Tamilnadu Chief Minister's Comprehensive Health Insurance Scheme

Tuesday 3 February 2015

The need to have a contingency/emergency fund

The need to have a contingency/emergency fund

  The need for insurance

 The need to purchase assets such as a house, a car etc.

 The need to save for retirement.
 
 The need for tax planning

o   Need to have adequate health insurance cover for the family to meet medical emergencies.
o   Need to provide sufficient funds for children’s  higher education and marriage- child insurance plan can address this need.
Ø  Child insurance plans come in two varieties- risk averse investors can choose child endowment plans, whereas investors who a=re willing to take the risk can choose child ULIPs with an equity fund.
Ø  Need to have a regular income or an annuity after  retirement. Insurance companies provide retirement  plans to address this need.  An individual can invest a lump sum amount, or during their working life they can make regular contributions towards them.
Ø  Purchase assets like a house, car etc
Ø  The bank offers a percentage of total value of the asset as loan and rese amount has to be paid by the individual called down payment, margin money or home owner’s equity

Ø  Retirement-
o   To have a sufficient/ regular source of income once they retire. Depends on the lifestyle that an individual needs to maintain with the cost of living during their retirement.
o   It can be partly addressed by investing in a retirement/pension plan from an insuranc e company after early age.
o   For working professionals retirement needs are partly addressed through the retirement benefits that their employer provides retirement, i.e. gratuity, employee provident fund (EPF) and pension.
o   Gratuity is an employee benefit paid by the  employer to the employee for the services rendered by the employee to company.
o   To be eligible for a gratuity the employee must complete give years of continuous service. Amount of gratuity is calculated based on number of years for  service rendered be the employee to company.
o   Gratuity eligibility, calculation, payment and tax treatment are defined by payment of gratuity act 1972.
Ø  Tax planning
o   While investing to fulfil these needs one should select investment products which make optimum use of income tax deductions.
o   Tax benefit should be considered to be an additional benefit and not the primary one
o   Difference between short term/medium term & long term needs
o   Short-term needs-funds required within a period of 1-5 years
§  Short-term needs include saving for emergencies etc.
o   Medium-term needs-funds required within a period of 5-15 years
§  Medium-term needs include savings for children’s education, marriage etc.
o   Long-term needs-funds required after more than 15 years
§  Long-term needs include retirement planning.

                   

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