Random Ramblings

Rahul heaved a sigh of relief. Finally his loan tenure was over, and his car was paid for. The loan which took away some chunk of his not-too-high-but-not-too-low salary was all paid for and he was the owner of a not-so-new Honda City now. Not that he needed it in a city like Mumbai where he used to use public transport to commute to office, but yes, it was used for his weekend trips to shopping malls with his wife. Rahul was in early 30s, and with the Honda city paid for, he had now arrived in life. Now he would have some buffer amount to save, and take his savings from five digits to six digits. He finally had a sigh of relief. With the car loan over, now he could now make a down payment for Royal Enfield and still have some cash for down payment for his new iPad too, soon. __ You can also check out this article on BeingFinWise

Of late, I have been observing people around and specifically trying to understand their attitude towards personal finance. And during several of several such observations, I have realized that there are a lot of things that people are probably not doing right. While everyone has his or her own priorities while planning for personal finance and chasing goals or things in life, here are some of my observations about some of the possible flaws and incorrect assumptions made by people.  1. Assuming that stock markets give almost assured returns  While historically markets have given good returns over long run & will probably continue to do so in future, the returns are not "assured" . So a person selling you mutual funds saying that it gives 15% annual returns is intentionally or unintentionally misleading. Markets may give you 15% annual returns. Or even 25%. Or even 10%. Or even no returns at all. Probably, the recent rally in markets has made people to assume and sal...