This millennial reckons baby boomers have had it 'too easy"

If you didn't wouldn't that be your fault for not taking personal responsibility for your life situation ? I don't see why it is okay for boomers to blame others but not for others to blame others.

 

I cannot see any connection between The Incredibly Generous Defined Benefits Super Schemes that a small number of Boomers and pre-Boomers (my father) have received and which the general population honestly believes we all have, and my personal financial responsibilities. What part of my post demonstrates that I am blaming anyone for my personal financial situation? In fact, from everything you have read by me, where do you see me blaming anyone else for my personal financial situation. Given Life's hand that I was dealt, I think I have done very well for myself.

 

So I posted this in the resources/reading section, but really should share this here too, given the topic and relevancy.

Attached is a PDF of a short book called The Richest Man in Babylon. It's a fable written 100 years ago but set thousands of years ago. Less a book than really a short illustration of the power of three things:

1) Buying not the golden eggs of life, but instead buying the geese that lay them

2) The power of putting your money to work for you and the power of compounding interest/returns

3) That those foolish enough to plunder all of their income during peak earning years cannot cry poor in their twilight years if they took no initiative themselves

Please read and enjoy. It changed my financial life and put me on a great journey myself

** sidenote I am not breaching any privacy laws in sharing this book as a PDF. It is almost 100 years old and is now in the public domain. Read, enjoy, and encourage anyone to read it especially those aged 13-30 as those aged-folks will benefit the greatest as they have the most compounding-years yet to live.

{Note from mods: Attachment deleted - book is still subject to copyright under Australian laws}

 

I read it a few years ago. I remember chuckling at the 24%(?) interest rates it quoted for lending money to the other peasants in the village. No wonder the protagonist became wealthy very quickly

The concept is still well worth understanding however.

 

Love that book & have the hard copy.

However point 3) above is totally incorrect these days.

They can and do cry poor at every single chance they get & the government hands them out money/other benefits, as if it was lollies.

An example of a BB I know (I'm a BB myself, so this is not a BB bashing) Worked all their life, but never bought a home. Perpetually broke! Money comes in & is gone almost as soon as it arrives. Lived the good life & now on the pension. Constant whinging about how they can't afford simple things yet the next minute the pension comes it, spends up big.....and is broke for the next 10 days.

 

There are always examples of flagrant financial mismanagement - I could easily find thousands of similar examples of people on high earnings supping at the teat of taxpayers money to pay for their lifestyle choices. Its not just relevant to pensions.

Should something be done, undoubtedly and everyone agrees until the proposal is to remove their Govt money and so very rarely, anything is done.

 

That was my point.

 

It was? Maybe in part but it came across as a pop specifically towards pensioners.

 

A very high percentage of BB's I know, that are retired, receive a part pension. A very low percentage of them have investments outside of their Super.

 

Well, there's probably more BB's retired than not now, which is why the person in my scenario was on a pension. The pension wasn't the point of my post, it was because they've had a great life with plenty of income, but have spent it all & now feel it's their entitlement to still have as much as those who have saved.

 

Hmm the easiest time to make money in property in Aust and probably many parts of the world has been the last 20 years.

 

Um, I would consider myself to be very financially savvy compared to every other adult i have met outside PC, and commenced investing ten years ago when our dependant university student offspring upgraded themselves to Independent Adults. We have made zero capital gain in ten years. I studied many highly respected investment authors in the Naughties, but applying their education to SEQ property in this timeframe has achieved nothing other than a very high mortgage when we were totally debt free beforehand. I believe we made better financial decisions prior to 2000 when there were no IP books to read and our financial decisions were self-initiated.

 

I believe there will be plenty of opportunities to make money in property in Aust in the next 20 years.

 

There are always plenty of opportunities. You just need to find them.

 

Good luck riding those interest rates from 10% to zero again.

 

Totally agree. And they aren’t that hard to find. Just have to “shut one’s mouth and open one’s ears and eyes”.

In 20 years time, today’s young kids will be complaining how easy their parents had it over the last 20 years and some of their parents’ generation will be saying “If only we did this ..., if only we did that ... (over the last 20 years)”.

As the old saying goes:

“If we did a better job of listening, then history wouldn’t have to repeat itself”​

 

Yeah, it is going to be tough to ride those interest rates from zero to zero .

I can’t wait for the day when rates get back up to 17% again. Then it will be really easy for everyone .

 

Yes, because interest rates are the ONLY part of the equation.

 

For me the most concerning thing (slightly off topic I spose) for my financial independence for the 5 years ahead, is not Capital Growth (I actually care very little about that... I have an established portfolio and the right 'volume' of assets - as in, no need to acquire any more for 'growth' to unlock equity to buy more assets); but rather rental incomes.

Mortgage consumer rates can go down to low 2's or even 1.XX%; but if rental income dimishes expotentially; you aren't really better-off in terms of having that surplus rental income and pumping it back into offsets so as to rapidly compound the ability to pay down that principal-debt amount securing those investments.

Rental income is everything right now (I know there's an entire thread on this already...) but in terms of wealth creation/maintenance and me NOT becoming like a 'needy baby boomer' in 30 years' time when I'm their age; these precious 5 years ahead could avoid me becoming a bleed on the public system in my old age, if rents can somehow not deteriorate too much so as to allow me to exponentially pay down the mortgage-principals which would allow me to live independently financially and without the need to take a cent from the public-purse in my retirement

Anecdotally, I'm very fortunate to have sold/consolidated my Sydney exposure a couple years back, during a high point in the Sydney cycle. I do hold rural-Victorian residential property but NOT Melbourne itself, so I'm not exposed there either. I really just have my PPOR in Sydney so I've somewhat dodged 'this part' of the rental-decline bullet (for now...). Anecdotally, I've not yet faced rental reductions in Bris/Per/US but that's not to say that won't start to happen soon