Innholdsfortegnelse for April 2021 i Money Magazine

DEBBIE DUNCAN “I love buying my children ‘little’ surprises; things they’ve told me they really want that I know they can’t afford. Usually, clothes and shoes but sometimes games. I’d struggle to give that up. Also, splurging on books, going out for coffee and buying movie tickets, especially when the British or French film festivals are on. Come to think of it, an early retirement is looking less and less likely.” TIM VERRENDER “As an avid vinyl record collector and music nerd, collecting and sourcing rare and hard-to-find vinyl records is my favourite (but also my most expensive) pastime. Also, splurging on live concerts, music festivals, dinners with friends and impromptu road trips would be almost impossible for me to give up.” MICHELLE BALTAZAR “It’s that constant battle between choosing…

When the government announcemed early access to superannuation last year, Australians sat up and paid attention. Super went from being something many of us rarely thought about to becoming a hot topic of discussion over Friday night Zoom drinks. Internet searches for “Should I draw down my super?” hit an all-time high. But instead of funds making it above the first-page results fold, comparison sites and the tax office topped the list. This highlights an important point: many people don’t realise they can talk to their fund about their super. The early release of super was the biggest single member engagement trigger in recent years, but it was an opportunity largely missed by an industry primarily focused on the flood of drawdown requests. As consumers and members, we need to…

THE ART OF BEING A TOURIST AT HOME by Jenny Herbert (Hardie Grant Travel, $24.99) With its colourful cover, this book entices the reader to travel without straying far from home. Author Herbert says she started writing this book in 2019 when travel was common, but Covid presented a different angle. She starts with the idea that holidays are a time to recalibrate and renew – it’s all really about disrupting the normal routine. Herbert takes us on a delightful journey through local streets, to parks, theatres, galleries and bookshops, where we can discover the wonder that exists all around us. Her message is clear: a thoughtful approach to travelling at home offers many benefits. JULIA NEWBOULD Five readers can win a copy. In 25 words or less, tell us…

Australians spend an average 20 million hours a week hunting for bargains, with the average person devoting 63 minutes a week to the pursuit. Parents spend 77 minutes a week hunting for deals while people aged 35-49 do it 30% more than the average. A PayPal survey of 1010 people over 18 also found that our love for a bargain informs our love for others, with 69% indicating they prefer partners who can find a bargain. This applied more to men (72%) than to women (65%). “Being on the same page financially, particularly when it comes to bargain hunting, has emerged as an important attribute Aussies look for when they’re dating, with nearly half of all Aussies wanting to know if their prospective partner is a savvy shopper,” says Jess…

Eric Peck Co-founder of Swoop Aero, a drone-based delivery business operating in Australia and Africa; age 31; lives in the Melbourne suburb of Balaclava Strived to earn good marks at school and to overcome difficult challenges. First job at Boost Juice. As a kid he wanted to be an RAAF pilot and later lived the dream. It was “the hardest job you could possibly do”. Got the flying bug after his uncle took him to the Avalon Airshow in Victoria. Most important investment lesson was being taught to be accountable for what he spent. Utimate goal is to run an ASX-listed company.…

I reckon the starting point here is a stocktake of where you are. You own your home, and after the subdivision and sale you’ll have cash of around $600,000. Then you have equity of around $100,000 in both your investment properties and also in super, a total of $300,000.  Let’s put your house aside. It is a wonderful asset, in particular with our aged pension system, where a family home does not count as an asset towards a pension. For all Australians, getting to retirement with some sort of home ownership, be it shared with a partner, friend or a family member, is really a key life goal. It does not need to be grand or in an expensive city. But even with little else in the way of investments…

