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How a Singapore couple juggles having $2 million retirement goal and letting a spouse stay at home

In last week’s post, we explore the math and the possibilities in using a privileged higher than above starting income, together with you and your spouse’s most productive earning years to put more into building wealth first, so that you have the option to put less into it to focus on other areas in life. (you can read it here)

One of my readers was gracious enough to share his experience.

I am sure all of us are juggling between ensuring we save enough, have enough to spend, bring up our kids and living a good life. So does my reader.

This is not an account of some above average income guy or gal with not much dependents who can sock away a huge amount of their income to reach financial independence.

This is an example of a family struggling to make tough choices, trying to fulfil many life goals in Singapore like many in their position. I am sure we want to reach a state of financial independence but also raise 2 children and have one spouse stay at home.

How does one family attempts to plan for it?

Where they are now and where they would like to get to

My reader and his wife is 36 years old, which is not far from my age. He currently works as an business analyst in the finance sector. They have 2 kids who are 6 and 4 years old respectively. So this would mean the wife gave birth to the first child at 30 years old and 32 years old.

They separate their wealth building just like a lot of couples do, she doing her own saving and he does his own investing.

He starting being serious about financial planning at the age of 30 years old when his first child was about to be born.

His current portfolio is $200,000 and his wife’s $220,000. His wealth building style is more income yield focused, with a target of 5% return per annum.

The target for both portfolio at age 40 is to hit $300,000 in value each.

This does not sound very unachievable until you realize that their plan is for the wife to quit working next year.

So this would mean that the portfolios will have to grow by 5% dividend contributions alone.

The eventual goal is to reach $1,000,000 EACH at age 65 years old, which is 29 years away.

How much they put into wealth building

Rather than the example that I provided of above average middle income earners, my reader and the wife started off with the income of typical university graduates. However, they climbed well along the way to achieve above middle income wages.

It is useless if you earn more but cannot put them away as wealth.

His savings rate is around 30% of earned income and for her 20%.

Planning considerations for wife to stop working

My reader and his wife’s decision to allow one spouse to stop working do not come lightly. 

They felt that a stay at home spouse can provide better care, education and attention to the children. They hope that this will push a better education for their kids, in the hope that they are good at their studies and have a better local university education.

In his mail he have articulate the following considerations, together with the wife’s plan to stop working:

  • His own salary have to cover all their expenses except traveling
  • Building a bigger emergency fund
  • Increase death insurance for himself, and critical illness for the spouse
  • Ensure hospitalization insurance for all
  • Taking care of education savings

Their planning struggles and coming to terms with life choices

They didn’t get to this point without conflicts.

I felt he is lucky in that his wife’s views on money, in a large part, is in alignment with his. So she is able to save on her own. Why this is big is that, research seem to have shown that, for some reason, couples with differing money values attract to each other.

His initial plan was to lean towards a age 50 semi-retirement. Then he would take a lower income.

That plan was conflicted when his wife brought up the idea of staying at home 2 years ago.

He was quite against this idea because that would mean all the burden will fall on his shoulders. 

A bigger worry would be that they might not be able to retire comfortably.

At this stage, he felt that the wife did not consider fully the ramifications of one spouse staying at home.

Her wife would also have to overcome her insecurities of changing from an above average income earner to one taking an allowance.

Submitting the ‘Proposal’ to the Wife

At this point, I was rather impressed by my readers planning. That wasn’t in question. However, turning his planning into a form of persuasion to make tweaks to their spending and lifestyle leaves me dumbfounded.

Even before at the early stage of planning, he has already plan for his family and parents in the event of his demised. The death cover and his investments should be able to last his family of 3 until they graduate from university.

For the parents, it will be an allowance to them for the rest of their income with other siblings contribution in mind.

