Securing Your Future: Overcoming Fear of Aging and Maintaining Your Lifestyle in Retirement

Is There Life After Retirement? Exploring 5 Ways to Save for a Comfortable and Prosperous Future

When we dine at our favorite cafes, book a manicure at the salon, or purchase a fitness membership, we rarely consider that these simple pleasures might one day disappear from our lives. While we are young, active, full of energy, and employed, it’s challenging to think about what life will be like in 10, 20, or more years. It seems so far away!

Financial Literacy and Retirement Savings

In developed countries, people’s financial literacy is such that they begin saving for retirement as soon as they land their first job. As a result, by the time they retire, they have a good passive income, leading an active and fulfilling life, traveling, and enjoying their golden years.

Unfortunately, we lack such a savings culture. Retirement looms in the distance like a grim specter of poverty, endless economizing, and dreary queues at the clinic. Travel? Perhaps only to the dacha.

However, 60 years is far from old age; it’s a wonderful time when you can live for yourself, indulging in your favorite habits, pleasant health and beauty procedures, and trips abroad. Relying on financial assistance from the state is only for the incurable optimists, so let’s take our future into our own hands and start saving for a decent retirement independently.

Investing in Real Estate

The most obvious and familiar investment for us is real estate. An apartment is a tangible asset that won’t disappear. The principle of generating income is simple and understandable: rent out the “extra square meters” in exchange for rental payments. There are plenty of people wanting to rent housing, especially if it’s in the capital, so the addition to the pension will be relatively stable.

Now, let’s talk about the downsides. If the apartment wasn’t given to you as a gift or inherited, you first need to save up for it. And ensure that your savings don’t depreciate in the process, which can be lengthy.

Once you finally become the owner of additional living space, another nuance arises. Renting out housing is not entirely passive income. The apartment requires the owner’s attention, effort, and time. It also demands financial investments: periodic repairs, updating furniture and appliances; otherwise, the comfortable housing will quickly turn into a “grandma’s place” and won’t yield the expected financial return.

And tenants don’t always turn out to be “kittens”—a bad experience can cost the owner not only lost money but also significant stress. If new tenants aren’t found quickly, the income from real estate will simply vanish.

It’s also worth remembering that real estate is not an asset that can be quickly converted back into cash. If you decide to sell the apartment, it will take time. The market is constantly changing, the value per square meter fluctuates, and making predictions in our reality is difficult. There’s no guarantee that when selling, you’ll be in the black or at least recoup the invested money. It could even result in a loss. Remember the “corncob” houses near Kamarouka—they were once the pinnacle of dreams and cost as much as elite housing, but now their prices have dropped, and they can’t compete with new buildings.

Bank Deposits

The situation with bank deposits is currently complex. The economy is unstable, and many are wary of putting money into long-term deposits. However, Belarusian banks still have sufficient credit of trust from people, so this method of saving is quite viable.

Interest rates on deposits for terms longer than a year currently range from 11.5% to 19% in Belarusian rubles and from 0.01% to 3.5% in foreign currency. With such low yields, saving a decent amount will take a long time. Long-term deposits are mostly non-redeemable, meaning you can’t withdraw the money without losses before the term ends. It’s better to deposit your hard-earned money not in one bank but in several—to minimize the risk of losing everything at once.

Pension Insurance

This is a new type of savings that has appeared in Belarus relatively recently. Several companies now offer pension insurance. The mechanism is as follows: you determine the size and frequency of insurance premiums, and interest accrues on them. For example, one insurance company offers 4% per annum in rubles or 1-2% in foreign currency. Upon reaching retirement age, you will receive the accumulated “second” pension: all at once or in parts over a certain number of years.

Corporate Bonds

This type of investment is actively gaining popularity. Mechanically, it’s similar to bank deposits: you invest money in securities (bonds) and receive interest. How can you tell if a bond is truly valuable? For example, bonds of some leasing companies are secured by real estate. The cost of one bond ranges from $100 to $5,000, and you can buy any quantity. The yield on bonds is currently 7-8.5% per annum in foreign currency and up to 25% in Belarusian rubles—significantly higher than bank deposits.

For instance, if we deposit $5,000 in a bank at a maximum of 3.5%, after a year, our income will be just over $167. If we invest the same amount in bonds at 8.5%, we’ll earn $425 in a year. And if we invest over 10, 20, or 30 years and don’t spend the income, by retirement, we’ll have a substantial addition that will be enough for both our usual life and pleasures.

What will this addition be specifically for you? Specialists from “AVANGARD LEASING” can help you calculate the amount using their bonds as an example. You can reach them at +375445554020 or +375172054020.

What if the leasing company ceases to exist? The guarantor of the bonds is real estate, which cannot be taken abroad or sold without the investors’ knowledge. Therefore, bondholders will simply get their money back.

Tokens

A progressive and highly promising type of savings in terms of income. The investor buys electronic analogs of securities—tokens. In Belarus, tokens that can be used for pension savings are issued by “AVANGARD LEASING.”

This is one of the most authoritative leasing companies, which has been issuing corporate bonds since 2010 and conscientiously fulfills all obligations to investors. This year, the company added tokens to its savings instruments because it considers them even more attractive for long-term investments.

Why is this a suitable instrument?

Tokens are accessible to people with different income levels. The cost of one token is $20, and the interest rate is as high as 9.5% per annum. The income from tokens can be capitalized, meaning you can add the interest to the saved amount and increase the capital monthly. This type of income is not taxed, and there are no commissions or additional expenses. You can exchange tokens back for money at any time.

Anyone can buy tokens online on the financial platform finstore.by. The income will be paid to the bank card specified by the owner.

Now, let’s see how this works. If, from the average “500” each month, you save $50 for retirement in the form of tokens with a yield of 9.5% per annum, and use the accumulated interest to buy more tokens, then in 10 years, we will have a capital of about $10,000. In 20 years—$35,600. In 30 years—just over $100,000.

Not a bad addition to the pension, right? Further, the amount can be reinvested or distributed monthly and spent as you wish. And the earlier you start saving, the more pleasant bonus you will receive by the age of 50-60. The size of monthly payments can easily exceed the same average statistical…