NAME: Leo, Alisha, Dom, 4, and baby Ellie* AIM: Retire this year INCOME NEEDED: $90,000 a year INVESTMENT STRATEGY: Vanguard index funds, shares, managed funds that align with their principles, maximum contributions to superannuation. IN 2018, LEO, Alisha and baby Dom were travelling with three suitcases, a backpack and a pram, so they could be together as a family. They decluttered their furniture and possessions. They had no house, no car, no debt and could live wherever Leo, who works in the resources industry, was sent. The alternative was flying in and flying out, sporadically getting together as a family. They now have four pieces of luggage, as their daughter Ellie was born over two years ago. Their nomadic lifestyle was welcomed by employers and it made Leo more valuable…

NAME: Kate Campbell, 22 AIM: Retire at 40 INCOME NEEDED: Expects this to change as she nears her retirement, depending on circumstances, but around $40,000 a year INVESTMENT STRATEGY: Automatic deduction into a savings account and then dollar cost averaging into a diversified portfolio of ETFs. Paying attention to her superannuation. KATE SAYS THE PAST year confirms the logic in following the FIRE goals. “You never know what tomorrow may hold. I want to be financially secure and I’ll keep adjusting that plan for whatever life throws at me.”   Four years ago, when she started on the FIRE path, she thought it might be a phase. But it has become embedded in her approach to life. “When I set my financial goals each year, FIRE is a guiding framework,”…

The financial world is becoming more complex to handle on your own, so building a team of experts can help you break free from money worries and get ahead financially. The catch is that most – though not all – finance professionals expect to be paid. So, it’s about knowing which services will give you the most bang for your buck and provide you with help in the areas you need it most. Financial planners The role of financial planners, or advisers, is to help you set and achieve personal goals. The advice can be as broad as building lifetime wealth or can focus on single issues such as managing a redundancy payout. According to Rice Warner, one in four Australians has received professional financial advice at some point, and…

The paperwork needed to formally transfer a property from seller to buyer can be formidable. In theory, there’s nothing to stop you doing it yourself, though it’s not recommended unless you have a legal background. That leaves the choice between a conveyancer, who specialises in property transfers, and a solicitor, who has broader legal knowledge. Importantly, this choice doesn’t apply in Queensland or the ACT, where only solicitors are permitted to do conveyancing work. As with all professional services, conveyancing costs depend on the complexity of the transaction. A conveyancer can be more affordable than a solicitor, potentially with a flat fee ranging upwards from around $700 for a straightforward transaction. A solicitor is more likely to charge by the hour, and that can see the cost climb higher depending…

When my 25-year-old daughter fainted at work, her colleagues called an ambulance and the paramedics took her to hospital. She was checked out thoroughly, sent home to rest and returned to work a few days later. A month later she received a bill for $980 for the ambulance. She was shocked and naively thought work would pay as it had called the ambulance. The bill was one of the biggest expenses to come her way. Luckily, I had talked her into taking out health insurance a year earlier as our insurer had dropped her off our family policy. She was thrilled to discover she would be reimbursed the full $980. (Some states – not NSW – do cover an ambulance.) It was an “aha!” moment for her. She saw the…

Keith Barrett, owner of Newcastle-based media consultancy Reverb Media, is taking the leap into becoming an employer. The key driver for Barrett is building the capacity of his business in response to “a huge spike” in interest in corporate communications towards the end of 2020.   “To be able to grow and service a larger range of clients, I need to have the skills and support in place to allow me to focus my own skills where they achieve the best outcomes,” he says. While Barrett has used freelancers for two decades, he says the advantage of putting on an employee is the certainty that he will have talent on hand when it’s needed. And while this inevitably brings the additional costs of super and holiday leave, hiring an employee is letting…

The outperformance of houses over units as a broad trend is increasingly evident. At a national level, house values have risen by 3.5% over the six months to January while unit values are unchanged. And the past three months have seen every capital city record a stronger result for houses over units. “Demand for units has diminished through Covid-19 amidst record low levels of investor participation and changing living preferences,” says Tim Lawless, head of research at CoreLogic. “At the same time, supply levels are heightened in some precincts. While demand and supply remain imbalanced, we are likely to see units continue to underperform relative to detached housing markets.” If you’re in the market for a home or an investment property, does this mean you’ll likely find better short-term value in…

