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Title : Keeping A Financial House In Order - Can We Help?
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Keeping A Financial House In Order - Can We Help?

If HGTV had a show like Flip or Flop or Fixer Upper that dealt with keeping your financial house in order, maybe many of us would be better off. Watching craftsmen and decorating experts transform an OK house into a showcase home has lots of appeal. We realize the process isn't quite as seamless as a 60 minute TV show makes it look. Anyone who has been been through a house remodeling knows it is messy, expensive, and frustrating.

Even so, millions of us watch the dream unfold before our eyes, wishing Chip and Joanna would pay us a house call. So, I wonder what would happen if there was a Financial Flip version. A household with decent income but marginal planning skills and the inability to resist the lure of of consumer society finds itself deeply in debt, just when college costs loom, retirement beckons, and the credit cards are bending under the weight of excessive debt.

In fly the experts, who in 60 minutes, right the sinking financial ship, find painless ways to fund important needs and erase all that nasty credit card debt. To celebrate their new-found financial wellness, the family takes a 7 day Caribbean cruise while the TV hosts way goodbye!

OK, that last bit is a little snarky. Celebrating financial fitness by taking a $10,000 cruise would be stupid. But, in the wonderful world of television fantasy, it would make perfect sense.

In the real world, not the one visited by TV stars putting everything back where it belongs with little pain or sacrifice, financial wellness actually takes work. It requires someone to adopt a long term mindset, one that doesn't mesh well with an instant gratification culture. It is built on a solid understanding of consequences, of the impact on tomorrow of decisions made today. 

To be able to retire and live a decently comfortable life doesn't require rich parents, a six figure income from a prestigious career, or living a deprived life beforehand. It does require at least a dollop of luck and fortuitous timing. What happens in the world's economies, the political climate at the time, even the state of one's own health at that moment, can play an outsized role.

Finally getting to my central thesis, your financial house must be constructed on a solid foundation. This is where I suggest retired folks can help. We have a lifetime of experience: mistakes, successes, missed opportunities, and decisions that turned out well. It should be our job to be the Financial Flip resource for younger generations. 

I teach Junior Achievement classes to 4th and 5th graders in a lower middle income neighborhood not far from my home. The kids are intelligent, street-smart, welcoming, and grossly unaware of how the monetary system that controls their lives really works.

As I explain the basics of our economics, I can see eyes open wide. When we talk about saving for the future, using education to help them achieve their goals, the importance of STEM knowledge, it is a new world for them.  They sense this awareness gives them more of control if, and that is a big "if," they understand how much of what they do today affects tomorrow.

They know how to navigate the Internet much better than I. The online world is where they live. But, that world places value on everything being instant and available now. That world does not teach knowledge, it teaches reaction.

I would venture to guess too many of those in the 20's and 30's, raised in that world, also lack a real understanding of how the way they treat money and their resources today will impact their 50s', 60's, and beyond. Most understand that Social Security will probably be a crippled version of itself by the time they require some assistance. Even so, saving for retirement is not on their horizon. Working forever, assuming "things will work out," I'm not sure what they are thinking. Obviously, there are financially smart younger people around. I contend they are more likely to be the exception rather than the rule.

But, it is not too early for those school kids, nor is it too late to help our children's generation. I suggest we have the responsibility, the time, and the life-experience to make a difference in the financial wellbeing of the generations that will follow us.

How? Well, Junior Achievement volunteering is one path. So is talking to your grandkids about money, how credit works, and what siren calls of society they should tune out (get the parent's permission first !). Offer to present a Basics Financial Literacy class to a Boy or Girl Scout Troop near you. Most churches offer financial counseling and seminars. Can you help? Since it is never too late to make some sort of course correction, look for a chance to mentor or counsel at a Senior Center.

For those of us with some wear on our tires, it is common to bemoan the lack of financial education younger folks seem to possess. More beneficial and certainly more productive is to share what you know.

You may think you are not financially savvy enough to help in this way. I disagree. If you are retired, relatively comfortable in whatever income and living standard you have chosen, then you are a winner in the world of financial decision-making. Don't downplay what you know and what you can pass on to others.


Find a way to pay it all forward (without using a credit card!).


Note:after spending over a month trying to get Wordpress to do what I want, I have shelved the move away from Blogger for now. I don't want to add a bunch of features, places for advertisements, and interactive options...something WP excels at. So, for now, I'll leave things be.

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