About the Guest Transcript

Suresh Sadagopan

A majority of us have a hard time planning our personal finances, often. While we know it is important and we intend to manage them better, we are lost as to where to start. The internet has so much gyaan on all such topics that it is overwhelming and bounces off.
This episode with Suresh Sadagopan, a SEBI certified Investment Advisor, is a step by step guide to starting and charting the path to making more money with what you earn and multiply it. Every question is possibly something you have pondered upon. The answers are worth all your time. Give it a listen, we promise it will be of great help!

Transcript

Shubham(00:00) -
Let me share with you some numbers around financial planning in India at an individual or personal finances level. Well, only 15%. Think about retirement financial planning in India as if you know, the other 85% would never retire or they don't need to think about it. By the way, I am also one of them. So the irony is on me too 75% of our investments are equity based, while this number is totally opposite, when it comes to developed nations 80% of their money is invested in bonds, and those kind of instruments, which are much better instruments if you look at them. But then it's difficult to change this pattern so easily, because only a miniscule percent know about any instruments beyond PPF or FD, or for that matter mutual funds. Now think about it. How many more do you know of I don't, personally right. So if you think Indians are risk averse, and there was a research done upon it, we would want to secure ourselves, let me tell you that only 3.44% of Indians own an insurance today in India, and 89% of our health care expenses out of pocket expenses. So we are not at all risk averse, I think. I mean, the numbers are abysmal, and clearly depicts our ignorance towards this aspect in our life. But then as they say, it's never late and today is an episode which is guided towards and which is directed towards this aspect of our life. And we have Suresh Sadagopan SEBI registered RIA, which is a Securities Exchange Board of India, a registered investment advisor. And he's also the author of the book if God was our financial planner, I think an interesting name right? God planning our finances for us, that'll be great ideas. Namaste I'm Shubham Aggarwal, and you're listening to SOS secrets of storytellers. Welcome to yet another episode. Today's episode is sponsored by IBS Hyderabad, club prayers, the official interview school and corporate event club of IBS Hyderabad, the organizing seafood 4.0 by skilling, India. Lots of fun, lots of contests and prizes to be won. Check out our website for more details. Hello, Suresh sir. Welcome to Secrets Of storytellers. How are you?


Suresh(02:18) -
Yeah, quite fine. Thank you very much for having having on this podcast. Thank you so much. Great. Thank


Shubham(02:24) -
You a pleasure to have you here. So Suresh sir when did you first invest in life? or understand the power of financial planning yourself? I'm really curious about that. Yeah. So


Suresh(02:34) -
I have been like, the rest of the country, men like the rest of the people rest of the investments. Right, early on, I never had any interest in finances. So like other people, whom I'm now probably going to talk to, I had left it to my father, my father is basically from a finance background. And he kind of manage all the whatever money was there, he just used to tell me and even whatever he used to tell me as to what he has done with my money in the money, which I earn. I never used to pay too much attention. Okay, so that happened till about maybe 35-36 years of my life, okay. I mean, I knew very broadly, okay, I'm putting some money, maybe in the FD, maybe in some insurance policy, or English or some money, and so on and so forth. So I knew something, something was happening, but I did not pay too much attention. And as Providence would have would have it, around my age 37 I moved into financial, financial services and financial planning field, okay, it is then nice. So then, once you come into this profession, you have to know everything about finances, right. So it was then that I start learning about finances. And I mean, it was actually then when I understood that the show very important. I have been as blissfully ignorant as the rest of our country in that particular.


Shubham(04:00) -
Right, I think serendipity is what I would call


Suresh(04:05) -
You could say that you could say it.


Shubham(04:07) -
So then this knowledge was somewhere handed down by your father as well as in he has a lot of major role to play in it, as well as your curiosity, right?