A small amount of general price increases (or inflation) is important as it incentivises businesses to sell more, employ more people, seek higher profit and drive overall economic growth. However, if the rise in prices gets away at such a pace that it negatively influences consumption patterns, impacts business profits through higher input costs, and leads to employee layoffs, then that is clearly going to hurt investment returns and economic recovery and cause political pain at the next polls. The loudest debate in the markets at present is over this question: will inflation get out of hand in the next couple of years? The affirmative camp is putting forward a list of compelling reasons for why its calls should be heeded by politicians and central banks, as they need to…

Finding companies that represent the best in their industry can be a challenge. Clues can often be found from revenue growth. Or the increase in profits. Some hints can come from ratios like return on equity or invested capital. You might look for a track record of new product innovation, or a competitive advantage from a brand or product that cannot be replicated. And then there’s resources. Now, I don’t mean to look down on resources companies – goodness knows they’ve been responsible for more than one national case of the economic equivalent of John Howard’s “Lazarus with a triple bypass”. We escaped the worst of the GFC, for example, in part because our banks were responsible, but also in part because we had an almost unprecedented resources boom that…

I first met Hamish Douglass in the early 2000s at an annual meeting of Cabcharge (now A2B). We ended up sitting next to each other in the front row and introducing ourselves. At the time he was a big shot at Deutsche Bank, but his passion for investing was obvious right away. A few years later he co-founded Magellan Financial Group (ASX: MFG) with business partner Chris Mackay. On May 5, 2007, I sat down with the two of them and a few other investors for a memorable dinner in Omaha, Nebraska, ahead of the 2007 annual meeting of Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway. At the time of our meal, on the banks of the Missouri River, Magellan was still working out its financial structure through a relatively complex transaction. A…

Letter of the month Stocks that make the top of the pops I read with interest “Top 50 shares and property” in the February issue. What caught my eye was the list of 50 top stocks for 2021 with the explanation of how these stocks were chosen by Bell Direct staff. Having access to the 2021 edition of Martin Roth’s Top Stocks (featured in the January issue), I cross-checked the top 50 with his 90 listed stocks and found only nine entries appearing in both lists. I then searched for companies that I was invested in and found only four in the shortlist – three of them were banks, the other a gold miner. It was an interesting exercise as both lists were compiled using legitimate data and acceptable criteria.…

Last week, I was talking to a friend about his financial situation – and he said he’d done well investing in property in London during the 1990s. He was working and living there, and realised the rent he was paying was more than the money he would need for a mortgage. Home loan rates hit a record high (17%) in Australia in June 1989 and stayed there until April 1990. My first home loan was around 14%. It was quite intimidating. These were big numbers. It wasn’t easy to figure out how a rise of 0.25% or 0.5% would affect repayments – there were no nifty online calculators, it was a matter of manual calculations written longhand on A3 pages. I was meticulous with my calculations – I never wanted…

Remediator is a new company that promises to find what might be owing to bank customers from the swelling $3.55 billion in remediation resulting from the financial services royal commission. The offer is compelling but should be resisted. It is ironic that offers like Remediator’s continue to highlight the fundamental inequality when it comes to Australians buying financial services. The royal commission pointed to the many entrepreneurs paying lip service to transparency to ensure their own returns before any possible returns for the people they are meant to serve. Remediator charges its clients 20% of the refund obtained. But there is a free service, run by the Australian Financial Complaints Authority, which has been set up to ensure that what is owed to financial institution customers is paid and any…

NUDGE COST: FREE OS: IOS only Nudge is the vision board of the 21st century. It pairs clever technology with behavioural economics to encourage Aussies to save more money, more often. First, you tell the app what you’re saving for – a Ducati Panigale or a trip to Paris perhaps – and how much it costs. After uploading a photo of your goal, the app will send you occasional prompts to save an amount towards it. Once you accept the prompt, money is transferred from your bank account to your Nudge account. According to Nudge, “the user can control the prompts in terms of frequency and average value, but the messages automatically customise based on their behaviour – follow through on the prompts and they’ll receive encouragement; repeatedly ignore or…

