7 Realistic Strategies for Retirement

Don't let financial experts scare you. It's in their interest to persuade you to save more money than you really need and hand over your nest egg for them to handle. Then they can skim off 1 or 2 percent as a profit every year.

Do you need 100 percent of your pre-retirement income to retire? That may be an option for corporate executives who leave work with golden parachutes. But it's not realistic for most of us, nor need it be. You can retire on a lot less, and most of us do. As a recent retiree told me, "I have half the income. But I also have half the stress, and I'm twice as happy."
Here are seven ideas to help you put together a strategy for retirement:
1. Assess where you stand. Count up your assets. As a benchmark, Fidelity Investments reports that with the past year's stock market increase, the average pre-retiree now has a balance of $250,000 in a retirement plan. If you have a pension, it's probably worth more than that. Then look at your debts. Is your mortgage paid off, or nearly so? Now is not the time to take on new debt. If you need to get a big loan to buy a new car, keep the old one and fix it up instead.

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2. Downsize your housing. Some people hang on to their old suburban home in case the kids want to move back in. But this is a "what if," while the expense of carrying a home is a certainty. If your retirement budget is limited, then move to a smaller place in a less-expensive neighborhood, with lower taxes and less maintenance. Don't put off the move because the real estate market is shaky. You may sell your old home for less, but you will also pay less for a new place.
3. Don't subsidize your kids' lifestyles. The old saying tells us to give our children roots and wings: Roots to know where home is and wings to fly away. It may be hard to say no to your children. But it doesn't really help anyone to let them settle into their old bedroom after college. They need to find their own apartment, cook their own food and learn to live on their own. If you do decide a child can live at home, make them pay rent and share other costs. It's only fair to both you and your other children.
4. Share and share alike. An alternative to having your kids move in with you is to move in with your kids. Then you should pay rent, but it's less expensive than carrying your own place. If you're single, consider sharing a home with a friend or sibling. Two can certainly live cheaper than one. Maybe you can also share a computer, TV or car. Living with someone offers companionship as well.
5. Go international. At the other end of the spectrum, some people have pulled up stakes and moved to another country. There are retirement enclaves in Latin America, from Mexico to Costa Rica to Ecuador. Some Americans retire to the land of their grandparents, in Italy or Ireland, where they enjoy support from family members. Some people tout the attractions of Malaysia and Thailand. These countries are relatively safe, the cost of living is low and local people respect the elderly. Retiring overseas requires a lot of research, but it's an option more people are considering.
6. Search out free entertainment. If you want to live in London or cruise the Mediterranean, you'll need 100 percent of your pre-retirement income. But most people don't do that. Your own hometown offers low-cost entertainment options, from summer concerts to fall festivals to senior exercise classes in the winter. Check out the library for free seminars, book clubs, movies and lectures. Your church, veterans association or social club can provide many rewarding activities for your leisure time, all at little or no cost.
7. Take advantage of senior citizen discounts. Join AARP for discounts as well as supplemental medical insurance. Drive over to town hall and find out about real estate tax breaks, as well as other senior citizen discounts. While you're there, check out senior programs like free transportation, low-cost meals and health and medical services. Many municipalities offer programs that are underutilized simply because people don't know about them, or are too embarrassed to ask. But let's get real. The services are available, so take advantage of them.

5 Financial Disasters to Avoid

A comfortable retirement without money worries is a goal everyone strives for sooner or later. But even if you don't quite have the motivation to save aggressively for retirement yet, do yourself a favor and don't damage your path to financial independence too severely. Here are a few disasters you need to avoid, which will make your life much easier when you are interested in preparing for your future:

Marrying a spendthrift. Marrying a spendthrift is a big no-no if you ever want to amass a solid nest egg. It's incredibly difficult, if not impossible, to save enough for a comfortable retirement unless both you and your significant other are on the same page. In fact, money problems always rank high in the reasons why people get divorced.
Getting into credit card debt. Don't swipe your credit cards without thinking it through. Credit card debt can creep up on you, and before you know it you will amass a huge balance. A purchase here, a swipe there and you'll be paying so much interest you'll need to work significantly more to achieve the same goal one day. That's why even credit cards with 0 percent interest for over a year can be dangerous. Many people end up racking up a huge balance they cannot pay off, which results in even more credit card debt when the rates reset higher.
Failing to develop a savings habit. You may not feel like saving aggressively, but at least put something away. Even a dollar every paycheck is a good start. If you have a 401(k) at work, strongly consider taking full advantage of the match. Also consider tucking some after-tax dollars into a Roth IRA to get some tax-free growth. Eventually, you'll want to increase your savings, and it's much easier to increase the amount later than to start a completely new habit.
Worrying too much about others. There's always going to be an urge to keep up with appearances, but all you're really doing with those purchases is strengthening your chain to your job. The worst side affect of increased consumption is that lowering it back down once you get used to it is much harder. The choice is yours: Would you rather buy more stuff or have the freedom to choose who you work for and when you need to work?
Having no idea where the paycheck went each month. Many people don't track how much they spend, but it's easy to cut out expenses that add no value to your life when you know where each dollar is going. And even if you don't want to put it all in savings, you can spend more on areas that actually make you happy. When you are less stressed you could become more productive at work and end up making more money, a bonus that keeps on giving

