Pinoy Fund Runners

Helping Filipinos achieve financial freedom

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The Budget App der

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Jake


It was twelve months ago that I started managing my finance by having my own budget. The first application I used was actually an excel file forwarded to me by one of my officemates. I used it regularly and tracked my expenses religiously. The only problem was it takes a lot of effort to input the values and track the expenses. Also, it doesn't have any form of feedback on how far I am on the budget that I was able to set.

On April 2011, I started to look into Apps on mobile devices that would help me manage my finance with ease and provide me real-time report and trend on my overall finance. On my experience on budgeting, my criteria are as follows:



  • Able to set budget represented by different criteria
  • Should contain data for income and expense
  • Track reoccurring expenses
  • Monthly report for income vs. expense.
  • Should be able to tell you how far are you from your budget: Budgeted vs. Actual
  • Can be exported to excel
  • Graphs like pie chart, bar and line graphs to show trends in my finance
  • User friendly
So far, with all the available apps offered in the market, one app fits the criteria I made: Budgets for iPad by iBear LLC


http://ibearsoft.com/budgets/

What makes this app so cool is the interface (and the graphics). Because of the real-time update and report on my finance, I was able to make sound decisions over my expenses.

BTW, did I tell you it was free? Yes, its free. And the advertisement on the app is not that annoying when you are using the application.

I have been using it for almost 6 months, and because of this app, I have better control over my expenses.

TRY IT!!!

Unfortanately it doesn't have a counterpart for android. However, they were able to release a better application that has more features than Budgets. It is called "Money", also developed by iBear LLC, and available for android OS.

http://ibearsoft.com/money/

I haven't tried this app but I am very curious to explore it. Two cool things about it is the Bills and Calendar features.
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Types of Mutual Funds

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Jake


There are several types of mutual funds offered in the Philippines. But for this article, I will only tackle on funds that are commonly available in the Philippine market.





Common Types:

  
Investment Portfolio
Investment Objective
Risk
Potential Return
Equities
Corporate stocks and loansLong-term capital appreciation
Moderate to high
High
Balance
Combination of corporate stocks and bondsFixed income and capital growth
Moderate
Moderate
Bond
Government and corporate loansProvide interest income and principal preservation
Low to moderate
Low

Historical returns:

The historical returns showed below are based on historical performance of Sun Life Prosperity Funds.
Prosperity Philippines Equity FundProsperity Balanced FundProsperity Bond
2001
-10.05%
-1.44%
10.54%
2002
-17.68%
-12.76%
8.40%
2003
39.84%
31.51%
8.42%
2004
20.18%
19.09%
7.89%
2005
11.35%
9.98%
11.05%
2006
44.00%
34.29%
11.96%
2007
20.58%
17.21%
2.42%
2008
-37.60%
-23.73%
1.65%
2009
43.50%
21.70%
5.67%
2010
41.24%
30.67%
7.85%


You might be scared of investing on Equity or Balance due to the negative values. The negative values do not really mean that your investment will zeroed out. The negative values mean that the unit values you bought on the previous year, devaluated. It is just considered as "paper loss". The number of units that you bought is still intact.

In fact, if the unit values went down, for just an example "due to recession", you must take advantage of that one by buying MORE mutual fund units, because the unit values are lower.

I highly recommend investing on Equity fund for your long term investment such as Children's educational fund or retirement fund. I will show on the next table why equity fund is superior to any other fund if you are thinking long term.

i.e. Initial investment =10,000

Period = 10 years


Alas! At the end of the tenth year, Equity Fund showed it's superiority over other funds.

Which fund is best for me?

That really depends on your risk appetite, your current financial situation and your financial objective. Always remember the simplest investment principle: "The higher the risk, the higher the potential return"

What do you recommend?

If you don't have any intention to use any of your investment on the next ten years, I highly recommend for you to maximize return of investment through Equity Fund. If you are about to use your investment, for just an example 5 years before your child goes to college or 5 years before your retirement, switch or transfer your funds to a more conservative type of investment like Bond Fund. This will protect your investment from any market fluctuations while you are doing periodic withdrawals on your investment.