Karen is worried about her disappearing savings, but ... As cash runs out, the pension will provide a safety net Q My husband and I are retired and still have two adult children at home. We have $550,000 in self-managed super, which is just sitting in our Commonwealth Bank account, on which we received a return of $23.37 for January 2021. We also have $235,000 in cash that we are using for income at the moment, but we are going through it. We also have a unit on the coast. It cost $330,000 and is returning about $1500 a month, but we still have rates and body corporate fees of $10,000 for the year to take out. We just don’t know what to do with our money. My inbuilt alarm…

I am almost at retirement age. According to Centrelink, there’s one year to go, although I don’t expect to be entitled to any benefits. I don’t mind continuing work but would like to perhaps cut back a little, say to four days a week. I own my home in Perth suburbia, which I am currently subdividing to downsize. I will live in the new house and then renovate and sell the old one. This should provide me with a substantial sum of money (hopefully about $600,000). My question is, what is the best use of this money? I own two investment properties: one in Roma, Queensland, valued at around $300,000 with a mortgage of $200,000, and a unit in Perth’s beachside suburb of Coogee, valued at around $500,000 with a…

NAME: Pat Seyrak, 32 AIM: Retire at 35 INCOME NEEDED: $40,000 a year INVESTMENT STRATEGY: Sold out of four Australian listed investment companies, without triggering a capital gain, and put the money into international ETFs: Vanguard MSCI Index International Shares, Vanguard MSCI Index International Shares (Hedged) and Vanguard FTSE Emerging Markets Shares. He already held the Vanguard Australian Shares Index ETF. IT DIDN’T BOTHER ENGINEER Pat Seyrak too much when his early retirement savings plunged by more than $100,000 in March last year. He told readers on his blog lifelongshuffle.com: “As usual, I have no idea where it will go from here. Up or down, it does not matter. During these turbulent times I am continuing to invest as per my regular investment strategy and am excited about the prospect…

Mr Money Mustache, Peter Adeney, says the best way to cut your spending and save is to get rid of your credit card, live close to work, don’t borrow money for cars, particularly pricey ones. He recommends cancelling your TV services and stop wasting money on groceries. Give your kids the opportunity to achieve greatness without being pampered and ditch overpriced mobile phones. WHERE THE SAVINGS CAN BE MADE Get out of debt. Make paying down any credit card debt a number one priority. Live close to where you work. Walk, cycle or take public transport. For example, if you live a long way from your work, it can really add up to take the car. If you are driving 20 kilometres, you could be easily spending $120,000 over a…

The need for consumers to check an adviser’s credentials has been thrown into the spotlight with the recent case of missing Sydney woman Melissa Caddick. Caddick is alleged to have siphoned off $25 million of her clients’ money while acting as their financial adviser. But Caddick was unlicensed, and reportedly used someone else’s AFSL without consent. A quick online check shows that neither Caddick nor her company Maliver Pty Ltd are listed on ASIC’s financial adviser register. If investors had run the AFSL number Caddick was using through the financial adviser register’s search function, they would have seen that she didn’t hold a licence in her own name, and this may at least have prompted further questions.…

Hands up if you know how to host a livestream event! If, like me, you have watched an event broadcast “live” on Facebook or on YouTube, it sounds as if hosting a livestream is as simple as pressing a magical green button and, shazam!, your event is blasted out to the World Wide Web. But the reality is more complicated than that. I witnessed it myself last month when I was part of a not-for-profit community group trying to do a virtual fundraiser solely on our wits and wi-fi. That wasn’t enough. Learn from my mistake and make sure you have someone in your team who is tech savvy or you could end up with 50 people on Zoom staring at a dark screen for half an hour. A week…

