{"id":3810,"date":"2014-04-03T09:59:26","date_gmt":"2014-04-03T14:59:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.cusjc.ca\/ottawainsight\/?p=3810"},"modified":"2017-11-19T20:23:39","modified_gmt":"2017-11-20T01:23:39","slug":"graduating-and-in-need-of-guidance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.cusjc.ca\/ottawainsight\/?p=3810","title":{"rendered":"Graduating and in need of guidance"},"content":{"rendered":"

About to graduate with no student loans, 22-year-old Hillary Johnstone asks professionals where she should start parking her money. <\/strong><\/p>\n

I know I\u2019m in a unique (and lucky) position.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ll be graduating this April with a Bachelor of Journalism degree and absolutely no student debt, thanks largely to scholarship money.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately the majority of my peers are in a different situation. The Canadian Federation of Students estimates the average student debt is $27,000. More than 60 per cent of post-secondary students will graduate with student loans. Yikes.<\/p>\n

As I begin work, I wonder where I should be putting my money. Retirement is a long way off and there are so many acronyms floating around: TFSAs, RESPs, RRSPs. I\u2019d also like to travel and own a home someday. What should I do?<\/p>\n

There was only so much information that applied to my current situation in \u201cThe Ultimate Kids Money Book\u201d that my dad bought me when I was nine (and that I recently found under my bed). So, I decided to call in the professionals.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019ve got to start thinking about what your life goals might be, and you might not even be able to know,\u201d said John DeGoey, a financial planner with Burgeonvest Bick Securities Limited in Toronto.<\/p>\n

\u201cYour goals might be saving for a marriage, buying a car, or for a down payment on a home,\u201d said DeGoey. \u201cIf those are your sorts of goals, then chances are keeping your money, safe, liquid and short term, something that is a high-interest savings account\u2026is probably the best thing you can do.\u201d<\/p>\n

DeGoey recommends I put my money into a Tax Free Savings Account for now, and an Registered Retirement Savings Plan down the road once I have a bigger tax deduction.\u00a0 RRSPs are a great way to save for retirement, because you can deduct contributions from your taxable income. However, there is a limit.<\/p>\n

A TFSA is a registered savings vehicle that you can contribute up to $5,500 to annually. It\u2019s an attractive savings option because you can withdraw funds at any time, penalty-free. You also aren\u2019t taxed on any investment income earned in the account.<\/p>\n

DeGoey wasn\u2019t the only one to suggest putting my money into a TFSA.<\/p>\n

Vickie Campbell is a financial advisor with Ryan Lamontagne Inc. an Ottawa financial planning firm. She also said a TFSA is best for me based on my short-term goal to travel.<\/p>\n

And even though retirement is more than forty years away, she did recommend I make a plan for retirement savings.<\/p>\n

\u201cDefinitely you will want to start thinking right away about saving for your retirement\u2026before you have a lot of other obligations, like a house,\u201d said Campbell.<\/p>\n

She said that saving up to travel is fine, but that it shouldn\u2019t come at the expense of my future.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you have more expensive years\u2026that money that you started saving right off the bat, will compound in terms of earnings on that, and you\u2019ll find that you have that little nest egg set away, before you\u2019ve even realized it,\u201d said Campbell.<\/p>\n

So where does all of this leave me? Feeling a lot guiltier about that dress I bought on the weekend that I probably don\u2019t need, and leaning towards opening a TFSA right now, but also a RRSP in the not so distant future.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s looking more and more like my RBC Little Leo savings account just isn\u2019t going to cut it anymore. I guess I\u2019ll just have to learn to embrace all these new acronyms.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

About to graduate with no student loans, 22-year-old Hillary Johnstone asks professionals where she should start parking her money. I<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3810","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.cusjc.ca\/ottawainsight\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3810","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.cusjc.ca\/ottawainsight\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.cusjc.ca\/ottawainsight\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.cusjc.ca\/ottawainsight\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/84"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.cusjc.ca\/ottawainsight\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3810"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.cusjc.ca\/ottawainsight\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3810\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4523,"href":"http:\/\/www.cusjc.ca\/ottawainsight\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3810\/revisions\/4523"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.cusjc.ca\/ottawainsight\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3810"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.cusjc.ca\/ottawainsight\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3810"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.cusjc.ca\/ottawainsight\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3810"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}