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I haven't read the entire thread and someone may have said this already, but we Americans like to put people in their "box" so to speak. Where did you go to school, have a college degree? What kind? What do you do for a living, etc. We have a mental hierarchy tree and want to place people on it so we can determine where they fit versus where we are.
We may not even do it consciously.One of the things I always found fascinating about Europeans, they never asked either of us what we did for a living.
In retirement, no job makes it more difficult to figure out where you/we are on the social ladder. So income is the measuring tape at that point.
That makes it easy for them to pigeonhole. Less work than listening to a person, watching what they do and how they do it, and really paying attention over a while rather than looking for soundbites.
Some people use soundbites as a mask or a deflector against real observation. It must fool the pigeonholers pretty well.
Perhaps I fall into the category of asking personal finance questions, but more in the "how" and "why" of decision making, not specifics about money - perhaps to some it is the same thing. I ask others because I have decisions to make about the timing of when I should start drawing social security, and am totally uncertain about Medicare requirements and options, so I am looking for some real world experience and impacts of those decisions. I don't wander up to random senior citizens and ask finance questions, but friends and family - sure. I have also visited the social security office and discussed some issues, but have found the more information I have, the more specific and better my questions are for SS administration counselors.
Edit: Oh, and 25 years ago I would have NEVER asked such questions, because I was SO much smarter then and didn't need the help! ;/)
Perhaps I fall into the category of asking personal finance questions, but more in the "how" and "why" of decision making, not specifics about money - perhaps to some it is the same thing. I ask others because I have decisions to make about the timing of when I should start drawing social security, and am totally uncertain about Medicare requirements and options, so I am looking for some real world experience and impacts of those decisions. I don't wander up to random senior citizens and ask finance questions, but friends and family - sure. I have also visited the social security office and discussed some issues, but have found the more information I have, the more specific and better my questions are for SS administration counselors.
Edit: Oh, and 25 years ago I would have NEVER asked such questions, because I was SO much smarter then and didn't need the help! ;/)
The "how" and "why" questions don't bother me a bit. I've learned a lot that way as have others. I have had and will continue to have discussions with friends, family, and acquaintances concerning the generalities. It's the probing for specifics that I don't want, especially when there's obviously an agenda for their personal gain from me (think Nurse With A Purse where I would be the NWAP). Specifics like what do you pay for your Medicare Supplement, who's your Financial Advisor, do you have an IRA or a pension, are fine but don't start asking what percentage of my income I spend on the Medicare Supplement, for example. I'm a private person anyway and I'm not sharing.
I haven't read the entire thread and someone may have said this already, but we Americans like to put people in their "box" so to speak. Where did you go to school, have a college degree? What kind? What do you do for a living, etc. We have a mental hierarchy tree and want to place people on it so we can determine where they fit versus where we are.
We may not even do it consciously.One of the things I always found fascinating about Europeans, they never asked either of us what we did for a living.
In retirement, no job makes it more difficult to figure out where you/we are on the social ladder. So income is the measuring tape at that point.
When I was in Europe for an extended time I was always asked what I did for a living... not walking down the street or out shopping... but it always came up at Social Gatherings and how I came to work in Europe... then the conversation would drift to education systems... etc.
One thing I was asked often about and something I had never thought much about was Bankruptcy... I would be asked is it really possible to run up big bills, have a good time, mortgage your home for cash and then walk away?
The Europeans I met found it fascinating that anyone would walk away from a home... they also found it fascinating that in California a purchase money loan is non-recourse... in that the bank cannot come after more than the collateral which is the home... made for some interesting discussions.
I would ask questions too... such as is it true your family has lived in this house for 300 years or your property is worth a million dollars and you pay very little property tax?
It went both ways in the thirst for knowledge and building a bridge to understanding...
The Medical Doctors I met were quite fascinating... often they worked as village Doctors and lived above their practice... huge malpractice premiums were unknown... etc.
When I was in Europe for an extended time I was always asked what I did for a living... not walking down the street or out shopping... but it always came up at Social Gatherings and how I came to work in Europe... then the conversation would drift to education systems... etc.
In the 1970s, I was in grad school and hung around with a lot of fellow grad students and faculty from the UK. When a new Brit came to a get-together, invariably another Brit would ask where he/she went to school. That's equivalent to an American asking what someone does for a living: knowing what school you went to allows the person to pigeonhole you.