The federal government has already introduced incentives for young people to take out health insurance to stem the exodus. Two years ago, some insurers started to offer premium discounts on hospital cover of 2% for each year that a person is aged under 30 when they first purchase health cover. The discount goes up to a maximum of 10% for 18- to 25-year-olds. It reduces as they grow older: 8% for a 26-year-old, 6% for a 27-year-old, 4% for a 28-year-old and 2% for a 29-year-old. There are penalties if you haven’t taken out and maintained private patient hospital cover from the year you turn 31. Under what’s known as lifetime health cover (LHC), if you decide to take out hospital cover later in life you will pay a 2% loading…

When deciding between a house or an apartment, would-be buyers need to weigh up: COSTS. When you buy an apartment, you’ll need to pay strata title fees to cover the cost of maintaining common property and insuring the building. These can be very steep – for example, in NSW between 0.3% and 1.2% depending on the level of facilities, such as lifts, pools, gardens and gyms. This means fees for an $800,000 apartment could be as high as $9600 a year. Homeowners have to pay their own maintenance bills, which can also be high, but normally they have more control over these costs as they alone decide on the timing of expensive maintenance. PRIVACY AND NOISE. Apartment living normally entails being in close proximity to your neighbours, so their activities…

1 BetaShares Active Australian Hybrids Fund It provides exposure to a diversified portfolio of hybrid securities in Australia. The fund actively manages volatility and downside risk and can invest in hybrid securities, bonds and cash. If hybrid securities are deemed to have too much risk (loss of capital) or to be overvalued, the manager can invest in lower-risk securities. Further, the fund’s income should rise in an increasing interest rate environment. 2 Ardea Australian Inflation Linked Bond Fund Ardea is a fundamentally driven value investor with a focus on liquidity, diversification and disciplined risk management. By utilising multiple and diversified strategies, the manager can add value over the medium to longer term. 3 Vanguard Australian Inflation-Linked Bond Index Fund The fund aims to track the return of…

Which leaves us … where? This is when you need to think about what you’re after. Single-commodity companies have the most raw upside, but also the greatest potential downside. A multi-commodity business has the benefit of internal diversification, with some parts zigging while the others zag, lowering your risk. So, if you really want to add a resources company to your portfolio, I think diversification wins. That, along with a quality resource base and well-regarded management, hands this year’s victory to the company spun out of BHP a few years ago. South32 is our resources Best in Breed.…

There are a lot of things in the sharemarket that say one thing but mean another. Like these, for instance: Broker speak Hi, we haven’t spoken in ages – Damn, I hit an old speed dial number. I’ll call you – Don’t call me. I’ll call you – This is possibly the last communication we will ever have. I’ll call you right back – Sounds like you might deal, I will call you right back. He’s a great analyst – His last recommendation went up. It’ll be alright in the long term – It was a terrible recommendation in the short term. The management lied to us – It wasn’t our fault we got it wrong. Buy at the bottom and sell at the top – I have no financial…

Performance after investment fees. Investment returns after investment fees annualised to describe each fund’s returns per annum. But if your managed fund achieves a high return and charges you an extra “performance fee”, Rainmaker has not taken this into account. Past performance is not an indicator of future performance. Rank. Funds are ranked against all managed funds in each segment, not just those included in each table. Indices and averages. Arithmetic average investment returns or average fees for all fund investment options within each category, that is, not fund size weighted.…

Contact us To send a letter to the editor, write to: Money, Level 7, 55 Clarence Street, Sydney NSW 2000 or email money@moneymag.com.au For all enquiries and letters, please include name, address and phone details. Letters may be edited for clarity or space. Because of the high number of letters received, no personal replies are possible. How to get Money Subscribe to the print or digital edition, as well as our free weekly email newsletter via the Money website or: Online: magshop.com.au/ money-magazine Call: 136 116…

Melissa Caddick posed as a financial planner to allegedly defraud her clients of millions of dollars before disappearing. In reality, she was not a qualified adviser. The terms “financial adviser” and “financial planner” are restricted by law to those authorised by ASIC to provide advice. They must meet stringent educational and ethical standards and must undertake continual professional development to retain their licence. The lesson here is to do your checks before entrusting them with your money. (Nicola Field covers this in more detail on pages 42-45). Research shows that people who are already receiving advice are great proponents of the service. In CoreData’s report The Value of Advice, 90% of clients say that accessing financial advice has left them in a better position and 89% say advice has allowed…