Amongst his proposal to the wife:

  • Increased her death coverage and provided early critical illness of 200k for her
  • Calculate all spendings that he will take over and project new expenses in the next 10 years after she stop working
  • Run projections of how much longer they both need to work if one partner stop working to reach their eventual retirement target
  • Increase their emergency fund (6 months) based on a sole provider expenses (from $20,000 to $32,000)
  • Try to reduce ways of doing household chores for her like buying a dryer. This is so that she is not treated as a stay at home maid.
  • Allocating more money to investing
  • Thinking of ways to make use of emergency and opportunity funds to grow more funds, such as the opening of a 360 account
  • For all necessities, make sure that they are getting the best rebates for their credit card
  • Make sure that his income can cover the housing loan on his own. They have around 6.5 years  left because they paid off using a fair bit of their CPF Ordinary Account
  • Cutting discretionary spending such as restaurants, yet still have joyful experience with children art and craft and DIY stuff
  • Trying to find a better job, even if it means working his ass off
  • Constantly trying to improve his investment skills

After all this, I present them to my wife. I figured we need to have the same mind-set and set the objectives for this plan. We are doing this so that she can raise the kids, educate them and ensure their study foundation years are strong. I also got to tell her the sacrifices that we will make. While running through all the projections, she can feedback if anything is missed out.

We will work for another 15 years longer and cannot take a breather to change to a less demanding job. She can only take a break of 10 years after which she has to re-join the workforce. She has to plan for the kind of work she can take on after that. We can’t travel as frequently as we do now. We have 1 short and 1 long vacation every year, this has to go. We should be grateful if I can cough up a long vacation every other year.

My reader mentions that when they are able to see that taking these possible steps can match up to their immediate values better, she is more participative in the financial planning.

My advice to them

After the planning work that my reader has done, there really isn’t much I can value add. For sure there is a question of whether $1 million each is enough, whether 5% per annum is a conservative estimate, those are up in the air.

As long as he chose to continue to home his competency in his wealth building method, making good decisions, financial independence knowledge, insurance protection, sustainable living, I am sure he would find his own answers.

If it is easier to ease in, perhaps taking one year simulating living on one person’s income, while the wife is still working would be good. This will be like an adjustment year to see if financially it does work out like the actual plan.

The benefits is that money wise, you get 2 times the boost. The wife is not living off the husband’s income for one year, while she is contributing for one more year.

This amount will add on to the emergency fund or wealth building fund to enhance their goals and safety.

Good Lessons to be Learnt

I wish I get more accounts like this but in reality these are the rare few examples showing really competent DIY Life Planning.

I felt that if I were to deconstruct, these are the key take away:

  1. It helps to be equipped with knowledge, reflect upon them and be innovative in planning various scenarios. When plans do not work or change, adjust accordingly
  2. Don’t have too much excuses. If you don’t think and reflect and write them out, the dream will remain a dream.
  3. If you love your spouse, perhaps the geeky love is to show them that you have plan for them even when you are no longer around
  4. The most important aspect of my reader here is his ability to build a system of continual learning, reflecting and creating sound systems
  5. Communication between spouses is important, and sometimes what works in the office can be a good tool to be use at home for communication as well
  6. While DIY Wealth Building, Management and Insurance Protection is challenging, my reader’s example shows that they can pick up the skills to execute competently in a relatively sound manner
  7. In wealth building, conservatively work out the average rate of return achievable, how much you can put into your wealth machine and set various milestones at various age. The more small wins you achieve at various milestones makes you stick to the system, and enhance your confidence in your wealth building strategy
  8. Couples usually get doubly more serious about financial planning when they have a child
  9. Its rare to find folks that pool their money together and allocate accordingly. Most chose to separate your money and her money

I have to thank my reader for allowing me to share, so that every one can learn from his family’s experience. Let me know what you think.

If you have unique financial independence or lifestyle planning questions that you would love to hear what I think, you can write to me at [email protected].

Here are some of the through-provoking, financial planning questions or case studies readers have asked me and I have done a deeper dive on. They may trigger some reflections about your own financial situations and help you live a better life:

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Kyith

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Sebastian

Sunday 5th of February 2017

Hi

Wondering if I can have some feedback on AIA GEN3 saving plan and GE Family 3 plan

Kyith

Wednesday 8th of February 2017

hi Sebastian, I do not purchase these products. What sort of feedback are you looking for? They can be wide ranging. It seems these are legacy planning savings products.

Tinychopsticks

Monday 14th of December 2015

It is really commendable that at 36 yrs old this couple have figured out their family financial plans. My husband and I are in our late 40s and we only started to understand this a few years ago. So kudos to them.

