​Gary Lee Hayes, 70, wished he'd been more regimented with his savings and investments. The California resident briefly served in the Navy, got a degree in public administration, and worked in mental health and handyman positions. He had little financial literacy growing up and said he didn't focus on building his career to be more lucrative.

Two of Hayes' main money regrets are not investing in Verizon stock early on and not saving at least 10% of his income each month. He also said he was somewhat too liberal with his spending throughout his life, though he said he didn't purchase anything too far beyond his means. He also avoided putting money into his 401(k) and said he should have chosen more stable investments instead of short-term ones.

"You can't expect that you're all of a sudden going to win the lottery," said Hayes, who receives $1,846 a month in Social Security and lives in government-subsidized housing. "You can't expect that someone's going to pass and leave you an inheritance that will make your life more comfortable."

A major theme among survey respondents was that they lacked knowledge about investing. For some, this meant not saving enough; for others, it meant falling into some common investing mistakes.

Nancy Seeger, 64, who lives outside Cleveland, said she made investing mistakes that had long-term repercussions on her finances. Seeger, who has two master's degrees, worked for many years as a teacher and health librarian. She was laid off earlier this year from her $74,000-a-year job and while she's not ready to fully retire and is still looking for work, she worries she won't be able to land another decent-paying job given her age.
She told BI she wished she could have saved more when her children were young and started retirement funds earlier. While she had some savings, she began consistently putting more into her investments at age 50.

She also didn't realize that because she has a pension in addition to receiving Social Security when she retires, she would be affected by a little-known Social Security provision that would lower her monthly check. Between her pension of $713 monthly and Social Security, which she expects will be between $1,200 and $1,400 monthly, she'll have just enough to cover her rent.
"I was fortunate to get a small inheritance from my parents and an aunt, which saved me, but it's unlikely that I will be able to do the same for my children, and that bothers me a lot," Seeger said. "I had hoped to travel, and I wanted to leave money for my kids, but both of those goals are compromised now."

Calculating how much you need for retirement requires difficult estimations of life expectancy, spending in retirement, and retirement resources. It will require a quarterly meeting where you and I will sit down and discuss estimations of life expectancy, spending in retirement, and retirement resources.

When I was younger, there was an older woman that lived around the corner from me. Her name was Nellie. She had Alzheimer’s but the neighborhood kids said that she was a witch so we were all cautious of her. One day, my sister and I were playing outside and my sister did not have any shoes on. She ended up stepping on glass and her foot was bleeding a lot. We had no choice but to go to the house we were trying to avoid. Nellie ended up "patching" my sister up that day. She was not a witch. The senior population is an important one. The following website contains information regarding this unique demographic: www.caring.com/senior-living/memory-care-facilities/california

Believe it or not, home-builder's are using lottery systems to determine who purchases a home. Do not believe me? Try to purchase a home in the River Island Community of Lathrop, CA. Of course, since I'm a seasoned real estate professional, I know that the home-builders are also using other factors to determine who the buyer will be but the fact still remains, that a lottery system is also one of the factors. I think that the only solution to living a lifestyle that does not involve indentured slavery is to purchase a property where you can plant vegetables and raise livestock. Another thing to note is that since people are more willing to commute longer for work, traffic conditions are going to get worse. Thankfully, traffic conditions are not as bad as India, Middle East, or SoCal.....yet.

So is it all doom and gloom as far as the real estate market in California is concerned? It is not. My personal real estate objectives are still within reach and reasonable. Are your real estate objectives within reach and reasonable?

Call me if you would like to discuss your real estate objectives.

Homeowners who are 55 or over, severely disabled, or whose homes were destroyed by wildfire or natural disaster, may transfer the taxable value of their primary residence to a replacement primary residence:

• Anywhere in the state
  
• Regardless of the location
  
• Regardless of the value of the replacement primary residence --even if it’s greater in value (with an upward adjustment in the tax basis if the replacement property is greater in value)
  
• Within two years of the sale of the original primary residence§Up to three times (although there’s no limit for those whose houses were destroyed by wildfire or natural disaster)These rules are in effect on and after April 1, 2021.
  

If you are interested in selling your home but are concerned regarding your property tax liability increasing, then give me a call and we can discuss this concern.

“Everything that should be up is up and everything that should be down is down,” Gov. Gavin Newsom said in January when lifting California’s regional stay-at-home order.

Today, that statement holds true for many aspects of California’s pandemic response — vaccinations are up, infections are down, hospitalizations are down — but rings hollow when it comes to the state unemployment department, where numbers are trending in the wrong direction. According to figures released Thursday, the Employment Development Department’s backlog of unresolved claims had ballooned to 1.08 million as of May 1, up from 1.05 million the week before and 1.03 million the week before that. The logjam has contained more than 1 million claims for 13 straight weeks.

Around 450,000 of those claims are pending EDD action, while the remainder are awaiting certification from jobless Californians, according to agency documents. But residents have long said jammed phone lines and tech glitches have hampered them from certifying claims, and data shows EDD’s call center is also going in the wrong direction. The agency answered less than 6% of the 4.8 million calls it received from April 24 to May 1, with each person calling about 12 times in an attempt to get through. That’s significantly worse than in late March, when EDD answered 10.5% of calls and each person called about eight times.

• Assemblymember David Chiu, a San Francisco Democrat: “My office has been receiving countless calls from desperate constituents, many of whom are in tears, some of whom are on the brink of homelessness and even some of who have threatened suicide.”
  

Lawmakers this week recommended rejecting Newsom’s budget proposal to create a new Department of Better Jobs and Higher Wages within the state labor agency, noting that “a new bureaucracy” wouldn’t help reduce the claim backlog. EDD, apparently cognizant of the Legislature’s mounting frustration, published this week a list of new tools and resources to improve customer service.

Newsom also appears aware that EDD is a liability. The same day Secretary of State Shirley Weber said enough signatures had been gathered to force a recall election, the governor’s unemployment fraud task force announced it had arrested 68 people and opened another 1,641 cases.

The work-from-home trend is prompting city dwellers to pack up, shop, and move to the suburbs, where the homes are both bigger and less expensive. Take smaller market Chula Vista as an example: The city with a population of approximately 270,000 saw unusually strong buyer demand push active listings down 54 percent year-over-year in August as home prices jumped 11.4 percent.

Instead of living in a large building with shared ventilation and little space, people now want a larger home, a yard, and a pool. Urban flight has been gradually occurring over the past five years, but the pandemic has accelerated that trend. Overall, 43 percent of potential home buyers say the pandemic has made them more likely to look in rural towns and city suburbs instead of dense city centers.

With the above said, there will always be people who, given the option, will want to live in a denser environment.