EPF savings for retirement may not be enough in near future to come. As I always mentioned in my previous write-up most of their savings are finished within less than 5 years. Again with the oil price surge, there is high chances of hiking inflation rate.
What you need to know before withdrawing from EPF ?
1. Check your eligibility, anything excessive of 20% out of 50K from your EPF Account 1 is a good start for your investment.Minimum of investment is 1K.
2. Do not compare the returns from EPF which is 5.15% dividends with your unit trust returns within next 1 year. Unit Trust Investments is not a short term investments, the growth takes atleast few year with minimun 3-5 years.
3. Gain Capital growth significantly over the years.Currently the minimum returns from Unit Trust is 17% per year.
4. Always evaluate the performance of Composite Index against the Equity Fund that you have invested . If you have invested in Bond Fund then check the performance upbeat on Fixed Deposit rate. Do not mix this performance and confuse yourself.
5. Try to understand which fund your’re investing your money in, read the prospectus and check the past market performance for few years. The UT Agent will normally advise their client but it is important to take note as well where the funds are going & the management.
6. Under the new scheme Service Charge for EPF investors is reduced to 3% compared to 5-6% previously, this another drastic steps introduced by the Financial Instituition to encourage more investors.
7. Most of the Unit Trust Companies (Banks or Insurance Instituition) are well build with state of art Sophisticated Systems that would be able to produce the return and valuation of the funds performance.
8. Read Financial/Investment magazines such as theedgedaily & Personal Money.
There are more information that one need to know before you perform the withdrawal, however this would be a good quick start.With new regulations, even youngsters would be able to start investing and diversifying their portfolios allocation over time period.If this write up able to change mindset of our young investors to start investing from now , It would be awesome.
Currently due to the domino effect in US, the Unit price are quite low, instead of normal 25cents, you’re able to purchase the units at even 17cents.
Ie.
With Minimum investment of 1K @ $0.25= 4000 Units
With Minimum investment of 1K @ $0.17= 5882 Units
So you will be getting extra 1882 units !!!!! The growth of your investment is based on per units.
Good Luck Investors !!