Best Activities to Outsource in Your Small Business

Rather than wear every hat -- every single day -- small business owners need to think about regular activities that can be outsourced or subcontracted out. When you can get assistance with tasks you are probably not skilled at anyway, you will have more time for higher level activities like business development and project management. Great leaders know it is more productive to outsource work that is not revenue generating, but essential to business operations. Since time is such a prized commodity when running a small business, it is smart to leverage the talents of others rather than trying to do it all by yourself. Here are some of the best activities to outsource in your small business.
Subcontract Your Marketing Efforts: Marketing is the fuel of a small business. Your marketing efforts tie directly to your sales results. So if you are too busy working the business you already have to focus on closing the next sale, you need some help. Outsource your marketing efforts to a consultant or public relations specialist for your small business. Some marketing people will help you develop downloadable content for your website, conduct email marketing campaigns. Some will focus on reaching out to LinkedIn contacts; they can handle direct inquiries or pitch you for speaking opportunities. They can also develop media pitches and monitor HARO for media opportunities.
Subcontract Your Payroll: Unless you run an accounting firm, you should not be doing your own payroll. Listen, you can get in trouble faster with the IRS for not paying your payroll taxes properly than not paying personal income taxes. If you hire an outsourcing company to do your payroll, then you can rest assured that you and your staff will have no issue when income tax season rolls around at the beginning of each year. If you do the payroll in-house, then you need to stay on the top of rules for federal, state and local tax laws that often change. The fees to outsource payroll are not very expensive, so do yourself a favor, let a payroll service handle the deductions for withholding, social security, unemployment and worker's compensation. You can't afford to make a mistake.
Subcontract Your Social Media Marketing: There are plenty of solopreneur marketing consultants and social media marketing agencies that can handle developing your social media strategy, content development and social promotion for your company. When you perform these tasks in-house, you often fail to retain the consistency of doing them. Leverage the services of a 1099 consultant to handle this for you. I am pretty sure, if you hire the right person or firm, and give them a specific niche focus and strong message about your product or service, your marketing efforts will flourish over time. Just remember that social media is a long-term strategy, so be prepared to invest 12-24 months to achieve your goals.
Subcontract Your Bookkeeping: Bookkeeping is the number one task in small business that owners routinely neglect and struggle with managing in their operations. Do not let this happen to your small business. By the 15th of the month, you need to know how well your business did last month so you can make any adjustments. By outsourcing your basic accounting services to a seasoned bookkeeper, you will have the ability to use updated financial information to run your small business. A bookkeeper can do your accounting work a lot faster and more accurately than you can, and it is affordable. Ask your tax preparer or another entrepreneur for a referral to the right provider. Stop getting your accounting done for the year at tax time; outsource your bookkeeping services today.
Subcontract Your Administrative Support: Do you often feel like you wish you had another pair of hands to help you in your small business? Utilizing virtual assistants is a cost-effective way to get routine tasks handled in a business. You can use a virtual assistant for maintaining your personal schedule, database, preparing mailings, email newsletters, copy editing, blog maintenance, booking travel arrangements, invoicing, collections and voicemail and email management. You can even leverage a niche-focused virtual assistant to do bookkeeping and receipt management. I have used Twitter and LinkedIn to search for qualified virtual assistants to support my small business.
No need to waste so much effort on being all things and more in your small business. Even if you only subcontract one or two of these tasks, the results will be tangible in short order. Be smart and choose reputable and recommended contractors. Do not sign any long-term contracts right away. Start with a one-to-three-month project. By outsourcing some non-core activities, you will have greater peace of mind as you help your small business grow!
What activities do you outsource in your small business?

