Retirement forum?

[Revelate]

Hmm, I'd flip that around notfancy:

Savings (and investments, personally I invest for savings rather than income but admittedly I'm not close to retirement), income, and credit profile are all important to a healthy financial situation.  Credit is one piece of the puzzle, it isn't the entire game.

I'd also question if it's different on public information sharing: I don't know it'd be easier or not as the issue I suspect isn't the individual board on the forum, but rather posting it in a public place anyway (hi Google!).

We have a bunch of people who have learned a lot over time regarding credit: I think it's safe to say (statistically) that the amount of knowledge on financial planning is less.  Does it make sense to take the time (which may be a decade or more) to try to turn this into a good financial resource / retirement management community, or rather use one of the currently established ones?  

At one point everyone was a stranger here too; granted most of us around for more than a few months grow comfortable with each other, but it's a shorter walk to get integrated into a different community that is dedicated to such things.  I'm honestly astounded there isn't a good forum community already for such things.  That said, the community here (Friendly, Supportive, Respectful) is admittedly not as easy to find elsewhere, but I can't imagine it's unique.

[thom02099]

Before responding, I'd like to defer to the OP, my-own-fico, to see if s/he would like to expand on the original post, to perhaps expand on their idea for such a forum.

[Jazzzy]

My 2 cents...

I would love to see such a category here on myFICO. There are credit issues specific to us aging baby boomers, and I have read other forums, without luck.

Many of the forums offered by the brokers are specific to trading. Also, many forums don't have moderators that are as good as the moderators here. I don't last long reading the demeaning, nasty comments on many of the other sites.

Let me give you an example that affected me just this week...

Thinking of applying for a big mortgage. 63 y/o. I was on the mortgage board asking about calculating income for a mortgage. Many of us at this age have a lot of assets, but maybe getting close to retirement. Did you know that if you are over a certain age, for certain mortgage types, you can take 70% of your assets that are not used for income, divide that number by 360, and count those assets as income? Very helpful fact to a person with retirement accounts. I asked, but I didn't get that information on the mortage board, however. It would have been nice to post questions about getting a mortgage at my age to folks that have maybe just been through it.

I'd love to see myFICO consider such a category. I remember when the Relationship category started. If a retirement community category doesn't make it, it can be discontinued. I think it could be a wealth of credit information to those of us at that stage in our lives. Don't see any harm in it.

[Revelate]

That's actually an excellent point Jazzy: the opportunity cost is near zero... and a good one as well regarding the ones run by the brokers.  

One question I do have, is whether a secondary forum that caters to that sort of information is worthwhile compared to putting that information in the much busier (in this example) mortgage forum?  Admittedly things get lost and sometimes very interesting tidbits like that one (thank you, I didn't know that, what age does it kick in?) get lost rather than put into the community knowledge base... though it might be ameliorated if we got a good FAQ?

Thom et al, I would suggest offering what opinions you do have: we poked the badger and folks will be looking at this thread prior to making a decision. 

To be clear since most of my posts have been on one side of the issue: I'm simply trying to understand the full use case given my own personal (and therefore limited) perspective on the forum as a change like this does have some tradeoffs (vis a vis the hassles of the CC App Approvals board), and I like seeing things fit into nice tidy categories... which is admittedly not always reasonable .

I'm more than fine with recommending any suggestion if it improves the nagivation of information, or quality of life on the forum, and FWIW given the low cost of implementation, it's probably worth simply trying it.

I think to make this somewhat more concrete, would folks mind suggesting what sorts of topics would typically be worthwhile to put in there?  

- retirement account discussions

- retirement planning

- retirement specific things (hard to quantify these individually) vis a vis mortgage acquisition without "traditional" wage-earner income; some of these things split hairs I think which gets difficult from a moderator perspective

I don't know if we'd see a lot of traffic on this subforum; however, there isn't much on the SL or Business Credit forums either compared to the larger ones, but they they're unquestionably useful for information organization.  Also as you state if it winds up being idle we can always airstrike it.

[thom02099]

What Jazzzy provided as information is the kind of thing(s) that could be useful to others; that's certainly something I didn't know and it's something that I will file in the old memory banks for future reference.

What my part of the suggestion was, just a place to discuss and share ideas that may be helpful in retirement; in making the transition to retirement as well as beyond.  I was thinking more folksy conversational type stuff versus the variety of subforums one finds at Motley Fool, for example.  Yes, there's a lot of information at that site.  Perhaps too much.  One can do a Google search on "retirement forums" and can find discussions.  I go to a specific site for info on RV/trailer travel, as that's my goal in retirement.  My suggestion off the OP's original suggestion, is more generic, a place under the auspices of MyFICO, to discuss things of interest to those in retirement or approaching retirement.  Not unlike the Business forum.  Since I'm not in business, I don't go there; doesn't mean it's not a valuable tool to others. 

As an example of things that could be posted/discussed, not just relative to credit cards, but credit in general -- dying.  We are going to die.  That is a fact.  Those of us in our 60s and 70s perhaps appreciate this more than someone in their 30s.  And as responsible consumers, we should be prepared to terminate credit relationships.

