What To Do If You Have Not Saved For Retirement in Canada And You Are Now 50 Years Old

Some people say, well, I'm 50 years old and I don't have enough time now to make a change and really make a difference. And I would argue that point because, you know, I've gone past that milestone and I'm ways past it now. And, you know, I've worked with people that have started, you know, at my age. And it works when you start to change things.

Hi. What would to do if you've not saved for retirement and you're now 50 years old? What an interesting question. Today we're going to go through four points for you on what you could do. And I'm Dan Allen. I'm here with my colleague and good friend, Liz Lamont. So right off the start, we're going to start with our first one and that would be stop and assess where you are financially and what you would need to change. What do you got to say about that first step, Liz?

Yeah, thanks, Dan. I think it's really important to take a really honest look at where you are at. Something that was really helpful for me is understand where was my money leaking away? What was I losing in the transactions that I was doing? Most of us are aware of, you know, we're paying interest in mortgages, but it's looking at those other things. Are there subscriptions that you don't necessarily need? Are there things that are going out of your bank account? Even bank fees, for example, would be something that you can look at. So lots of different ways of just really assessing where am I spending my money every month and where is all that money going? And is there other ways that I could be putting money aside towards, towards my goals?

You know, I think that point I always bring out and I experience this in my life. You know, you get, you get to 50 really quick and you know, if you haven't got something achieved at that point, you're going to have to change something because if you keep on doing what you've been doing, you're going to get the same result. So I love that one where you just stop doing an assessment and then, okay, what do I need to change and how could I do that? So great point. Point number two that we wanted to talk about was education. Who likes the word education? I thought at one point in my life I was done with school and oh boy, I don't have to worry about learning something new. And then as I got along doing different things in life, I go, I want to learn more, I want to keep learning more. Because if I don't, I'm going to regress And I've learned that you want to keep on educating yourself and when it comes to things like how you're doing financially, it's something that we should really be willing to put energy into. What are some thoughts you'd have on that, Liz?

I think it's really important to not feel overwhelmed as well by it. So it could be as simple as listening to one podcast a day on something that you may not know a lot about, reading a book or two, using different ways to learn in small chunks. When I was doing a lot of driving around at one stage in my life, I would put podcasts or audio books on in the car so that I could make better use of that time. So we often feel like we don't have enough time with the business, but it's creating those windows to educate yourself. Another thing that's really important is to know that we don't know what we don't know. So sometimes when we feel like we understand a concept, sometimes it's still helpful to learn more about that concept or listen to other people talk about it, because there's always things that we perhaps could learn. So there might be a new idea or a new strategy within something that you already feel very familiar with that you could expand on, and it might open up new possibilities for what you could do.

Well said, Liz, because one of the things I found in my life, and you may have too, is that sometimes we actually limit ourselves because of what we think we know, and it just becomes something that blocks us. So be willing to listen to what other people have to share on something. I think that's a great point you made, Liz. So let's just segue into number three. And this one is really, I think you've probably all heard it, and I thought of it too, as I reflected on one of the books that you could use to educate yourself, which was Rich Dad, Poor dad by Robert Kawasaki, was you have to take action if you start to educate yourself. But at some point you have to start doing something. And it's like anything that you do in life that you want to really change a result. It's going to involve being consistent and being deliberate. I think I've heard it said sometimes, almost just have to desire to do it and start doing it and just continue to do it, even if you don't see the results at first. You just have to have dedication to what you're doing.

Yeah, I think that's really important, Dan, and thank you, because I think we all know that anything that we've Achieved has not been big, grandiose efforts. It's been small, deliberate actions on a consistent basis. Repetition is a huge part of that. So I would encourage you to look at some of the other videos on our channel and watch them multiple times. Take action by watching things multiple times until you grasp the concept. I'd also encourage you to have a plan for what that action is going to be and small, small milestones about where you want to be in a certain amount of time. So for example, if you were starting doing some more exercise, you wouldn't expect to see the results within the first few days. But you know that if you have that consistent effort, you might assess after say three months or something. Where am I at after that deliberate, small action? And so in conjunction with our other points of educating yourself, taking that consistent action, it's really important to also mark your successes as you go so that you can see the progress that you're making, because that's really, really encouraging. Which I think leads into our fourth point. A lot of people feel like that they have run out of time. That's certainly not the case. You have a lot of time still. And especially if you're willing to do the things that we were talking about and take deliberate action on a consistent basis, you can be in a very, very different circumstance, quite possibly in years time. Imagine where you are today and imagine being much closer to your goals in 10 years time. How that will feel. But it will require consistent, deliberate action over that period of time.

Some people say, well, I'm 50 years old and I don't have enough time now to make a change and really make a difference. And I would argue that point because, you know, I've gone past that milestone and I'm ways past it now. Work with people that have started, you know, at my age and it works when you start to change things. Example a lot of people know about. And that's good old Colonel Sanders. Now, if you study his story, you know, he was 65 years of age, old age, security check and trying to figure out and how and sell his recipe to somebody. And you know, by the time it wasn't that many years later, he was a multimillionaire. So, you know, don't get discouraged by the fact that you're 50 or 60. And I can tell you the journey to 60 is not that bad. It's actually a good place to be. And yeah, don't sell yourself short by saying I don't have time. That's what I'd like to encourage you with today. But it does mean changing something. When I go back to the old Colonel Sanders story, he was taking action. He was doing something and really trying to make a difference, and it worked out for him, and you can do that, too. And the other thing, when we think about how would we do this? What would you say to somebody if they come to you today, Liz, and you said, hey, I haven't, here's where I'm at. And you know, what should I do? How would you, what would be the one thing that you'd really say to them, other than what we've talked about now that they should really add to their, you know, what they're doing now to really make a difference for them?

I think the really important thing is to create a foundational asset, something that will enable you to have some stability, some compounding, uninterrupted compounding, and the ability to grow your wealth, wealth with some certainty and just making sure that you still have access to liquidity so that you have the option to go and, and create whatever else you want to on top of that. So really, you know, the. And asset is what we talk about whole life participating policy is what we teach. We teach people. And I would encourage you to go and educate yourself about that. We have a lot of videos on how that process works, and I'd encourage you to click on any of the links that are appearing beside the video.