Suresh(04:16) -
Yeah. So my father definitely tried his best to handle down the knowledge he had. To me. I mean, I was the culprit in the sense that I was not really willing to pay too much attention. So this is a this is a very curious problem that we have. I mean, among all the people in our country and every other country, that it's nothing like financial literacy is low in our country and is high in other countries. I can tell you, from my interactions, it is the same all over the world. Nobody wants to talk about finances, nobody's interested in money, they are interested in things which they can do with money, they are not interested in money personally. So that is


Shubham(04:57) -
How it is. What should I say? myself, my father is a banker, and I have very conveniently left it to him. But he's retired now. So yeah, thanks for coming to it. Yeah,


Suresh(05:08) -
No, that happens a lot. But surprisingly, what I said, I'm talking about my own experience. Yeah, my own experience was like that. But in hindsight, yeah, I mean, I have not done the right thing. So that I definitely want to wanna, and I want to tell each one of the listeners, that it's very, very important to have at least a basic understanding of finances. Even if you're not an expert in that it's absolutely fine. But we all need to have a basic understanding of finances, at least to be able to understand what is an insurance? What is a fixed income product? What is a equity or interpret? I mean, at least that we should know. Because when they talk to some of the client, they said, I have invested in some product from icici. I have invested in a mutual fund. And actually, when we open that thing into some unit, but not a mutual fund, it is a Munich


Shubham(05:56) -
Yeah, very different. So


Suresh(05:57) -
These kind of things happen very often. So the the level of financial literacy is really abysmal. And that we need to correct.


Shubham(06:06) -
Right, I think that brings me to my question, what is your book? If God was your financial planner all about? And who is it meant for?


Suresh(06:17) -
Yeah, so. So it's basically a follow up of what I just started talking just now, see, people are not really interested in knowing too much about finances. Okay. So in my case, I have something like 16 years of experience as a financial advisor, and a financial planner. So if I want to pass on some useful information to the public at large, and if I want to write a tome about financial planning, and personal finance, and things like that, I think there may be all of maybe five, six people who will read them.


Shubham(06:50) -
Hmm.


Suresh(06:51) -
Okay. So I did not want it to go down that path, right. So I thought, probably, I can make it a bit interesting, and do the whole thing in a story kind of a format, okay, so that the finance, which is subject or not truly liked by a lot of people are, at least it can be packaged in such a way that it is part of an overall interesting story. And, I mean, they get to read about it. And in the process, they get to know about the products, the strategies, the process that we follow in financial planning, and everything, at least they get to know the basics about financial planning and personal finance. So that is how the book has been written. It is meant for the normal lay public, but I also liberate the experience that I've had in the past 16 years, in the field of financial planning as an advisor, and a lot of what I interact with my clients, a lot of the problems, which I'm solving for the clients will also resonate with the various financial services professionals and advisors themselves. Okay. So so it has two different audiences, but from anything actually written for a normal investor audience.


Shubham(08:02) -
Right, right. Right. Great. So do you think the reason for this money mismanagement, if I may call it that is because of our ignorance? Or is it because of the lack of proper and enough material available in this regard?


Suresh(08:19) -
I wouldn't say today that it is because of lack of proper material available at all. Because today, if you go to the Internet, and if you search on any subject at all, including financial subject, I think you will be snowed with the amount of information that you can actually pull up on any particular subject


Shubham(08:37) -
Correct which could be another problem, you know?


Suresh(08:39) -
Yeah, it's it is a super big problem. It's a it's a big problem. And internet is is not a place where you can be 100% sure, that the information that you're getting is all Correct. Correct. Correct. Authenticity, we don't know at all. Yeah. So anybody can actually go and blog and they can give their opinions. So the authenticity is not really known. And it's fitment, or particular situation is again, not really know. So I would say the, to start with that basic antipathy towards finances is something that is at the root root cause of all the problem. It's a it's an irony that we spend so much time earning the money. I mean, we spend probably after graduation program, we spend maybe 35-40 years, yeah, to earn that money. And we spend almost all the waking hours that we have in the prime of our life, to earn that money, correct. And then we don't spend enough time to, I mean, allocate the money properly, to achieve whatever goals we want in the most appropriate manner. So that's the that's the aim. So the money is lying around in the bank account lying around here, there, somebody comes along, and they say you do this here, some insurance person maybe comes along, and he says, Have a wonderful policy for your service. You don't even go through the brochures, right? This is the reality today. So and then, of course, Then we also don't pay much attention to how much money is required for the future. So I mean, money is there in the bank, and we are spending it and new money comes in because there is a salary at the end of the month. So that is how life is going on. I mean, we don't pay too much attention to our money at all, that's the biggest problem. Right?