What are the other MF available in the market?
  • GS Fund – Pure Government securities or loans. Lower returns than bond fund.
  • Money Market Fund – Short-term loans or commercial papers issued by corporations. Investment returns is almost as low as the bank.
  • Foreign Currency – Consists of either corporate stocks or foreign government loans. For me, I don't recommend investing on dollars. It's growth is just being nullified by it's devaluation.
If you have more questions about MF, feel free to email me or set an appointment to enlighten you in detail about this investment.
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The ideal way to save money

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Jake





There are three types of people on their methods of saving money.


  1. Income - Expense = Savings
    This type of saver tends to spend his or her income first for expenses, and whatever it is left, will be considered savings. Most people failed to save in this process due to their perception that they are spending money below their income. This clearly shows that the person does not keep track on his/her expenses and only relies on what is left on their ATM savings account. We usually termed this as a "Luck" Saver.

    i.e. At the beginning of the month, the person receives an income of 20,000. Since the person relies on perception when spending, he never realized that he/she has spent 19,950 pesos at the end of the month. Before the 2nd months income, he/she was able to save only 50 pesos.
  2. Expense - Income = Savings
    These are the people who haven't received their income, but already have their expenses lined-up. These are the people who were able to accumulate bad debts from loans or credit-cards. They subjected themselves to spending spree and totally OUT-OF-CONTROL.

    i.e. At the beginning of the month, the person has accumulated already 10,000 peso worth of credit-card expense. When his/her 20,000 pesos income came, the person is already limited to budget his/her remaining 10,000 pesos to a whole month. If this habit will continue, he/she will remain on bad-debt.
  3. Income - Savings = Expenses
    This is the most ideal way to save money and accumulate wealth. The moment your income is provided, set aside a portion of that money for you savings basket. The remaining money will be used for your expenses. In this way, you will be disciplined to limit your expenses and not to extend your savings. With this method you will be able to set your expenses and savings fixed.

    i.e. When the person received his/her 20,000 peso income, 10% has already been set-aside for his/her savings. The person is now free to spend the remaining 90% on anything he wants. He/she will be able to accumulate 24,000 pesos at the end of the year if he/she continue to do this type of discipline for 12 months.
So what kind of a "Saver" are you?
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Crazy over Mutual Funds

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Jake


You already heard a lot of people investing on condominiums, stocks, government bonds, businesses, loans and time deposits. Let me share to you, my personal favorite investment instrument: Mutual Funds.

I could not describe better than what is place on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutual_fund

So instead, I would convince you on why Mutual Fund is considered a sound investment.


See Figure below:





YOU as an investor trust you hard earned money in the bank. In return, the bank gives you a small percentage growth on your savings ranging from 0.5% to 2.75% p.a., guaranteed. This is one way for the bank to attract more investors. Sounds generous? Wait until you look at the 2nd figure.




The money that you deposited in the bank is used by the bank institution to invest on a higher earning investment instrument. i.e. Bonds, Loans, Stocks etc. This investment instruments gives an average interest yield ranging from 6% to 17% p.a., potentially even higher. If you ever wonder why the banks are confident to give you interest yield on your savings deposit of 0.5% to 2.75%, it is because the banks are confident they will be able to get higher interest yield out from stocks, loans, bonds, etc.

The purpose of Mutual Funds is that it gives investors an opportunity to have direct access on these investment instruments that gives an investment growth higher that what is returned by the bank.








So how does it work? It is best explained with this picture:



You buy Mutual fund units called NAVPS (Net Asset Value Per Share). The unit prices changes every business day, which depends highly on the market or economy. You earn on mutual funds by using the same principle as Buy & Sell, "Buy Low, Sell High".

