Monday 12 January 2015

My property is eating my pension pot?-Odunze Reginald C


I started a big family house during my working career when  I was heading a juicy department in my organization, I was later transferred to another department that is not juicy as a result of  incessant complaints from my colleagues who are envious of my position. 
But that is not the case, the issue now is that I am retired and  I am faced with the difficult task of managing my pension pot as well as completing my build, these were lamentations of a retired pensioner.  But I feel that the pension because he did not consider building house within the limit of his income.
Richard Dyson noted that “ while traditional pension saving is complex and unpopular with many, the phenomenon of buying-to-let is now growing at its fastest rate ever, spurred by rising rents and house prices and cheap mortgages”
In most developed countries in Europe and America, pension fund are being used for infrastructural development especially in the area of housing. But what they do there is that they build houses for lease and rent, and in some cases for outright sale. They discovered that of all investment in life, it is real estate that has the highest rate of return. As a house that was bought in 2012 for 10 million cannot be sold for the same amount even within a period of 3 months. As both land and building appreciates over a period of time.  Jerry Lewis, the owner of MacDonald, once stated that he is getting his wealth through real estate and not through the restaurant.
But my interest in this presentation is the impact of property ownership in retiree’s life. Some cities have been noted to charge property tax; a typical case is that of Lagos and other major cities in and around the world.  Building house is a great idea and a solid investment, but what people do not know is that the type of built is of paramount importance especially in the life of the retirees.
Building a house for commercial is a great investment unlike building houses strictly for residential only for the owners, if it is residential commercial purposes, it is also a good idea. But what I am adversely against is building magnificent house just for residential. That is a big liability.  This is because it may be difficult to maintain such property during retirement, as the pension pot may not be enough to offer adequate maintenance's of the facilities during retirement as house owners or land lords do not make adequate provisions for sinking fund as it is only in Britain that make provisions for sinking funds as it relates to Building , other countries like Unites States , only  relates sinking funds to bonds  but In modern finance,  according to Bodie, et al. (2007) Essentials of Investments .in  Wikipedia  “a sinking fund is a method by which an organization sets aside money over time to retire its indebtedness. More specifically, it is a fund into which money can be deposited, so that over time preferred stock, debentures or stocks can be retired” But has been extended to building in Britain as way of alleviating or reducing the huge budget in building maintenance.
 
Therefore in any concerning building and capital expenditures, it is imperative we embark on  the necessary planning and making sure we build according to our budget even we have the opportunity  at the point to build a bigger one., what we are saying is that a house you cannot adequate maintained should not be use as final abode for retirement as it will create more financial bottlenecks to the retiree and at the end making retirement life miserable.
And until we have that mindset, we may not have a happy retirement.

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