Shubham(10:19) -
So Suresh sir great that you've reached this point in the in the discussion, because the idea of today's episode is that we leave our listeners with some concrete steps. Yeah, you know, that they can start or do better with their finances at the end of this episode, because the problem that I just shared, the lack of it, or, you know, the grandiosity of it, is that I also have been someone who goes to the internet and I'm left, you know, I'm left dumb, so to say, because I don't know what to seek, where to go, what to read. So, where should we start?


Suresh(10:53) -
The first place to start is that we have to realize that we are putting in a tremendous amount of efforts to earn that money and that money which we are earning is going to help us achieve various goals, there are lots of aspirations, there are lots of things that we want to buy, and there are a lot of places where we want to go. So, the point is, we have to understand this money which we are earning after so much of effort, we will have to spend some time to understand how that money can be made to work in the most appropriate effective manner. So, we need to have a basic financial literacy and we should not really shy away from finances. So what are the basics that you need to have in place one is of course, the liquidity contingency a lot of people whatever money they have, they will have in the bank account, they will spend it off at the end of the month, it will be some 10,000 20,000 Yeah, and it certainly if there is an expense which comes out they don't know where to look. So, all these kinds of things can be avoided if you have a kind of a liquidity margin. Normally as financial advisors, we ask people to have a liquid fund or a money market fund to keep the keep a certain level of liquidity, it can be one like one of the flex you can be more than that, depending on the person situation and there is also this other thing called contingency. So, this contingency is our emergency corpus, a lot is being taught at this particular point, because this COVID situation is a kind of a I mean, situation, which we have not really thought about at all right in 2019 if somebody had talked about 2020 getting washed away, yeah, I mean, we would all probably smile in an intelligent fashion, okay, I mean, we did not anticipate this at all, but this is a contingency, this is an emergency, and a lot of people have been found short on that particular fund. So we need to these are absolute absolute basics, you have to have appropriate amount of liquidity, you have to have a basic level of contingency surplus put away so that in these kind of situations, or it may not be anything outside, it can be something inside there is there is a financial matter on which you need to, you need to on which you need to spend some money, right, it's something to do with your family. So you need to have a contingency permission for that, then the next thing is insurance. So you have to have appropriate security measures. So that so that you are you are not really impacted financially, when something goes wrong, maybe on the medical front, maybe in terms of an accident, maybe in terms of some critical illness and stuff like that. So there are fortunately insurance products, which are available, which can cover one for a very low premium. And we should go for that. Like even if we take a home loan, for example, we have to call ourselves for the amount of money that we have taken as a loan. So this this is the second basic thing that we need to do. Then the identifying and quantifying goes a lot of people trigger income is coming and everything is fine. Lots of money floating around in the bank. So we are spending we're not thinking about the tomorrow's Okay, we're not even thinking about the near term goals like vacation, anything we're not thinking or we're not planning Yeah. So we need to first think about what are the goal first of all identify the goals. And if we don't think about the goal, the goals will keep on changing from time to time then we are not really going anywhere. Okay, we have to first quantify the goal and we have to plan for that and we have to move towards that. Okay, so the other thing, very, very important is we have to draw proper budgets. Hmm. Most of the people when money comes in,   okay thike today require money, okay? Go to the ATM drop 20,000 30,000, whatever amount you want, and you keep spending. And after maybe 10 days, you require more money, you just go to the ATM again, you draw more money. Apart from that you're spending through ATM you're spending through one v map everywhere, everywhere. Now Google pay everywhere you spend. So you don't even know what you're spending. You don't have a budget. You don't know how much suddenly happens a lot with even our clients, when we ask them how much you're spending, most of the people are not at all aware. And they will have to actually go back and start thinking and writing out and then they will send it across.


