As I read more and more about the poor returns from the funds I also see more and more financial gurus rationalizing the losses on the funds and advising intelligent investors to hold on. Baby Boomers need to filter out some of these messages as they don’t apply to you.

It runs something like this. Investors have had 4 years of great returns so one bad year should not result in you taking you money out of the funds. (If you have lost much more than 10% on your risk-based assets like equity and property funds this is actually good advice I think - You’re stuck with your investments for now).

It implies that since the market has gone up in the long term it will soon recover and continue on in its merry way. They have no way of knowing this. Baby Boomers cannot rely on these sorts of statements when their retirement relies on the money they have saved in their nest egg.

It also implies that all fund contributors are investors. Baby Boomers are not investors any more once they have retired and are living off their nest egg. They are capital preservers first and foremost. If their funds make more than is needed to preserve capital that is a bonus. Chasing high returns is risky. The important thing is to avoid large losses because they will be too hard to recover from when taking a pension. Read the rest of this entry »

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From some of the emails and comments I have been getting it is plain to me I need to redefine what my blog is about.

This blog is all about how to protect your retirement nest egg if you have one when you are close to or actually in retirement. Rule #1 is avoid large losses in retirement. If you have many years to go then you should consider putting a bigger percentage of your nest egg into risk-based investments like equity funds or stocks once the market settles down again. This blog may not be of use to people far from retirement right now. Read the rest of this entry »

The most viewed post on this blog is the one I did on Should Baby Boomers Start an Internet Business in Retirement. I thought it was a good idea and said so. I didn’t expect it to be my highest rated post on this blog though.

So I thought I might write a Post on my experience so far with this blog and what I am hoping to achieve with it. It might help other Baby Boomers decide if they want to start their own blog.

I have spent some considerable time on the Internet over the last two years. I have purchased products for Pay Per Click Adwords Income generation, Affiliate Marketing, Leads generations and Adsense Web sites and Blogs. I have asked for refunds for about 50% of the things I purchased and apart from my first and only major disaster with Stores on Line which cost me about $14,000 I have always got a refund.

Despite my Stores On Line experience it whetted my appetite for the Internet as a place to develop a business. But I always wanted to do something I believed in passionately. So whilst they will tell you to do your keyword research and chose a niche which has reasonable traffic I chose for my first serious site Baby Boomers in Retirement. I’ll admit it is hard going but I believe in the message am trying to get across to other Baby Boomers about the need to protect their nest egg in retirement. (blatant plug here - So spread the word and tell your friends if you find my Blog of value). I am also enjoying writing my posts and researching stuff I would do for my own retirement investing anyway. Read the rest of this entry »

I have been working hard on the Blog for three months. I’ve written a 60 page eBook about some really important information Baby Boomers should know. I’ve just completed a 30 page report and a spreadsheet called “What if a Baby Boomer retired in 2000″. I also aim to write a post every day which I research beforehand as well as posting and buzzing social network sites to help get the word out there.

At present I am spending about 8-10 hours a day and sometimes more researching and writing posts for this blog. I love the research and writing and am really enjoying this work.

I am in semi retirement and have the time to do it too.

I can see I am getting more visitors each day but I would like some feedback on what you all think.

Am I wasting my time? Or do you find the information informative and relevant?

I am on a mission to make Baby Boomers aware that the $40B in US retirement funds alone is a major target for the Wealth Management Industry. There will be the largest transfer of wealth in the history of the world and much of it won’t be going to you or your kids, but someone else’s kids who happen to be financial planners. They just haven’t got their act together yet. When they do it will be a tsunami of marketing and many Baby Boomers will be taken in by it.

When I was young my father said he should have given me a guitar so I could become famous and make money. I should have given my kids a tennis racket each. But the next generation should all become financial planners if they want to get rich.

Comments and feedback are the lifeblood of Blogs and so I would ask you to give me some feedback and make a comment below. Let’s get some communication going so I can provide better information.

I want this blog to be totally focused on information about protecting our nest eggs in retirement. I’m trying to make it an authority for people to come to for information about where to get good financial planning advice when in retirement.

I’ll welcome guest blogger’s who want to submit posts. My only proviso is they are in concert with my main theme of protecting a nest egg in retirement. Even if you have never blogged before just email me what you want to say and I will post it under your name on my Blog.

Any help you can give me would be appreciated.

Thank you.

David Bates

We Baby Boomer need a list of Financial Planners who genuinely want to help us protect our Nest Egg in retirement, avoid large losses and make it last as long as we do.

In my research on how to protect my nest egg in retirement I have come across three so far that I believe are moving in the right direction or have systems in place now that are designed to protect my nest egg.

Each take a very different approach,but all display a genuine aim to help us protect our retirement nest eggs and all have a system they use or promote to manage our nest eggs.

They are all financial planners but they are independent thinkers and are not mutual fund sales people masquerading as financial planners.

Read the rest of this entry »

Employing a Financial Planner to manage your Mutual Funds can result in poorer investment returns than if you had chosen the Mutual Funds yourself a recent study shows.

This came from a detailed study written in October 2007, “Assessing the Costs and Benefits of Brokers in the Mutual Fund Industry” and written by Daniel Bergstresser of Harvard Business School, John Chalmers of the University of Oregon, and Peter Tufano of Harvard Business School. You can click on the title above and download the 36 page report for free. It is actually quite readable Here is their closing paragraph which makes for sobering reading if you use a financial planner and do not direct them in managing your nest egg. They state:

“In summary, we find a reasonably clear pattern of results. We find that the brokered channel sells funds with inferior pre-distribution-fee returns. The channel does not show any evidence of superior aggregate market timing ability, and shows the same return-chasing behavior as observed among direct channel funds. Finally, more sales are directed to funds whose distribution fees are richer. This work leaves us with the puzzle of why investors continue to purchase funds that appear to be no better at substantially higher costs. The answer could be that we, as researchers, failed to measure important intangible benefits, or that consumers of brokers fail to consider the costs and benefits of this relationship.”

What is significant about this study is: Read the rest of this entry »