| Monday, October 24, 2005 |
| Do Women have a fear of commitment - to investing? |
Yes, according to this article published in the Christian Science Monitor. This fear is detrimental to women's later financial health. More women need to start investing earlier. The solution, according to the article, is investment clubs and education.
While I agree that more education is great and that investment clubs do provide a nice "hands on" educational opportunity, I am not sure that is really enough. As indicated by the quote below, women have a vastly different view of money than men and the current retirement products are all very much crafted and designed by men for men.
"Women see money as a pond or a lake. When they dip into that pond, the level of the pond can start to be drawn down. They think of this as a finite source of security in many respects. Whereas men may think of wealth as a river running by. When you pull water out, the water will continue to flow."
I am not sure what the solution is - I did not start investing as early as perhaps I should, but at least I used those early working years to buy real estate and pay off credit cards, student and car loans. Even if I had started investing early there is no guarantee it would have grown much. I remember a conversation I had with a co-worker early in my career. She was about 40 and I was about 25. I asked her opinion regarding the mutual funds available in our retirement plan. She said, "I have no idea, I have been putting all my money in the money market fund. All those other funds are too confusing". At the time I was working at a large well known financial services company where she was a 20 year veteran.
It just goes to show that if an employee of a financial services firm who has access to tons of educational information about investing can't take the plunge perhaps something is wrong with the system and not the gender of the investor?
Any comments, thoughts, opinions are welcome... |
| posted by Boston Gal @ 7:11 AM *
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| 4 Comments: |
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I'm a woman who is also a real estate investor. We're up to our 13th property. I dragged my partner, who is also my fiance, kicking and screaming into real estate. He hates it still. But, we're doing OK with our endeavor. And, one day soon, I'm going to quit my job and do REI full-time. Well, I already do REI full-time--I just also unfortunately have a day job, too.
I had a monopoly board with my name on it, so to speak, as a child. And, my grandmother, a CPA, also invested in real estate with my grandfather as her partner. When I visited their house, she would entertain me with pages and pages of math problems and then hours of checkers. I loved it! To this day, I like a challenge. I even chose Computer Science (one of two women in the program) as my major in college--where I was the research assistant to the only female professor on staff. One of my projects was a paper on a similar topic--why there weren't more women interested in the field of Computer Science. I came to this conclusion: the issue was a lack of confidence, solid role models, and education. Regarding the lack of education....statistics showed that girls lost interest--probably due to peer pressure--in math and science around the age of 10. Coincidentally (or maybe not), that's also around the age they become interested in boys. I have my theories, but what do you all conclude?
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Dear Jane Dough,
I am a first time visitor to your site and enjoyed myself. I will be back.
I am the owner of a mortgage company in Michigan (15 years), if I can help you at all in your journey, just look me up.
Come on over and visit my blog as well. Perhaps you can pick up a tidbit or two.
http:///www.mortgageplanningblog.com
I found your site full of personality and very informative. I believe many of my clients can relate and learn with you. Therefore I put a link to your site, on my site, for them to learn and grow with you.
David Porter
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Women see money as a pond or a lake? That sounds so hokey I don't know whether to take the article seriously or not. I know lots of women who manage their own investments and have very agressive portfolios.
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Even seasonsed finance professionals seldom consistently beat the market. The best advice is to dump all your retirement money i.e 401K etc into an S&P 500 fund. That's what finance professors and they explain their decision by saying that they don't have the time needed to consistently pick 10-baggers.
i don't think gender is an issue; men and women seem to make lousy financial decisions.
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I'm a woman who is also a real estate investor. We're up to our 13th property. I dragged my partner, who is also my fiance, kicking and screaming into real estate. He hates it still. But, we're doing OK with our endeavor. And, one day soon, I'm going to quit my job and do REI full-time. Well, I already do REI full-time--I just also unfortunately have a day job, too.
I had a monopoly board with my name on it, so to speak, as a child. And, my grandmother, a CPA, also invested in real estate with my grandfather as her partner. When I visited their house, she would entertain me with pages and pages of math problems and then hours of checkers. I loved it! To this day, I like a challenge. I even chose Computer Science (one of two women in the program) as my major in college--where I was the research assistant to the only female professor on staff. One of my projects was a paper on a similar topic--why there weren't more women interested in the field of Computer Science. I came to this conclusion: the issue was a lack of confidence, solid role models, and education. Regarding the lack of education....statistics showed that girls lost interest--probably due to peer pressure--in math and science around the age of 10. Coincidentally (or maybe not), that's also around the age they become interested in boys. I have my theories, but what do you all conclude?