Shubham(15:13) -
Right? You've touched the very pointed cord, I would say, you know, that is the reason I'm smiling this profusely. Probably at myself. Yeah, please. Okay, okay correct


Suresh(15:26) -
Always, we need to save at least save and invest at least 20% of one's income. So that is a, that is a basic hygiene factor, if you were to ask me, and we need to at least symbols that 20% before we start spending, ideal amount will be probably 30% or more. But I would say, for for a person who is pretty young and gotten at least 20% To start with, could be a good idea.  Because I mean, emeralds may have made a lot of places where we want to spend money be mobile beat on holidays, picnics and printing, living it up, whatever, okay? There may be a lot of places where they want to spend on that. I'm absolutely okay with it. But I spend after putting aside a certain sum of money in terms of savings, right? So then when your income goes up, you can always increase the amount of money that you put aside. But to start with each has to be the basic amount, right? It has to be there.


Shubham(16:24) -
That's that's a great rule of thumb. Yeah. And


Suresh(16:26) -
If you don't know all these things, though, the last thing they want to say to the question you asked, Is that you, I mean, you immortal good admission, if you can't do all these things. And if you can't read up if you can't pinker if you don't know what to do where you are going please a molecule degreaser. I mean, even when you go to the gym, you have a gym trainer right true, I mean, everywhere. Today, nutrition, you go to a nutritionist, Doctor, of course, I mean, when we have something about the health, we go to a doctor,


Shubham(16:55) -
You have a specialist for almost every aspect of life,


Suresh(16:58) -
Everything. And the most important thing in life, which is our own finances, which will actually take care of all the other aspects.   We don't have anybody to consult at all and who are the people we are consulting, we are consulting our own friends, yeah, our own colleagues, our own relatives, who are as clueless as we are correct, some of them are slightly better place, but nobody can replace a professional advisor. So if somebody does not have the information on finances, or they don't have the wherewithal to go through all these things, and keep up, it's better to go to a good advisor and seek their counsel.


Shubham(17:35) -
Right. Right. I think that's a great rule of thumb again, and if I were to ask you say one or two rules of thumb more that we could probably live by when it comes to finances, what would what would they be?


Suresh(17:49) -
Yeah. So, basics again, whatever you require in terms of the next three years in terms of goals and expenses, I mean, you need to keep that in liquid assets with low volatility. So, let me give an example. Suppose a vacation is coming up in the next 18 months, for example, see, that is a near term goal, okay? It is not a goal, which is very far away, like your retirement for example, correct. So it's a near term goal. So, you cannot invest that money into stock market, because stock market currently is volatile 18 months down the line a few months down the line, where will the stock market we don't know it can be plus 25% it can be minus 20% or it can be flat we don't show the ideal thing would be to keep this in a low volatility vehicle like maybe a short term and be like maybe a liquid fund or ultra short term fund or something like that.  So basically, what I'm trying to say is what you require for the next three years, you keep it in a vehicle, which will not lose capital and which can give you some money okay, okay. That is the principle plus some small returns are sure right, because a lot of times the goals are very, very important words like let us say, you have a daughter or a son and you need to pay some fees after six months after eight months. So, now, if that is the goal that you have, then you really require that money for sure, I mean, you cannot depend on the stock market, you cannot tell the school or college saying that stock market has gone down Can you please give me three months more four months more, I will pay later, right. So, there are many many goals like that which are very, very important goals which you cannot compromise on. So ideally, that's why the four year and balance has to be distributed in appropriate asset classes as per one's risk appetite and as per well as per one's goals when they are going to come in the future as per that. So we will have to distribute that properly. Keep enough contingency liquidity. I mean, I cannot emphasize this enough. This is very, very important. Keep putting aside 20 30% or more before you spend that income. Okay. So those are the basics.


Shubham(19:56) -
Right, right. And I understand and I think they have a lot of value. But, you know, while we go on this path of understanding of nonsense slowly and gradually, there's, there's still chances that we go the wrong way. What are some of the grave mistakes or, you know, areas where we go wrong, even if we are on a path of, you know, financial planning?


