Encouraging Retirees to start the Sorted journey

12 February 2009

Encouraging New Zealanders to start the Sorted journey

The Retirement Commission says a new campaign will encourage New Zealanders to take action to get their finances sorted, and in doing so, help them cope with the current financial uncertainty.

Retirement Commissioner Diana Crossan says better money management and planning provides people with the confidence to make sensible decisions about how they spend their money and what they can save for the future.

“In difficult financial times, people need to manage their money more carefully.  That requires goal-setting, planning and budgeting.  This new campaign will feature New Zealanders who have started the Sorted journey.  The aim is that people watching the ads will be inspired and motivated by the stories and will go to sorted.org.nz or order a copy of the booklet, Sorted – Your guide to getting there,” said Diana Crossan.

The first face of the campaign is 42 year old, Liz Price.  Her main concern was that she had made no provisions for her retirement. 

“I knew I had to do something soon.  To a certain extent I didn’t want to think about retirement.  Also, I didn’t really know where to start.  The Sorted website got me going.  I used the Quick Retirement calculator to work out a ball park figure of what savings I might need to retire on.  That was a bit of a shock but maybe that was what I needed to motivate me to start preparing for retirement.”

She also had to work out how much she could realistically save each month so she used the Budget calculator to find where the money was going now, and how much she might be able to save.

“I felt it was really important for me to be realistic about the budgeting.  Budgeting doesn’t mean depriving yourself of all treats and being miserable and tight.  For me, it’s more about knowing where the money is going, prioritising my spending and making good decisions,” said Liz Price.

“It wasn’t as hard as I thought it would be.  I’m really pleased I faced up to it.  There’s nothing like taking action when something’s worrying you.  It’s now a priority for me to reach my savings target every month.”

The new campaign starts on 15 February and will feature different New Zealanders each month for the next few months.

Resources used by Liz Price include:

www.sorted.org.nz

Budget calculator: www.sorted.org.nz/calculators/budget/

Quick Retirement calculator: www.sortedorg.nz/calculators/quick-retirement/

Sorted booklets

Sorted – Your guide to getting there

Retirement planning

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