When you get down to it, several nuances can come up in your financial planning equation and you have to be careful not to fall prey to some common traps.

Considering that retirement is a non-negotiable and generally unavoidable event in every working professional’s life, the fact that only three in ten are actually doing anything to prepare for it, much less about retiring early, is eye opening.

Just like we learnt in school in our moral sciences class, chasing temptation usually has unwanted consequences. In investing, these consequences are potentially life altering and not in a good way.

Residential housing prices in the country have more than tripled in the past decade. Does it make a strong case for investing into real estate?

Buying low and selling high is easier said than done, thanks to volatile equity markets. Timing the market is tough. That’s why experts suggest retail investors choose a systematic and unemotional way of investing in equity. Rupee cost averaging and value averaging are two such popular methods.

Buying a car is the second biggest buying decision after a home. While it’s okay to occasionally binge, over-stretching your car budget can cause financial angst and jeopardise long-term financial plans. Spend only what you can truly afford. How do you do that?

International travel is only one of the extras you need to account for while budgeting for your child’s overseas education goal.

We do end up getting our collective acts together later on when concerns for our child’s future or a drying up job market force us to think seriously about investing. But is there a cost to investing later on in life, rather than earlier?