Suresh(20:17) -
Yeah, so, a lot of people do not understand the effect of inflation. While we all have heard about inflation, and we know that inflation is bad, the prices are rising, all that I mean, the true part of what inflation can do over the next 20 years or 30 years is not really understood properly. So this is one of the one of the typical problems that we have. So for example, coming out of this, you don't know how much you require in retirement. So we say that Okay, today I'm spending 40,000 tike if I have one crore It will be fine. So a lot of people say this incidentally. So, the point is, I mean, we asked them to be ready to get this one group secret, yeah, do you know it is one crore or 80 lakhs or five crores or it can even be 10,000 crores, but how do you know? So, the point is, we need to fund the best and what all goes they will have to achieve in the period between now and the retirement, we will have to understand what is the intervening inflation in that period, what is that they are going to save in that period. So, there are a lot of variables. And this COVID is also taught one more thing, we we generally tend to assume that we will have a job and everything will be a straight line and the upward rising straight line. See that is also not true. I mean, the world today is full of changes. And many of the changes are very, something scary. Also


Shubham(21:42) -
Uncertainty could could not have been at a higher point, I think


Suresh(21:46) -
It cannot be at a higher level than what we are currently seeing. Okay, so the other other thing is that people don't have a plan. And this is what is super worried. There is no plan at all. In fact, we plan for everything we plan for a birthday, we plan for a vacation, even if we want to go over to let us see our movie, we have some plan. Yeah, but as the most important thing in life, we don't have any planet or nothing. So the money is lying around somewhere. And we are just putting aside whenever we want whatever we want. Okay, thike, somebody has come, okay, I can invest 50,000. And what is, the person who's coming to sell the product also asked me Sir, how much can you invest? And nobody is asking you? How much do you require? What are your goals? How much do you require for that goal? What have you done for that goal? And you're also asked not asking them? I mean, if you are not yourself interested in your own family's welfare or your own welfare, why, other person will never ask you. The other person wants to sell a product. Right? Correct. So that wasn't not good. As he is going to ask you only one thing, how much can you invest? today and not on monthly basis? How much can That's all? And people fall for that? And they do that? So I mean, without a plan, you can land absolutely anywhere and the place where you land you will not like, correct? Yeah. And the place where you will land is not place? Probably not the place where you actually wanted to go. Yeah, yeah. So planning is very, very, very, very critical. Very, very important. And people are not doing that. And that I would read that as probably Mistake number one. Okay?


Shubham(23:23) -
Is it a mechanism to know, if I'm investing the right amount of money, given whatever my earnings are, and that my planning is headed the right way is something that I can think of is there are many claims, you know, if you do not smoke cigarettes, or if you do not drink beverages, soft beverages, then you will have a Ferrari in the next 25 years or so, you know, those kind of claims? I'm not sure if those really make sense or not. But is there a way to Is it a metric that keeps telling us that we're on the right path?


Suresh(23:54) -
So, what you're exactly asking is essentially financial planning Right, okay. So, in financial planning, that is exactly what we what we seek to do. So, first and foremost, we understand the person's financial situation. So, in terms of income, expenses, assets, liabilities, investment insurance, and goals, we look at all these things okay. And then we draw up a plan. So, once we know what the goals are, first and foremost, what are the goals that you have to decide? So, you can without knowing what is your goal then you can go anywhere, then you have to first fix the goal and which is a high priority goal, which is a medium priority goal low priority goal, that also you will have to fix because you may have 25 goals. Yeah. Given your income level and given your lifestyle, maybe only seven of those goals may be feasible, right. So first and foremost, we have to establish the feasibility whether it is a Ferrari or whether it is anything that they want to see as long as it is feasible. We financial planners can help them we're not magicians Yeah, we can help with the prudent money management appropriate money management approach. asset allocation and proper risk profiling and accordingly allocating money. So that is what we are going to so, it's very, very important to get that financial planning, right. If we don't have a plan, then we will not be able to answer any of the questions that you posted. And once we have a plan, we will also ask the right question about what is the kind of I mean, we will also found out what is the kind of risk that this person should be exposed to. So every person has what is called what we call this profile? Yeah, so that is basically the amount of risk that they are willing to take visa either investments, some people are inherently discovers, so they're pretty conservative. And some people are willing to take a certain amount of risk for a certain level of return. Yeah. Okay. So now those people may be called aggressive or moderately aggressive, I mean, as per the degree. So now, we need to understand that and what is the amount of money that can be put aside for any goal will actually be a factor of their risk profile. Also, it will also be a factor of how many years to return, we have a concept called risk capacity. So a person who is let's say, at 32, will have a higher risk capacity than a person who's at 52. Because the amount of us a person at 32 has killed retirement, maybe 28. Yeah, the amount of years that a person has from 52 is only eight years. So the risk capacity if there is a loss, or if there is any untoward incident visa refinances, a person at 32 can potentially recover a much better number one, and the more important things the person can aggressively take certain calls, with a view to get good returns, which probably a person in 52, may not be able to take because they are at the side end of their career. All right, great,