More than 400,000 Aussies placed their first trade in the last two months, according to Investment Trends. “Young Australians are increasingly embracing investing, with one in six first-time investors under the age of 25,” says Irene Guiamatsia, from Investment Trends. An important prompt was the desire to learn a new skill, highlighting how many spent their free time during the lockdowns. The ACCC is focused on super, with more than 20 enforcement investigations under way. It recently commenced civil proceedings against Rest and Statewide Super for allegedly breaching the Corporations Act and ASIC Act. ASIC alleges Rest wrongfully discouraged members from switching funds, while Statewide Super is accused of wrongfully charging insurance premiums to members who didn’t hold group cover. According to the ATO, the average SMSF member balance for…

As parents grow older, they may require additional care and can find it hard to maintain their own home. To deal with that, increasing numbers are moving into “granny flats” within the homes of their children. In a typical scenario, the parents, or parent, might sell their own home. They will then pay a substantial part of the proceeds of money to their son or daughter for the right to live in a granny flat within the child’s property for the rest of her life. Often both parties will put in place a legal agreement to formalise the arrangement and to provide protection to the parent in the event that the child divorces or passes away. Unfortunately, under current law, the cash sum paid creates a CGT liability falling on…

The housing sector should be front and centre when it comes to the way governments view productivity and growth, say leading economists and housing experts. In a survey for the UNSW City Futures Research Centre study, 84% of expert respondents agreed that Australian governments pay too little attention to how housing outcomes also affect productivity and growth, while 80% agreed that rising mortgage debt poses an economic stability risk. “The vast bulk of housing experts and economists surveyed are concerned that ongoing Treasury dependence on ‘cheap money’ policy will further ratchet up house prices and widen the gap between rich and poor,” says professor Bill Randolph, from the City Futures Research Centre. “From a purely economic perspective, the informed expert view is that this will undermine productivity and economic growth.”…

A bolt of inspiration hit Eric Peck while serving as a RAAF Hercules pilot eight years ago in Afghanistan. “I saw how drones were being used to track soldiers on the battlefield,” he recalls. “It piqued my interest, because my parents had just moved to a farm, and I thought maybe they could track their cows that way.” The seed took shoot four years later after Peck had left the RAAF and was working at professional services firm Deloitte. There he met a robotics engineer, Josh Tepper, who had been asked by government agencies whether drones could be used to move chemotherapy medication to remote places. “There’s normally a hospital within about 100-150 kilometres of most smaller healthcare facilities in the country, and there was only about a kilo of…

FOR PAT SEYRAK, it isn’t that he doesn’t like his job. He does. But his job is all-consuming and it doesn’t leave much time to enjoy life’s good experiences. He wants to buy back his life. Instead of staying in his job as an engineer until he is in his mid-60s, he plans to retire early. Really early – at 35. Pat and his partner, Steph, both millennials, want to take control of their lives now while their health is great, to get out and enjoy the world. They want a more balanced lifestyle with more time for family and friends. They are followers of the popular personal finance FIRE movement – it stands for financial independence, retire early – who rigorously save $1 million or more, invest sensibly, retire…

NAME: Dave RETIRED: At 28 INCOME NEEDED: $45,000 a year for Dave and his partner, Alison, and dog, Boss INVESTMENT STRATEGY: Selling down investment properties and buying more index funds. Currently buying real estate investment trusts. Owns some peer-to-peer investments. DAVE’S REMARKABLE achievement of retiring at 28 began when he was 19 and working with people much older who unhappily lived pay day to pay day. It dawned on him that he didn’t want to work every week to pay the bills in a job he loathed. “The only way to escape this treadmill was to become wealthy. And the best way to achieve that was investing,” he says. He saved hard and by 23 he had bought two properties. His partner, Alison, also bought a property with her savings.…