Advantages of Mutual Funds:
  • Managed by a full-time professional fund manager whose main objective is to analyze investment products available in the market and select those who yield best.
  • Requires low capital to start your investment. Usually, it requires only Php 5,000 for your initial investment and Php 1,000 for you subsequent investment.
  • You have multiple funds to choose from depending on your risk appetite or financial objectives.
  • Fund managers ensure that the money you invested is diversified to mitigate the risk of losing all of your investments. Remember the saying "Do not put all your eggs in one basket". For equity Mutual Funds, investment is diversified not just on different companies, but different industries as well. This reduces the risk of losing all your investment to a mere NULL.
  • Liquid Investment. You could pull out your investment or sell your MF units, ANYTIME, either partial or full.
  • Highly regulated by the Securities and Exchange Commission
  • Potentially higher returns
  • You could easily purchase Mutual Funds directly through SEC-Licensed Certified Investment Solicitors.
  • Transparent. Your updated on your investment regularly either through mail or online
  • Flexible. You may switch you funds anytime and you are not obliged to invest regularly.
Risks of Mutual funds:
Before I enumerate the risks, let me emphasize that NO investment bears NO risk. But even though there are risks on investing on Mutual Funds, these are properly mitigated by the advantages stated above. You have several funds to choose from, depending on your risk appetite. Remember that he higher the risk, the higher the potential return.
  • Returns are not guaranteed. Fund value depends on the current unit prices of the fund you chose.
    • This is true; however, history shows that Mutual Funds, on a 5-year average, performed higher than time deposit, even higher than inflation rate.
  • Fluctuates with market or economy.
    • Especially if you chose equity fund.
    • However, on a 10-year average, equity fund shows that its investment return is superior to any other fund.
Summary:The objective of mutual funds is not to replace your savings in the bank. Your bank should only serve as an emergency fund and other short term financial expenses such as food or clothes. But for your long term investment, I really recommend go for Mutual Funds due to it’s higher potential return. It’s liquid, flexible, managed by professional fund manager, and most of all, it is diversified. Because of it’s advantages, it is considered as safe and secure investment.
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How much Educational Fund do you need to prepare?

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Jake




There are several factors that contribute on the Education Fund you need to prepare for your children's High School or college Education.

  • Tuition Fee
  • Miscellaneous Expense – i.e. allowance, books, uniform
  • Inflation Rate – Natural increase of miscellaneous expenses. Average inflation rate is around 5.8% (1995-2009)
  • Tuition Fee Increase – According to CHED, tuition fee increases 12.25% annually.
  • No. Of Children
  • Post-education interest rate – The interest rate of your investment instrument where your retirement fund will be used during your children's schooling.
  • School Years
  • No of years before your child start High School or College
Let us use the following example for our step-by-step calculation of educational fund:

  • Annual Tuition Fee(Current) – Php 114,174.00 (Ateneo de Manila University)
  • Annual Miscellaneous Expenses (Current) – Php 30,000.00
  • Annual Tuition Fee Increase – 12.25%
  • Inflation Rate – 5.8%
  • No. of Children – 1
  • Post-education interest rate – 2.5%
  • School Years – 4
  • No. of years before child start College – 15 yrs.
Step 1: Calculate future educational expenses. This includes tuition fee and miscellaneous expenses.

We will be using the Compounding Interest Formula for us to get the future value for tuition fee and miscellaneous expense.


Step 2: Calculate Real Interest Rate. This is the adjusted tuition fee increase and inflation rate

To make simple we will just deduct the Tuition Fee Increase and Inflation rate with Post-education interest rate

Adjusted Tuition Fee Increase = 12.25%-2.5% = 9.75%

Adjusted Inflation Rate = 5.8%-2.5% = 3.3%

Step 3: Calculate Total Educational Fund needed based on the result of Step 3

We need to use simple interest amortized loan formula. Yup, it's a bit complicated, instead, we will use the MS Excel Function "PV" to get the initial fund needed.

Fund for Tuition Fee = PV(AdjustedTuitionFeeIncrease,SchoolYears,-TutionFeeFuture,0)

=PV(0.0975,4,-646193.32,0)= PhP2,059,480.35

Fund for Miscellaneous Expense = PV(Adjusted Inflation Rate,SchoolYears,-MiscFeeFuture,0)

=PV(0.033,4,-69888.59,0)= PhP257,929.82

Add both fund and you will have the total Educational Fund needed:

PhP2,059,480.35 + PhP222,741.67 = PhP2,317,410.16

In summary, for you to be able to school your child at Ateneo, you need to accumulate 2.28M pesos worth of educational fund on the next 15 years.

Of course, this is not accurate as we could not predict the inflation rate and tuition fee increase on the next following years. The figures shown above should give you an idea of how much you most likely be needing in the future.
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How much do you need for your retirement fund?

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Jake

Before we compute for our retirement fund, we must consider the definition of retirement. From Colayco's books and from financial institutions.

"Retirement is being able to have sufficient fund or income generating assets that are able to sustain your current lifestyle. It is the capability to achieve financial freedom without having to worry about money to support your needs and wants".