Shubham(26:48) -
I think a great piece of value and great help from whatever you've described and discussed anyone last comment that you would like to give leave to the listeners?


Suresh(27:00) -
Yeah, so as far as financial planning is concerned, I would say that, you have to take it seriously, if you don't have a plan. It's not that you necessarily have to come to a financial plan, if you are able to do it all by yourself and do it. But if you are going to work without a plan, as far as your finances are concerned, it's just not going to work. And you will like I said earlier, you will land in a place which will which you will not like. And today, I mean, nobody wants to depend on the children once upon a time, maybe 40-50 years back, the financial planning was having children who are reasonably well educated, and who will take care of the parents that was financial planning once upon a time, right. Today, that is not financial planning. So nobody also wants to depend on the children and probably that kind of support also may not be available today Okay, that is the reason why the sever tech and Jio campaign that I mean, had a tremendous amount of resonance and response. Right. Okay, because everybody wants to stand on their own two legs. Correct. Okay. So financial planning is extremely important. And I mean, don't, don't lose sight of that. I mean, if you have not done that, do it. Now. If you can't do that, find a person who can actually help you to give your entire life and finances a direction. So find out that person and then get that blueprint. Done.


Shubham(28:25) -
Wonderful. Great. So thank you so much Suresh Sir. So, this brings us to the last section of the podcast, which is a very interesting and a lovely one. Yeah. So you know how we've named the podcast, it's called secrets of storytellers. Okay. So, please, we want to hear a secret from your side.


Suresh(28:43) -
I have two secret Okay. Well, you may think yeah. So, but the point is, this is this is such a common sensical principle that when I actually reveal the secret, we say oh, this is a secret Okay, I thought there is something else there is some place some bank some institution, which can give you that 25% return rate Actually, there is no institution law bank, nobody who can give a higher return than otherwise what you are anyway getting, right. Okay. So the first thing that I would want to tell is that I do not run after returns, it is not going to help you in terms of achieving your goals. I mean, this is a very, very fundamental thing. A lot of people think that if you get a very good return at every point in your life, and you will do very well. So I want to bust that particular myth. You don't have to move the product from product A to product B to product C, based on what is performing in the market at that particular moment. Like for example, a lot of people move their money into gold. In the month of April, May June, up to August, people move a lot of money into gold and now people are taking away money from gold. So what happens in this process is that they are pulling out money from some other instrument in which they have already missing, correct Okay, and they are putting money to other instruments not for any other reason there is no, there is no logic to it, just because something is going up there, they're putting that money. So, there can be from wherever they are taking out the money, there can be losses in terms of when they're pulling out the money in terms of exit loads or tax rated the tax rate issues or tax incidence let us call it tax incidence and in the next one if it is a fad kind of thing, which they are pursuing, they may get into the product at the wrong wrong point in the cycle. And then again, they will pull out that money when it starts tapering like what is currently happening as far as gold is concerned. Right. So do not run after returns and have a proper well thought out strategy. Asset Allocation that is an allocation is what kind of what kind of products should I put money in what kind of asset class as a class one equity? What is their goal when commodity correct like that real estate, these are all asset classes. So how much to put in each of them. So we financial panels actually help in that there are lots of do it yourself. Sites also. I mean, it's not that you necessarily have to come to a financial planner, right? I'm not saying this because I'm a financial planner, but financial planning is important, if you can do it and do it yourself. No problem at all, if not come to financial planner.


