How to handle Personal Finance in this Coronavirus outbreak?
Coronavirus quickly worsened from epidemic to pandemic. In the snap of a finger, this virus brought the world to a grinding halt. I am sure we all had big plans laid for their future and many had planned well for it financially. However, we shouldn’t lose faith in the humanity of the economy; the horizon holds an upturn.
Here are a few tips to remain buoyant in this time of the Corona virus crisis.
- Redemption: We all run to our investment in this situation, as safeguarding our hard-earned money is the first instinct. As an individual, I might say you are not wrong but as a financial planner I would need to know whether your investments are kept for long term goals or short term goals. This may sound counterintuitive, but it’s not time to panic and cash in your chips. This is not the end of the world right!! Soon, the market will swing upwards and your portfolio will gain value if you have invested for long term goals.
- Missing your investment opportunity: The market took a downturn, so, think of this as stocks on a discount rate similar to a situation as the sale on big brands like Zara or Puma where we tend to buy more for less price. As a financial planner, I would say this is a great opportunity to invest.
- Making your own decision: When markets are affected globally, there is a high probability of people advising different theories and trying to panic the investors. Based on that advice one tends to make decisions on their own. You wouldn’t ask a friend for medical advice, so why would you ask for financial advice without consulting your financial planner? The responsible thing to do is to listen to the advice of professionals.
- Learn from experience: Any financial planner, would always insist on contingency planning. Like it is said, make sure to set money aside for a rainy day. For example, how our mom always has that dabbawalla money for an emergency. This emergency corpus that I am talking about is basically 6 to 9 month of your income that needs to be kept aside which will cover your EMI, insurance premium, household expenses, etc. We financial planners take job loss into consideration while planning for our clients.
- Discussion makes a difference: If you have not done this till now, start doing it from today. I strongly feel there is a community out there who might have faced this kind of situation before, a generation before us, who have seen it all. Go and speak to them, speak to your grandparents, ask them how did they stand strong, what did they go through. When a pandemic outbreak like coronavirus or recession period had hit them what measures they took to get out of it through the years. What will their experience do is either it will give us ideas of what to do or what not to do?
Lastly, I would like to say, the coronavirus outbreak is something that we have never experienced before so please follow the World Health Organisation guidelines and adhere to the government rules to be safe and secure. Together we can pass this tough time and yes don’t forget to consult your financial planner.
