The Gallery Assistant

Barbara Rose is a 27 year old, living on limited income and having education debt, with desires to have a comfortable retirement and own real estate. After working through the mentoring process, she has an understanding of what she needs to save, annually, to achieve her goals and when she might be able to buy her own place.

Her goals are achievable because she has a plan, understands how it will progress, and will be able to monitor and adjust her costs as she move through time.

Single Professional

Catherine is a 35 year old working for a public company, which provides an annual stock award benefit with the usual retirement and stock purchase plans. She felt burdened by her education debt, and was annually disheartened by a feeling that she was not saving enough for her retirement and was never going to be able to buy her own apartment. Her personal financial mentoring project helped her understand how her assets and liabilities were going to change over time (her assets were growing and her liabilities were shrinking), see the value of the nearly invisible stock award benefit and provided her with the motivation of owning her own place within ten years.     

The Young Actor

Although Harry was an unemployed actor at the time of his coaching project and knew from experience how to prioritize and limit his spending, he was able to understanding the impact of saving even a small amount early in his professional career. He was able to determine the type of savings account to use, how to make even a small amount automatic, and see what the future value of growing savings would be. He felt prepared to take advantage of savings opportunities when they became available. 

High Tech Couple

Stephanie and Rick have 2 young children, a comfortable lifestyle but want to put money aside for the kids college expenses, buy a home and ensure a comfortable older age. Through the consulting process, they have a much better grasp on their living expenses, and how savings and other retirement funds can increase in the future. They will need to make some choices about how they will “spend” their earnings (on current or future lifestyle), but they are much more satisfied foregoing certain luxuries because they understand how their current behavior will benefit them in the future.

Elders

Bob and Alice have worked long and hard, managed to help put their children through college, saved for their retirement and are about to look forward to a transition from full time work to their interests, volunteer activities and travel. After reading and hearing about how unprepared people are in the US for retirement, they decided to embark on a brief but useful information gathering and analysis project to ease their concerns about their finances. They look at a summary of what they have (their assets), what they spend (their living expenses), what they expect to receive (social security and retirement fund withdrawals) and how those amounts will change over time. Their new understanding helps them embark on this wonderful time together with less stress and more pleasure.

Living in the present

Fred has always had enough money to buy the things or vacations he desired. While he put money aside for his “retirement”, it was always a minimum amount in order to give him more disposable income. A brief consulting project would have shown him that a small adjustment in his “spending” (choosing between current or future lifestyle) would have very little short-term impact and great long-term benefit.

Boomers with IRA savings, wanting to leave full-time job

Mark and Sue don’t have children. They have worked full-time since their early twenties. Now in their fifties, they are trying to decide when they should transition from full-time careers to a lifestyle that will allow them more travel time and relaxation. They have slowly built their retirement savings, and now wonder how they can safely afford to live and still give themselves the luxuries they had hoped for. Through financial tutoring, they were able to forecast their income and expense amounts over the next twenty years to give themselves the security they worked for.

People who are anxious

Amanda is fifty-something, working 2 jobs to make ends meet. She knows she should be saving something for the future, but can’t seem to figure out how much that should be or what she can afford, so she doesn’t. A brief analysis of her situation would help her see what she has coming from social security, what she could put aside now, and what that would provide her with later.

Miscalculated Boomer

Jeff was one of the early contributors to an IRA in the 1970’s, and assumed he had been putting enough aside for his eventual retirement. He hadn’t been. He worked through a simple analysis to correct his savings shortfall, and he then had the peace of mind he was looking for. He could move forward with confidence that his lifestyle would not change and that he would enjoy a comfortable lifestyle after he stopped working full time.

The Artist at 29

Bruce is an artist who desperately wants to pursue his dream. His parents are worried that he will not be able to support himself, especially in the distant future. While he did not ever expect to accumulate much money (this was really not important to him), financial tutoring provided structure and predictability to his financial life, and helped his family realize that he is thinking about his financial future and dealing with important issues.