We have 2 teenagers. When they were little ( and we were in our 30s like this couple ), it was a struggle to attend to them and have a full time job at the same time. Having domestic helper, childcare / student care helped, but it was still a stressful period. Now that they are late teens, it is really much easier.

Looking after young kids is a full time job. To also have to work is really a double burden. Guys should try doing it themselves before suggesting the wife takes on a part time/ full time job while looking after young kids. It is very possible when the kids are older teenagers.

Being retrenched is very common in Singapore. My friend's husband was retrenched twice, and herself once. So having an emergency fund is absolutely important.

This couple's goal is very achievable. The husband's income is likely to rise as he gets more senior. Controlling expenses and expectations would be key. Best wishes to them.

Kyith

Tuesday 15th of December 2015

Hi Tinychopsticks,

thanks for the sharing. Being single, I would never have say i fully understand how much it takes, but as i grow older and have more peers with children, I understand why the lament that a lot of the wives wanted to stop working.One of these will get you down,and the stress level will be much higher. I am not sure about retrenchment since its not very prevalent on the 25-35 level from what i experienced ( i admit this is not a good reflection). Is it more prevalent when we are in our mid to late 40s?

Best regards,

Kyith

HS

Wednesday 3rd of June 2015

Alternatively, the wife can consider to arrange to work on part time basis in the current company. When are children have grown up or in secondary school, she can go back to full time. My wife did that for my elder child for 5 yrs before moving back to full time. Few of my close friends did that too. But can be challenging for wife while pay cut 50% but not the work load.

Kyith

Thursday 4th of June 2015

Hs,

Thanks for sharing ! I always thought its challenging but doable. My previous project manager and now department Head is like this. She stayed home to tend to the kids and when they are bigger get back to work. When she came I knew she is too qualified. Taught me much stuff and a top performer will always be recognized.

But I fear not everyplace give equal footing

Do u know what jobs stay at home mom usually do?

DS

Tuesday 2nd of June 2015

i must say, 36 yrs old with 2 kids with a joint commitment, i think it is highly commendable and not heard of in most families. but i think Mr LP is right to commend on the risks, the wife shouldnt stop working all together.

Kyith

Tuesday 2nd of June 2015

Thanks DS, u seem to indicate this joint commitment is a rarity.

LP

Monday 1st of June 2015

I'll be worried about the risk involved in having one person earning all the income for the family. Usually we can take 1 or 2 hits, if the hits did not come together. We downplay the risk of having all the possible risks coming together ALL AT ONCE, no matter how independent the events seem to be. A totally foreseeable event could be a massive crash in the economy, triggered once again by the finance sector, so the sole breadwinner will lose his job, his passive income from investments will take a hit in both capital wise and income wise, and one of his close relatives/family are sick. Can he take that multiple-prong hit?

Not saying it can't be done, but it will involve some sacrifices. Can't have your cake and eat it too, I guess.

Kyith

Tuesday 2nd of June 2015

Does that mean in the past when our parents can be sole breadwinner is because the stakes were lower or that its easier to find back a job?

Jomel

Tuesday 2nd of June 2015

Dear LP

There is a psychological phenomenon called negativity bias, which one example is that we can think of negative events happening more easily than positive ones (and that's the mechanism which insurance companies strive on). The chances of what you proposed happening is maybe about 1%?? Hence let's not think negatively about this family, especially when they appear to have thought carefully, and have taken necessary steps to increase their emergency funds.

There are many intangible and also possibly tangible benefits of a sole breadwinner family i.e. more attention can be spent on the children's daily needs, studies and well-being, and also on the husband when the wife learns to cook dishes and the family spends cosy dinner time together at home can far outweigh the sacrifices made by both parents, and the reduction in family saving rates. Money is not the most important commodity in life; family, love, and time are.

On a side note, I am surprised that after two days of this post, there is only one comment. It shows that the vocal readers of this blog seem to be eligible bachelors or are not having children yet.

I do not have much comments on the actions of this family, but their decision to be a sole breadwinner family is completely justified, especially since one of their children is entering primary school soon. I will just add a suggestion that there are many jobs out there for stay-at-home mums, and if the mother has time to spare, why not considering these jobs e.g. translation, teaching tuition (in your own home) etc.

Jomel

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