Being able to openly discuss, without judgment, the prospects of dying and what one has done, credit wise, to prepare for that event, could be invaluable to others.  To further this example, I had recent major surgery where a complication of the surgery could be death.  Because I have 2 kids and a partner who depend on me, I put together a document on my computer for them to access entitled "In Case Of Death", with instructions, among other things, for them to contact my credit card companies, and provided the account numbers and phone numbers to call.  Now, this is likely not of interest to the general population here at MyFICO, but such a suggestion could be to someone who's retired or will retire in the future.  It would be a pity for a similar type suggestion to get lost in a "busier" forum discussion, when having a specific forum for it would alleviate it being lost. 

Just more of my 2 cents worth !

[thom02099]

Here's another example of what could possibly go into such a subforum:

http://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/SmorgasBoard/Saving-for-my-future/td-p/2896358

[Revelate]

We're going to give it a try.  Jazzy's point effectively sold it, worst case it can always be archived and it might work out well for the community.

Thank you for the suggestion and feedback all!

[vanillabean]

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@Revelate wrote:

We're going to give it a try.  Jazzy's point effectively sold it, worst case it can always be archived and it might work out well for the community.

Thank you for the suggestion and feedback all!

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Thank you, Revelate and everyone. Your support is much appreciated.

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@thom02099 wrote:

Before responding, I'd like to defer to the OP, my-own-fico, to see if s/he would like to expand on the original post, to perhaps expand on their idea for such a forum.

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Somehow my subscription to this thread got dropped off, so I was pleasantly surprised this morning to see all the excitement.

My take on it is that when you get past forty years, your outlook on life changes. It's no coincidence that almost all the free-wheeling characters on Mad Men are younger than forty, lol. And when you hit fifty and qualify for AARP, your outlook on life gets another dose from that change. Younger people may understand the practical particulars, but cannot grasp the deeper layers of this emotional dimension any more than I can put myself in the shoes of a pregnant woman.

When you reach a certain age, people simply connect in another way. I think that's what such a forum can do, apart from being a place that unites the various types of information that pertains to the situation of approaching retirement. Let me add that credit is still very much a core component in my life. Even once people have retired, today's trend is to stay more financially active than in earlier times. Times may well have changed from when the sitcom Golden Girls was cancelled, not because it wasn't popular, but because the viewers were considered indifferent to advertising.

Thanks again!

[Revelate]

Enjoy!

http://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/Retirement-Topics/bd-p/Retirement

[the_jan_b]

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@thom02099 wrote:

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@Revelate wrote:

Would those in support of this provide some examples of such?

- Credit education in general: this forum is already one of the top resources for that

- Retirement / financial planning: There are tons of sites which focus on this specifically: is this just a community thing or is there something the Fidelity's / Schwab's / Motley Fool's, etc ad naseum's of the world aren't providing?

I see credit building / rebuilding as age agnostic personally, much as the FICO algorithm does; however, if there's a compelling reason that my front-side-of-40-self isn't seeing we'll be happy to bring it up to the administration.

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As the baby boomers' average nest egg is falling short and rebuilding is needed, a Retirement forum here at myFICO within Bouncing Back from Credit Problems might be useful. What do you do think?

When one who is approaching retirement age (or already there) many have lost a significant part of their retirement funds due to the financial collapse of a few years ago, and there's a certain amount of rebuilding that is necessary.  But age (NOT AAofA!) becomes a factor, as the timetable is dfferent for rebuilding for someone in their 50s versus someone in their 20s or 30s who are rebuilding due to their own decisions, and not so much influenced by external factors that many of us boomers faced or will face.  Discussions about 401(k) plans, IRA's, Roth IRA's, etc as they relate to retirement and credit/credit cards would be appreciative.  A place, under the general auspices of MyFICO, where like minded folks could discuss these unique issues.

Conversely, there are some of us who didn't get hit too bad with the financial collapse and were able to ride it out with minimal loss.  We have bounced back somewhat aggressively, and a Retirement forum could be a place for discussion of what we did and how we did it, to share with others who may be facing retirement. 

For many of us boomers, we are already there, facing retirement in maybe a matter of months or years.  Our perspective changes regarding finances; many of us have overcome obstacles but still face uncertainties.  Scores don't matter quite so much to some of us; to others they still do. Again, a matter of perspective.   But we don't get caught up as much in some of the general conversations on some of the forums here, because our perspective changes.  App sprees, for example, may not be as relevant to a boomer as more selective, strategically timed apps may be. 

If one is retiring this year, for example, the likelihood is that one will NOT be applying for more credit, and indeed may be looking to downsize in a variety of ways.  Social Security, Disablity, and how to survive on both if necessary becomes a real topic of discussion.  If one has a pension or 401(k) to supplement, so much the better, but there are a lot of folks who don't have either.  Trying to rebuild and save under those circumstances is WAY different for us than for someone in their 30s.  Having a place to share information with like minded folks would be a good thing. 

EDIT:  I don't know how successful a sub-forum like this would be.  I DO know that there's not a whole lot out there in the internet for these types of GENERAL discussions, where one can chat and post with like minded folks who are somewhat credit savvy after having spent some time here at MyFICO.  I've looked for this type of forum, and some are just way too technicially complicated to make much sense to the average consumer type person.  That would be me!  I just want to be able to discuss credit issues as they relate to retirement in layman's terms, in an understandble, relateable format. 

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Where's the Like button for this?  ^^^^