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The Medical Doctors I met were quite fascinating... often they worked as village Doctors and lived above their practice... huge malpractice premiums were unknown... etc.
The BBC series Doc Martin shows this: he is a London surgeon who develops a fear of blood and returns home to his Cornish village to run the medical practice there. He lives above the practice.
Well now, that introduces another angle to this story.
Let's say you said this to the OP, sitting out on the park bench chewing the fat.
Why would I do that when I wasn't even talking to her? Do you have a fever?
The person I replied to mentioned paying off a mortgage before retiring. I mentioned getting one before we retire.
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You didn't ask her opinion.
What?
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How would the other Pro-Nosy-Body posters feel if I said this:
"A mortgage? Why? I never took out a mortgage in my retirement years. Why retire when you still need to pay a mortgage? That's poor financial planning"
I don't know what a "Pro-Nosy-Body poster" is but if someone said that to me, I would explain calmly why we're doing it. (Hint: So we don't have to sell substantially-appreciated stock or our California residence.)
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My guess is that wouldn't go over very well. The reverse busy-body effect LOL.
In fact has ANYONE ever received that type of "advise" without getting butt-hurt? (nope)
Thank you for being a foster parent. That's a service to society that I personally believe is up there with members of the armed forces & first responders. Thanks for you service.
Welcome. Two of my adopted kids were from US foster care. I had other foster kids too. The last two I adopted were from Guatemala.
All the fosters, including the first two I adopted were multi-handicapped. For the last two, I wanted easier kids, I am getting old!
A few years ago, I helped a couple we knew set up her computer with a program I wrote for her that kept track of all her assets, incomes, and savings accounts. We had done a recheck up on everything and it was up to date exactly. Three days later they were on there way to the closest larger town, when a drunk driver killed both of them as well as himself. I saw her kids at church when they were in town to arrange the funerals, and get things under control.
I asked the one son, if he knew how to get control of their money and assets. He said they were completely lost. I told him about the computer program with everything on a complete record and where their will was. I went over after church, and using the password which I had set it up with, opened their financial records. There had not even been one change before they died. The son that was the executor, took the computer home with him when they left 3 days later, knowing exactly where they stood, and the parents were a lot better off than the kids realized.
Some one always needs to know how to access the parents records for older people, and have it as easy as this young man had to handle their estate. There was money in places he would never have known about until they got yearly accounting for tax purposes in the mail. And if I had not known where they had hidden their wills, etc., he would have been in problem. They would not have known, that the home was in a trust, that passed directly to the older divorced brother that had been local and helped the parents so much.
If you have not given your kids the knowledge of your affairs when you are retired, you are leaving them a big problem when you are gone. We had put everything in a computer in this situation, and it was automatic after they got the computer and their wills I knew where they could find them. It was just filing papers, and arranging to get access to the money, advertising for any bills which did not exist, filling out some more papers, and closing the estate within 6 months. If I had not set things up on the computer for her, it would have been a fiasco. It took about 4 minutes to dig out the wills, etc., and open the computer to the program I had put on it, and I went home and they had it all there before them. They had not even known who was the executor.
I think the older you get the more you tend to loose filters... in other words it is easier to say what is on your mind...
In the Bay Area it seems if you are young and own a home someone must have died and left it to you or you have generous well-off family helping.
When people would ask me I would tell them straight up it really wasn't hard at all... buy the least expensive single family home on the Oakland MLS... move in and fixed it up and repeat every 12 to 18 months... then I get the glazed look most of the time but a few that have asked actually applied what I had done and made it work for them... it is the old and tried starter home method needing work in a not so great area...
There is a convenient idea that for average people to have anything someone had to give it to them... I guess it provides some solace.
On a separate note... I would visit friends at a local retirement home... they had sold homes and decided to move... it was funny because one of the ladies would give me short bios of all her friends... like that is George, he was big in Paints and sold his company for 3 million dollars or that is Jim and Betty, her father left them a fortune when he passed... well you get the idea.
So much truth to this. My daughter was able to buy in Salinas when the market crashed with an FHA loan, and told her friends how to do it, but her friends with their designer purses, etc., didn't think Salinas was sexy enough. They are still renters, she ended up buying in Oakland, selling the Salinas house, and recently bought a house in San Leandro nearly for all cash, because of how she did on the other sales of the not-so-sexy zip code real estate she bought.
I still think, though, that it's out of bounds for someone to ask personal questions about your income. There's a line between asking for investment advice and asking what you have in your bank account.
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