NAME: Serina Bird, 48 RETIRED: At 46 INCOME NEEDED: $60,000 to $70,000 a year for a family of four INVESTMENT STRATEGY: Four investment properties, shares and aggressively paying down the mortgage. Selling one property and increasing her investment in ETFs. SERINA TOOK THE PLUNGE by leaving the security of her well-paid public sector job in 2019. She says she is probably working more in retirement than when she was employed but she has the flexibility she didn’t have before. She describes what she is doing now as having a purpose with a passion. Serina’s approach is helping people who are struggling, not only with their finances but their relationships and jobs they don’t like but are too scared to leave. For a start, Serina wrote The Joyful Frugalista, a book…

Robo advice is pitched at low-cost, automated investing rather than all-encompassing tailored financial advice. The process starts by sharing details about yourself, your attitude to risk and your investment goals with the robo adviser – often via an online questionnaire. From here, a ready-made portfolio (typically exchange traded funds) will be recommended based on your goals and risk tolerance. Part of the appeal of robo advice is that the platform you choose automatically rebalances your portfolio over time. So, as long as your circumstances don’t change, your investment mix continues to reflect your needs. As this is all done through computer algorithms, the cost of robo-advice is far lower than in-person financial advice. With Stockspot, for instance, you’ll need $2000 to get started, and monthly fees of $5.50 apply on…

I have two teenage sons, both of whom have their driver’s licence and new jobs, which are launching them into a new phase of independence and curiosity about the world. It is an exciting time. As part of this transition, they are learning what it is to manage their own finances, how to spend wisely, how to plan and save, and how to spend just enough on yourself to have fun, without blowing it all. Both of my boys are fascinated with the FIRE movement (financial independence, retire early), and it has opened up some great conversations about spending and healthy money mindsets. As part of this, I have had to work hard at breaking several money myths that are considered “commonsense” to many people. It created so much discussion…

Small business is big business, accounting for nearly 98% of all the nation’s commercial enterprises. Among them, sole traders have the strength of numbers, comprising a whopping 62% of small businesses. That’s close to 800,000 businesses owned and operated by just one person. Being a one-man-band provides absolute control plus plenty of agility. The downside can be capacity constraints. There’s only so much one person can do in a day, and suitably skilled contractors may not always be available when you need them (see breakout, “Talent on hand when it’s needed”). Hiring employees can give your business the resources it needs to grow. But it also comes with a raft of responsibilities you may never have had to deal with before, and it’s important to get things right from the…

The way Australians spend their retirement is changing. According to the Bureau of Statistics, in the 2018-19 financial year there were 3.9 million retirees; 55% of people over the age of 55 were retired – a 2% rise from 2016-17. This has prompted the federal government to tackle the consequences of an ageing population head-on, increasing funding for the Commonwealth home support program. The program enables seniors to stay at home for longer while still gaining access to support services to live independently. Wealthier retirees are expected to contribute to the cost of care. The ageing challenge is only likely to get worse: as the population ages, so too does the demand for care.…

10 MOST-ASKED QUESTIONS Q What do you do if your builder goes broke? This is such an awful thing to happen when you’re in the middle of what is often a once-in-a-lifetime project. If your builder is placed into liquidation, you should make contact with the liquidator as soon as possible and let them know where your build is up to. You should also make contact with the provider of your home warranty insurance or fidelity fund certificate and seek advice about your options to make a claim. Your ability to make a claim against home warranty insurance or a fidelity fund certificate will vary between jurisdictions. MICHAEL HOPKINS Q What are your rights if there is a major problem after the builder has finished? If it is a new…

Navigating the super-in-retirement landscape alone is virtually impossible given its complexity and the financial perils of getting it wrong. While access to affordable advice is the obvious answer, that’s easier said than done. Most Australians muddle along as best they can, unable or unwilling to pay for financial advice. Only 10%-15% of people have a financial planner, mostly those with lots of money. These shortcomings are laid out by actuarial firm Rice Warner in a recent submission to the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC). “It is useful to consider the circumstances of a couple approaching retirement, who want assistance on the complex environment of superannuation, tax and social security. At this stage, the couple will need to deal with longevity and investment risks and might need to use home…

