.

It goes without saying that our perspectives have clashed at times. Which one’s right? Which one’s wrong? Is there a middle ground? I think there’s no definite answer to these questions because our individual perspectives are a direct result of our individual experiences and beliefs.

What do you think?

Further reading:

Investment Strategies: Saving For My Next Car — How Should I Go About Doing It?

Vinaya HS — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 18:30:36 +0000

In suggesting how to save for your next car after clearing the loan on the present one, I only outlined a broad strategy without suggesting a specific financial instrument. Now that I have cleared the loan on my Swift, it’s time to adopt my own advice. But I’m not able to arrive at a decision on what financial instrument do I choose? Thought I’d ask for your help.

Here are the specifics.

I’ll be able to set aside anywhere between Rs 5,000 to Rs 10,000 each month. I want to change my car in about 4 years from now (and hence it’s kind of a medium- to long-term goal for me). I plan to buy a car that falls within the accumulated corpus plus the trade-in value of my Swift.

In what financial instrument should I save/invest?

Further reading:

Tweets on 2010-09-08 — Income vs Expenses

Vinaya HS — Tue, 07 Sep 2010 18:30:59 +0000

Further reading:

Tweets on 2010-09-07

Vinaya HS — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 18:30:09 +0000

A reader asks,

What should one do if one has repaid all debts, owns a home, leads a simple life (no cars, clubs, or expensive holidays), is sitting on a pile of cash (most of it in fixed deposits) and has no continuous stream of income except for paycheck. Is this person very close to financial independence? Any thoughts?

Brilliant. You’ve ticked most points in this checklist.

But have you covered the other basics — health insurance and life insurance? And will the monthly after-tax interest earned from your fixed deposits be adequate to meet your monthly expenses on a continuous basis? If not, you aren’t.

What do you think?

Ask the Readers: Compulsory Medical Check-ups Prior To Buying Insurance

Vinaya HS — Sun, 05 Sep 2010 18:30:29 +0000

A comment on this post caught my attention. Why shouldn’t a medical check-up be mandated prior to buying health or life insurance? What do you think?

Further reading:

Tweets on 2010-09-05

Vinaya HS — Sat, 04 Sep 2010 18:30:45 +0000

The last thing you want to happen early on in your working career is to rack up debt. The debt will just prevent you from moving on with your life.

Source: bit.ly/cwGcII

I am a case study. If I hadn’t made that mistake, I’d be many steps closer to financial independence today.

Further reading:

Marriage and Finances: Health Insurance — How We’ve Gone About It

Vinaya HS — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 18:30:30 +0000

As a family, we need health insurance coverage for myself, D, and D’s parents. Through my job, I have health insurance coverage for both D and myself. Through her job, D has health insurance coverage for herself and her parents — I could have added my name too, but didn’t see the need to.

In addition, I recently bought individual health insurance covers for both D and myself (Star Health’s Medi-Classic policy). I’m also planning on buying individual health insurance covers for D’s parents (looking at the market trend, a job might not always guarantee health insurance benefits for parents).

Ideally, we should have gone for a family-floater cover, but none of the policies I researched were worth buying (really low cover, too many exclusions, and too many terms and conditions) and hence this approach.

How have you gone about procuring health insurance for your family? I’d like to know.

Further reading:

Investment Strategies: Modeling A Retirement Portfolio

Vinaya HS — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 18:30:39 +0000

If you have Rs 20,000 to invest each month towards building a retirement corpus, how does this portfolio sound for a retirement that’s twenty years away?

Rs 10,000 in HDFC Top 200 Fund (Growth)
Rs 5,000 in HDFC Prudence Fund (Growth)
Rs 5,000 in HDFC Monthly Income Plan Long Term Plan (Growth)

What changes would you suggest?

Note: There is an overlap in the equity-investing style between the HDFC Top 200 Fund and the HDFC Monthly Income Plan Long Term Plan since both invest in large-cap growth stocks.

Further reading:

Tweets (Again!) on 2010-09-01

Vinaya HS — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 04:00:00 +0000

A major upgrade of the software powering this blog and an unexpected server outage had me on my toes since yesterday evening. #
Upgraded to WordPress 3.0.1. #
Upgraded to Thesis 1.8. #
You can now ask to be notified by email whenever there's a comment on a particular post. Ashutosh, I finally got around to fixing this. :-) #

Further reading:

Tweets on 2010-09-01 — The Meaning of Being Debt Free

Vinaya HS — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 18:30:09 +0000

For the past year and a half, the first day of each month saw me watch yet another EMI draining my cash flow. Today’s the first of the month and it’s different today because I chose to be debt free.

And what does it really mean to be debt free?

I could’nt have answered better.

Three cheers to an EMI-free life.

Further reading: