A viatical settlement is the sale of a life insurance policy by the policy owner before the policy matures. Such a sale, at a price discounted from the face amount of the policy but usually in excess of the premiums paid or current cash surrender value, provides the seller an immediate cash settlement. Similar to reverse mortgages, viatical settlements involve insured individuals with a life expectancy of less than five years. In countries with high health care costs (such as the United States), this is a practical way to pay extremely high health insurance premiums and other senior care expenses that severely ill people face. Some people are also familiar with life settlements, which are similar transactions but involve insureds with longer life expectancies (two to fifteen years). - From Wikipedia and other sources 5/2007Retirement Is A Scary Proposition If Youre Without A Plan, And Running Out Of Time
Of the 75 million baby boomers nearing retirement today, many are:
* Debt Ridden
* Severely unprepared for retirement
* Under Funded
* Without a Strategy
This is a very serious problem in a country that we can all remember used to assure most people of a retirement where you are taken care of financially.
We all know that social security alone is not the answer to this problem. Many baby boomers are on the cusp of retirement without the ability to pay their basic living expenses with the money they will have coming in after retirement.
This means most will be looking for jobs to compensate, or they will be looking for extensions of their current jobs past the time they had hoped to retire and enjoy their lives comfortably.
Out of embarrassment, many people answer their friends by saying they wouldn't know what to do with themselves in retirement to justify why they are still working to make ends meet past retirement age.
If you are in the situation above or can picture that situation in the next 10 years, there is something you can do to change that financial prognosis.
First, look at your 401k. Calculate what you could expect at retirement if you could actively manage it up to 8% more in yearly compounded return.
Depending on when retirement is supposed to happen for you, what kind of nest egg does that leave you as opposed to depending on the return you are seeing now?
A very simple but powerful 401k strategy that works with any 401k plan involves two things.
1. Awareness
2. Use of an index fund
By awareness, I mean tracking the value of your 401k holdings on a weekly basis if possible. With this level of awareness you can easily spot a portfolio decline. If it approaches a predetermined amount (5% to no more than 10% suggested) you should switch into a money market. Or if you are well informed and have the ability to do so, switch into an index fund that is designed to profit from a decline (a Bear Fund).
The biggest advantage you will gain is NOT letting your account value sink to such dismal levels where a 40%, 50% or greater gain is required just to get back to even.
This alone could significantly increase the size of your 401k over time.
Is this the only strategy that can safely increase your return rate on your 401k?
Not at all. You just need to know what most people won't tell you. I have written a book on the subject called "Scientific Wealth Strategies." You can find it at http://wealthscientist.com
I also have some more retirement strategies and resources located here: http://wwww.retirementinfo4u.com
Whatever your situation is right now, how much time you have left to make a change, and how much you calculate your need to be for a comfortable retirement, you cannot benefit from leaving things as they are.
Only education and strategic investment can net you the returns needed to have a safety net in place so that when you retire, you are not stuck in a constant monthly deficit spending cycle.
That's not what retirement was supposed to be about. And it doesn't have to be that way for you!
C.C. Collins is a Wealth Building Advisor and Author of "Scientific Wealth Strategies" at http://wealthscientist.com Find more information at www.retirementinfo4u.com