Australian Communications and Media Authority 1300 850 115 acma.gov.au Australian Competition and Consumer Commission 1300 302 502 accc.gov.au Australian Financial Complaints Authority 1800 931 678 afca.org.au Australian Securities and Investments Commission  (ASIC) 1300 300 630 asic.gov.au Australian Securities Exchange 131 279 asx.com.au ASFA 1800 812 798 (outside Sydney) 9264 9300 (Sydney) superannuation.asn.au CPA Australia 1300 737 373 (within Australia) +61 3 9606 9677 (outside Australia) cpaaustralia.com.au Do Not Call Register If you want to reduce telemarketing calls 1300 792 958 donotcall.gov.au/contact-us/contact-details Fair trading/ consumer affairs ACT: 132 281 NSW: 133 220 NT: 1800 019 319 QLD: 137 468 SA: 131 882 TAS: 1300 654 499 VIC: 1300 558 181 WA: 1300 304 054 Financial Counselling Australia 1800 007 007 financialcounsellingaustralia.org.au/contact Financial Planning Association Listing of financial advisers 1300 337 301…

There are a variety of ways to gain exposure to gold. You can buy gold bullion as coins and bars from manufacturers such as the Perth Mint or ABC Bullion. Perhaps an easier way is to invest in gold exchange traded funds (ETFs). ETF Securities (ASX: GOLD), the Perth Mint (PMGOLD) and BetaShares (QAU) all offer ETFs backed by physical gold. Essentially these funds hold the gold on your behalf. Then there are ETFs that invest in companies exposed to gold, such as miners. Options here include VanEck (GDX) and BetaShares (MNRS). You can also invest directly in gold miners – the largest ASX-listed examples include Newcrest (NCM), Northern Star Resources (NST), Evolution Mining (EVN), Saracen Mineral Holdings (SAR) and Regis Resources (RRL). If silver is your precious metal of…

Performance after fees: When calculating fees, Rainmaker assumes a member has $50,000 in their account. Strategy: Some MySuper products invest your superannuation based on age and are known as lifecycle funds (marked LC). The table includes the LC option for 40-year-old members. Non lifecycle funds are known as single strategy (S). Rank: Funds are ranked against all MySuper investment options available in Australia. Indices and averages: To produce these indices, Rainmaker analyses the results of more than 3300 investment options.…

February 22, 2021 will go down in Australian history as VAC (Vaccine Against Covid-19) Day (although the prime minister, Scott Morrison, the chief medical officer, Paul Kelly, and 84-year-old aged-care resident Jane Malysiak received their gift of the jab a day earlier). Two days short of 13 months – the first official coronavirus case in Australia was confirmed on January 25, 2020 – the vaccine has landed. With the exception of anti-vaxxers and conspiracy theorists – who make up 1.5% percent of the Australia population, according to Victoria’s chief health officer, Brett Sutton – most people welcome the vaccine’s roll-out. The Melbourne Institute’s Taking the Pulse of the Nation survey, carried out on February 1-6, 2021, found that “about two in three Australians are willing to be vaccinated and of…

Natalie Isaacs Founder and CEO of 1 Million Women, Natalie has worked over the past 12 years to achieve her goal of mobilising a million women into environmental action – the number has reached 950,000 so far. She believes one small action multiplied by millions changes the system. In 2013, Natalie and co-founder Tara Hunt won the UN’s Momentum for Change Award. In 2017, she won Australian Conservationist of the Year. In 2019, she celebrated 1 Million Women’s 10th anniversary with the Love Earth Festival featuring, among others, Midnight Oil, Katie Noonan and Emily Wurramara. In 2018, she published Every Woman’s Guide to Saving the Planet. • Earth Hour, when households and workplaces are urged to switch off the lights, will be held on March 27. Earth Day is April…