Laying the Foundations

Growing your Superannuation

Superannuation is a long term savings plan designed to help you save for retirement. There are several things you can do to grow your super savings.

 It’s not just about contributing more, it’s also about making the most of what you’ve already saved.

  • Consolidate your super
  • Make your own contributions
  • Make use of the Government co-contribution
  • Salary Sacrifice
  • Forming a disciplined approach to your investment strategy
  • Self Managed Superannuation

Have you thought about a self managed super fund? There’s a lot to consider. Setting up your own self-managed super fund can have its advantages, but it is not for everybody. You can have greater control of your investments and retirement, however you also need the skills and time to manage your own fund. We can review this option with you and help you with your investment strategy.

Investing for Growth

You buy a growth investment anticipating that it will increase in value over time.

Shares in a company, units in a managed fund and real estate (land and the buildings on it) are typical growth investments. 

Investing for Income

Income investments usually pay interest or dividends, depending on the kind of investment they are. Investments that pay regular interest are known as fixed-income investments, and include bonds, term deposits and cash investments. Your current situation and financial goals will have an impact on which option best suits your needs.

Planning ahead for Retirement and Retirement planning

When approaching retirement, an important consideration is how to invest your savings, including superannuation, so that you are able to provide yourself with regular income throughout retirement. When it comes to choosing how to structure your investments in retirement, it is important that your savings are invested in a tax effective way while still maintaining flexibility to cover any unforeseen changes in your circumstances. It may also be appropriate to gain access to Centrelink benefits.

Transition to Retirement

Transition to retirement strategies are designed to give you greater flexibility as you approach retirement. If eligible, you may access your super through a pre-retirement pension (a regular income stream drawn from your super savings).

Using a transition to retirement strategy could enable you to ease your way into retirement by winding back your working hours (eg. moving from full-time to part time work) and supplementing your income with a pre-retirement pension.

Centrelink

We can provide Centrelink information for people who are retired or who are planning their retirement including pensions, allowances, concession cards, loan schemes, claim forms, assessment for residential aged care and a range of specialist services.

Understanding Aged Care

Looking into the costs associated with moving a loved one into care can be quite complex. There are a number of areas to consider, from the day-to-day living expenses through to what government subsidies you may be entitled to.

Residential aged care and home care pricing structures sometimes vary between providers and will also depend on your current income and assets. We can help you work through the following:

  • Fees and charges and what they mean
  • Estate planning
  • Pensions
  • Government subsidy
  • Keeping or selling the residential home

Estate Planning

It is important to plan for the future management of your assets if you become unable to manage them for yourself. This should form a part of your retirement planning and involves making some serious and sometimes difficult decisions. You need to consider making or updating your will, granting a power of attorney, setting up trusts etc.