Shubham(31:26) -
Right. Okay,


Suresh(31:28) -
So the second very important point to consider is the regular consistent investment. It's very, very important, irrespective of how much one is earning, it's very, very important to invest on a consistent basis regular basis, month on month basis in a disciplined way. So that's what is important and that is what actually builds wealth over a period of time and we have seen this with our clients time and time again, the last secret which I want to share is with respect to expenses, a lot of people tend to think that my income is not enough right The problem is seldom about income, we have seen people with very some 40,000 kind of income and doing very well for themselves okay. So, it is always how much you spend. So, let me also share with you one ratio, okay. So, suppose there is a person who is earning 50,000 rupees and spending let's say 25,000 rupees, okay? And which means that I'm assuming that they are saving the 25,000 rupees, right? What is that they are saving, they are saving one month of expenses, one month of expenses, so I'm not talking about how much percentage of income Okay, I'm talking about percentage of expenses Okay, okay. Now, let us take the case of other person who is running one lakh rupees, right and suppose a person is spending 60,000 rupees and saving 40,000 rupees right okay. Now, this person may be saving in monetary terms, you may be saving more 40,000 rupees much more than 25,000 rupees,


Shubham(33:06) -
Yeah, but I get your point, but look at how much


Suresh(33:09) -
Of the expenses can be covered by this person, it will be only two thirds of the monthly expenses will be covered. So, we have to pay attention to expenses that is very, very, very important. If you keep the expenses under wraps, I mean, if you are able to keep the expenses under control, you have done a wonderful job in terms of financial planning. Apart from the other things we we can otherwise, but expenses control and regular consistent disciplined investment and not only after the returns of the product, and not shifting from one product or the product just because a particular product is giving return are the most important things. If you want to call it secrets, these are the most important secrets that you will have to keep in mind. Why you want to attain financial Nirvana?


Shubham(33:58) -
This is this is beautiful series that this is really beautiful, because the third secret I'm amazed how you put it, and how you've, you know, taken a very different perspective thinking how much percentage of your expenses are you saving is a great way to look at it. Okay, so that's beautiful. Thank you so much. I'm very sure there's going to help a lot of people.


Suresh(34:18) -
Thank you very much.


Shubham(34:19) -
Great, I think thank you so much for all these words of wisdom and so much knowledge for sharing with us. And I'm sure the listeners are going to you know, get a lot of value from this and I hope you enjoyed the session as well.


Suresh(34:32) -
Yeah, I enjoyed the session but a lot one one if you would permit me for about a few seconds Okay.


Shubham(34:39) -
Sure, please.


Suresh(34:40) -
So, this this book, which I have written if God was a financial planner, contains a lot of things which I had mentioned here, I mean, of course, we do not have too much time to discuss all the nuances of financial planning or asset allocation or various concepts and strategies, right. You will find all that in the book. It is written in a lucid story format, you can easily cover that book in mainly two, three sittings. And I can assure you that you will be a better person for that in terms of finances. After reading the book itself, it's an easy read. So this is the feedback, I have got from a lot of people. So it will be very, very helpful if you are, if you are a person who does not, you are running away from finances, this is exactly the book for you. It has been written a story from an even if you are a person who knows something about finances, and this is a wonderful book for you to keep as a handbook. And as a reference book. At any point in time, you can go and refer to various things that you may encounter regarding finance, or during your next Thank you. Great,


Shubham(35:42) -
I think goes without saying that the listeners would definitely pick up the book because if this podcast of 30 minutes was so valuable, the books gonna be much more valuable, I'm sure. And no doubt about that. Great. So thank you so much for your time Suresh sir. And it was a pleasure having you.


Suresh(36:01) -
Thank you, Shubham  


Shubham(36:02) -
Thank you, and thank you to all the listeners. This is Shubham signing off until the next secret and the next storyteller. Bye Bye

Money Tips to Manage Your Personal Finances with Suresh Sadagopan

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