This is the stage in life that we consider as 100% Passive Income.

We need to consider the following data for us to compute the needed retirement fund:



  1. Current Personal Expenses – If we are to maintain our current lifestyle, no need to adjust this value. If you want to increase the quality of your lifestyle in the future, increase this value.
  • i.e. Maintain Lifestyle = 30,000, Improved Lifestyle = 50,000
  1. Average Inflation rate – average inflation rate from 1995-2009 is 5.8%. We will use this value for our example
  2. Retirement Age – Government standard is age 65. But surely, majority of us would like to retire earlier than 65.
  3. Life Expectancy – This is the age wherein you will be "Taken out from the picture"
  4. Post-retirement interest rate – This is the interest rate of your investment instrument where your fund will be place during your retirement.
Step 1: Determine your annual future expense at the beginning of your retirement

i.e. Current monthly expense = 30,000. Annual expense (PV) = 360,000
Average inflation rate(i) = 5.8%
Post-Retirement Interest rate = 2.5%
Current age = 30
Desired Retirement Age = 55
Life Expectancy = 75

Years before retirement (p) = 55-30 = 25

Using compounding interest formula:



FutureValue = 1,473,819.14

You may also use the MS Excel Function "FV" to calculate future value.

i.e. =FV(0.058,25,0,-360000,1)


Step 2: Calculate the Real Interest Rate.

During retirement, our expenses will still increase over time due to inflation. The Real Interest Rate adjusts the rate of return of your investment if inflation rate was to consider.



From our example:



If we experienced a negative value on our Real Interest Rate, it means that the inflation rate is higher than the interest rate.

Step 3: Calculate the retirement fund needed to be able to sustain lifestyle from Age 55 to Age 75

The formula here is a bit complicated. We will be using the Simple Interest Amortized Loan Formula to get the retirement fund needed:


PMT = -1,473,819.14 (this should be negative)

i = -3.119% (This should be negative since inflation rate is higher than

n=Retirement Years = 75-55 = 20 Years

PV= 41,801,703.26

You may Also use the MS Excel Function "PV" to retrieve the same value.

=PV(-0.03119,20,-1473819.14,0)

The graph below shows a good illustration of your fund and expense during your retirement years:


From the example, for him/her to retire comfortably, he/she needs to accumulate a total fund of 41.8M at the age of 55.

Did it give you a headache? Which one? How to do the calculation or how to accumulate 41.8M pesos worth of retirement fund?
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Why do you need to plan for your children’s education?

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Jake

 

I graduated from De La Salle University, one of the Top 3 Universities here in the Philippines, and also has the most expensive tuition fee among the three. During my college years, my parents are incapable of paying DLSU's school expenses. Fortunately, my parents took an education plan (when I was one year-old) which covered almost 80% of my total school expenses. The total amount of money invested by my parents was around 23K, but it was able to cover almost 450K worth of tuition fee expenses in DLSU. Do you think it's worth investment? DEFINITELY.

According to CHED, tuition fee increases around 12.25% per annum. On top of that, there are also increasing miscellaneous expenses (i.e. allowance, food, uniform, books) caused by inflation rate. Average inflation rate is around 5.8% (based from 1995-2009).

If we are to consider this annual increase, this will be the projected annual tuition of known universities here in the Philippines

  
2010
2015
2020
2025
2030
UA&P
201,600
359,271
640,257
1,141,000
2,033,375
DLSU
139,165
248,006
441,971
787,635
1,403,644
ADMU
114,174
203,469
362,602
646,193
1,151,580
Assumption
106,237
189,325
337,396
601,272
1,071,526
San Beda
80,832
144,051
256,712
457,487
815,287
UE
60,279
107,423
191,439
341,162
607,985
UST
56,778
101,184
180,320
321,348
572,673
AMA
53,071
94,578
168,547
300,367
535,284
Lyceum
47,628
84,878
151,261
269,561
480,385
UP
45,360
80,836
144,058
256,725
457,509
Holy Spirit
41,001
73,068
130,214
232,054
413,544

You don't need to plan for your children's education if you plan to school your children in a 2 year vocational courses. But of course, as a parent we would like to provide them, as much as possible with the best quality education there is. If we are to anticipate the future costs of these universities, do you think your hard earned savings is enough? That's why you need to plan for your children's education.
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