Are you on track for the future you deserve?
Chiquita Dent was 23 years into marriage, with a near-perfect joint retirement portfolio shared with her husband. Then the couple’s relationship crumbled and divorce followed.
Dent, now 51, discovered she would need to regroup so that she could manage her money to ensure that her retirement years would be stable as a newly single woman and mother of a 16-year-old son.
She is not alone. While women tend to outlive men, they are less prepared for retirement than their male counterparts.
“This was my mom’s story 27 years ago when my dad died and she was 69,” said Charlene Holland. “She didn’t know what they had because she was never involved in financial matters. When he died, my mom lost her financial anchor and this was after he promised her that she would be fine financially for the rest of her life. This was not the case. His death was like a tornado that struck and devastated everything in its path.”
Holland, a certified financial planner who plans to launch her own practice, shared that within the past decade, she has witnessed that same scenario “being played out in the lives of much younger women — women who were educated, and many who had careers but had left them to raise their family.”
Women, as shown by a study from the National Institute on Retirement Security, face unique challenges in saving. This stems largely in part from a gender pay gap that “persists into a retirement wealth gap,” according to the May 2020 report, “Still Shortchanged: An Update on Women’s Retirement Preparedness.”
The report showed that older women receive approximately 80% of the retirement income that older men receive — nearly identical to the gender pay gap for American women. It also found that women age 65 and older had a median household retirement income of $47,244 or about 83% of the median household income, $57,144, for men, and that women earned less than men over the course of their careers.
“Not only do women outlive men, they also typically earn less for similar roles, and often spend time out of the workforce if they’re having children,” said Russ Thornton, founder of Wealthcare for Women, which focuses on retirement planning for women 55 and older and their families.
To review your finances and to find out if you are on track for the retirement that you deserve, contact me, I will be happy to help with whatever questions you may have.
Rob
E;robertgourlay@holbornassets.com T;(+6)01151565649 W;www.rgwealthsolutions.com
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