One of my clients is a man in his early seventies who came to New Zealand from Yugoslavia in the 1950's with just a few coins in his pocket. Although he came from a background of poverty, Vlad set himself a target of making $1million before he retired. He was a hard worker, and started in a labouring job. Soon he had saved enough to put down a deposit on a house. Over the next few years, Vlad bought several more properties, eventually building up a sizeable portfolio of industrial, commercial and residential property. When he retired five years ago, he sold his properties, not for $1million but for $7million. When Vlad came to see me, one of the first questions I asked him was what he wanted to use his $7million for. He couldn't give me an answer. Vlad had been so focussed on achieving his target, he had lost sight of the purpose of money in his life. His health was deteriorating, making travel difficult; his children were doing well financially, and now he had a big problem. He had all this money, with no obvious use for it, yet he was fearful of losing it.

Mary is another client who has a very different view about money. She came to see me just before her 65^th birthday. Mary had been living on an invalid's benefit which paid her just over $11,000 per year after tax. On turning 65 she would be entitled to NZ Superannuation, which would give her around $13,000 per year. Mary wanted to know how she could best invest her additional income, as she didn't need it to live on! After years of living on a meagre allowance, Mary had learned to live quite happily within her means.

By contrast, Sam and Judy are a couple in their forties who have combined incomes of over $200,000, yet who live from payday to payday. They both have stressful managerial jobs. They have a view that because they work so hard and have a high status in the community they deserve to have the best of everything - a house in the best suburb, a new car, an overseas trip once a year and private school education for their children. Much of this spending is done on a credit card rather than from saving. They constantly worry about keeping up with all their bills despite their high incomes and frequently argue about money.

The point of all of this is that whether you have enough money to be happy depends not on how much money you have, but on your attitude towards the money you have. Vlad's belief was that the more money he saved, the happier he would be -yet he had far more money than he really needed. Sam and Judy will continue to live beyond their means no matter how much money they have unless they change their belief that the more money they spend, the happier they will be. Meanwhile, the happiest of all of them is Mary, who despite her meagre income doesn't have a worry in the world.

Article by Liz Koh

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