This article was originally published here, under the title, "Top 5 Tasks to Outsource in Your Small Business."
Melinda F. Emerson, known to many as SmallBizLady, is America's #1 small business expert. As CEO of Quintessence Multimedia, Melinda educates entrepreneurs and Fortune 500 companies on subjects including small business startup, business development and social media marketing to fulfill her mission to end small business failure. She writes a weekly column on social media for The New York Times. Forbes Magazine named her #1 woman for entrepreneurs to follow on Twitter. She hosts #SmallBizChat Wednesdays on Twitter 8-9 p.m. ET for emerging entrepreneurs. She also publishes a resource site Melinda is also the bestselling author of Become Your Own Boss in 12 months; A Month-by-Month Guide to a Business That Works and the ebook: How To Become A Social Media Ninja; 101 Ways to Dominate Your Competition Online.

 

The Challenge for Women Entrepreneurs

You don't have to be a woman entrepreneur to know the challenges of money! But, women entrepreneurs learn early-on that their former educational experience with money may not be enough when it comes to launching, operating and growing a small business. Money problems can start early, fester and eventually become the downfall for even the savviest of women in business.
However, money problems are really the easiest of all small business problems to solve if you follow some very simple rules.
First, every entrepreneur must know how much (s)he will need for startup costs to get the business going -- and then add a cushion of at least three months to make sure there is time to collect revenues so there is cash flow.
Cash flow is a simple concept that indicates the movement of money into and out of a business. Every entrepreneur understands the need for money to be spent to launch a business, but too often (s)he has not carefully calculated the time it takes for the income to flow back into the business. Understand -- until the business has cash flow there is NO business!
Second, every entrepreneur must know the answer to this question, "Do you know where your money is?"
I ask this question of every woman entrepreneur I work with and most don't really understand that the money spent on operating the business has not gone up in smoke -- or at least, we both pray, that it hasn't.
So, where is the money of the small business owner? Look around your business. You'll see equipment, software, customer databases, inventory, key employees, brand recognition and hopefully, some receivables. All of these things are valuable assets in your small business. All of these things are actually money in disguise. Never underestimate the value of what you have built in your small business if you have invested in it wisely. Many of these assets can be leveraged to infuse money into your business. This is exactly why where you spend your money is so important. If you are not spending it on building assets then it truly will go up in smoke!
Third, although the current economic climate is lagging, there is plenty of money around for small business owners who have a feasible plan to make money. Your first place to find money is always friends and family. If your friends and family don't believe in you, who will? Next in line is to network in your industry and see where others have found investors. Again, if you truly have a business than can scale, there are people ready, willing and able to fund you. But, you won't find them sitting behind your computer and complaining about the lack of funding for women entrepreneurs. They invest in people and businesses that are hungry and aggressively motivated to win.
And, if you have spent your startup money wisely on building assets there are financial institutions that will provide you leverage for the next stage of your business. Once again, this requires you to actively investigate the opportunities available to you using every asset you have both personally and professionally if necessary to get the infusion of funds you need to keep growing.
Finally, if you own a small business you MUST understand your financials. I believe that it is a myth that women are less savvy then men when it comes to handling money. But, the myth lives on because women don't squash it every chance we get when it comes to knowing how our business operates financially. Many small businesses have a bookkeeper take care of the daily, weekly or monthly income and expenses of the business. But, this is not an excuse to not take the time to comprehend your business' feasibility for financial success.
As a business coach, I know that too many entrepreneurs are afraid to acknowledge how close to the edge the business runs financially. It is my job to assure them that their business is no different than any other and that is why we keep such a close eye on what is working and what isn't.
I believe that cash is king in every small business! But, what that truly means is that at the end of the month ,the business has more income than expenses. And, why do I say that this is simple? Because if the entrepreneur knows where every dollar of expense must go, (s)he also knows that with growth revenues will outpace expenses. (This is where the entrepreneur can see the value of a business plan).
Small businesses, just like the people that operate them, have natural cycles -- maybe even seasons. Entrepreneurs need to learn to plan for business cycles. Sometimes expenses will be up when revenues are down. But, financial planning will always get you through the down times.
So, women entrepreneurs everywhere stop paying attention to all the negative press about your lack of funding opportunities and banking relationships. What investors and banks want are small business people who know how to monetize ideas and grow businesses. The more the business grows and the more money you make, the more cash flows in their direction.
Cash may be king, but it is a woman entrepreneur that is queen.