Dear David,
I am a 52 year old women and have spent years as a spiritual student of “The Power of Positive Thinking,” “Think & Grow Rich,” “Manifesting Prosperity,” “God is My Source,” “All is in Divine Order,” and many other new thought prosperity programs. While I love the comfort of these theories and they have been great helping me learn to absolutely trust in a Power greater than myself, financially, I have about $150.00 accessible cash! Between us, my husband & I made about $65,000 last year and have enjoyed a good life, but there has never seemed to be enough to save for the future. Besides, I thought, the future will take care of itself. All of a sudden, at the dawn of 53, the future is getting closer!!!
I haven’t figured out my Latte Factor. Actually, I’m not good about writing down my expenditures. When I make a commitment to do it, all of a sudden I don’t buy anything. What I do know is that I spend a lot of money on unnecessary things. And since I absolutely believe there is enough, we are approaching your system a bit bass-ackwards. We are figuring out how much money we want to invest and will make due with what’s left over, and still have enough to play with.
I just got a job at a state college in December. They have a required 6% retirement deduction from my monthly check, so fortunately I had sort of a forced savings begun (I have no other monies saved). But, since hearing you on “Oprah” this summer, I have gone from that 6% to having 15% of my salary in a pre-taxed deduction. My husband’s employer matches his investment up to 6% and he has been utilizing this program for 4 years now. Since he is getting a pretty decent raise this month, we are moving him up to 11% pre-taxed deduction and shouldn’t feel the pinch at all!
Another thing I have working for me is that next week I am going to receive a check for about $125,000 from my mother’s estate. She died 6 years ago and through a whole complicated mess that I will not get into, we are just now settling. Obviously, this is more money than I will ever see at one time in my life and I want to be sensible about it (well, I don’t really want to be but I’m going to be).
These are our outstanding debts at this time:
I absolutely believe in tithing and am having a ball thinking of all the local charitable organizations I will be helping by dividing up the $12,500. I also would like to start an emergency fund, and we would like to take about $20,000 – $25,000 to do some repairs and improvements around the house. All of a sudden $125,000 doesn’t seem like that much money!!! We are speaking to a financial planner next week and are making an appointment with a tax advisor.
I have thoroughly enjoyed our telephone sessions and the materials included in with the Coaching Program. I am constantly reading the books or listening to the tapes and getting really excited about making my assets work for me.
By the way, since I already had Smart Women Finish Rich & The Automatic Millionaire I loaned those copies out to friends, and they told me today that they have upped their contributions to their retirement accounts!!! This stuff is contagious!
Thanks again for all you do! I’m looking forward to our call on Monday the 27th.
