There was a time, back in the ’80s, when you’d be looking forward to retirement and all of its luxury. You’ve spent a lifetime of hard work, you’ve explored every bit of your potential and reached the highest of positions. And now, it’s time to enjoy life through the eyes of an adventurous 60-year-old exploring the globe in their RVs. Perhaps you’d be having other plans in mind. After all, you’d have a pension securing you for the rest of your life, money was not an issue anymore.
Unfortunately, times have changed. Defined pension benefits are no longer in the picture, the 10-year-treasury bond became 2.9% as of 2018 (as opposed to the 15% in the 1980s), and the work style of workers has greatly changed altogether. More seniors are still going to work passing their 60’s, and the level of self-employment is taking over the employment system for millions of Americans.
That’s why you’ll find more and more people exploring the options of IRAs by the day, as they need to take matters into their own hands. Even if you’ve enjoyed a long life of employment, all of these changes in the economy are indeed alarming. So, imagine working as a freelancer or being self-employed with no one else taking care of your retirement plans for you.
While some retirement plans are pretty well known, like the 401(k), traditional IRA, and pension plans, there are other unconventional ones that could save you in these difficult times we’re going through. Some of these options are:
1- Investing in Precious Metals
Long before the rise of our current currencies, gold, silver, and platinum have been the main form of trade. Centuries later, they still bypass the fluctuations in the economy, looking down at the inflation-scene from their high-horses. The best thing about investing in precious metals is that there are many ways to do that. Starting from collecting physical gold in the form of jewelry, bars, or coins, you can also roll over your traditional IRA into a self directed IRA to hold your precious metal investment. There’s also the option of investing in gold exchange-traded funds or investing in gold-mining.
2- Going into Real Estate
Real estate also offers great options of diversity, allowing you to hold real estate in your IRA account or real estate investment trust. Also acting as an inflation hedge, you’ll be able to watch your ROI multiplying as the property values increase over time.
3- Investing in Cryptocurrency
Cryptocurrencies, the most known of which is Bitcoin, have become the latest and fast-growing trend in recent years. It’s become so widespread that the IRS has even approved investing in digital currency for retirement plans. This means you can simply own digital currency or add bitcoins into your IRA account for a structured and secure retirement plan.
4- Health Saving Account
Intended mainly for health insurance purposes, some creative individuals make other uses of their high-deductible health plans. As the amount of money that you put in your health saving account increases over the years, and on the occasion that you don’t end up using that money for medical expenses, you’ll find it rolling over year to year. When you’ve reached your retirement age, you can use the amount that’s built up for other non-medical expenses, or ensure you have enough health insurance to save you in the unfortunate event of needing medical attention.
Being able to look forward to a peaceful and luxurious life in retirement should be a given for everyone, we’ve worked hard all of our lives after all. And yet, in an age where the economy is very unstable and raided with fluctuations, we find that we need to take matters into our own hands. Luckily for us, there are a lot of other unconventional ways to plan for secure and worry-free retirement life. If we start planning early enough, we won’t have anything to worry about… maybe except deciding on our next adventure destination. But who doesn’t want that to be the biggest of their worries?
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