Not Just Getting Older, But Better

(Editor's Note: Jeremy L. White is a Certified Public Accountant and has authored several books with Ron Blue regarding finances including Surviving Financial Meltdown, Your Kids Can Master Their Money and Faith-Based Family Finances.)

Not Just Getting Older, But Better

I turned 45. Another way of saying 45 is “old,” according to my teenage daughters. But I’m feeling good about the proverbial “middle age crisis” after reading a recent study.  Researchers from the Brookings Institution found that middle age people make fewer financial mistakes than those who are younger or much older. 

Researchers found that age fifty-three is the best age where the fewest financial missteps occur.   Overall, people are really hitting their mental stride between forty-three and sixty-three. 

Although the ability to process and retain new information peeks around age twenty, the better type of wisdom – based on both experience and knowledge – actually increases with age. 

So, I began thinking about the mistakes we likely made when we were younger.  What do we know now that we wish we knew back then. If you could go back to those younger bodies and younger minds, this is likely the list of things you might do with all this “old person” wisdom. Younger guys, just start now and learn from others:

·        Spend less than you earn consistently and over a long period of time. 

·        Remember the longer-term your perspective the better your decision.

·        Save earlier in life is better than waiting until later. 

·        Learn from other people’s experience.  Here is a nugget from a client of mine, “When my friends were buying new Chevrolets in the 1960’s, I was buying farm land.  Years later, I got something to show for that decision and they don’t.”

·        Give more sooner in life.

·        Rely on God’s principles of money management instead of financial fads (such as Internet stocks, low or no down-payment mortgages, or gold).
 

·        Listen to my spouse, my parents and my advisor. 

·        Borrow less and paying less in interest.

·        Give more generously.

 Editors note:

Jeremy L. White is a CPA with Blythe, White & Associates in Paducah, KY and a Board Member of Men Who Win
For more about what the Bible says about money Luke 16:13


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