Chapter 7: Make Money Work Smarter for You

Focus on saving for lifetime goals and retirement

Microsoft Money's Lifetime Planner helps you to accomplish your long-term financial goals. These goals might include retirement, paying for college, or taking a sabbatical from work.

You can try out just about any event that might have a major financial impact on your lifetime plan. For example, you can "model" what would happen if you took some time off work, received an inheritance, sent all your kids to college, or retired early. You can enter these events in your plan or try out the Financial Event Modeler. This feature uses your actual data, but lets you test different scenarios without actually putting them in your lifetime plan.

Your lifetime plan is automatically integrated with information you enter elsewhere in Money. For example, when you update the balances of your investment accounts and other accounts in the Banking area, they're automatically updated in the Lifetime Planner.

Once you create your lifetime plan, the Lifetime Planner tells you what you need to do to start following through. If you keep your accounts current, update your goals as they change, and try to follow the other strategies suggested throughout the Lifetime Planner, your forecasts will be accurate, no matter where life takes you.

Tip
The Lifetime Planner requires detailed information on your finances, including your investments, retirement accounts, and assets, as well as living expenses and other data. If you haven't already entered this information in Money, the Lifetime Planner will walk you through how to add it.

Step-by-Step
A comprehensive walk-through of the Lifetime Planner is available. Click here to read how to use the planner, with each step clearly outlined for you.
To create a lifetime plan:

  1. Click Planning, click Planning Tools, and then click Lifetime Planner.
  2. Click Get going on your plan.
  3. Enter all required information, and then click Next.
  4. Repeat step 3 until you get to the Action Plan page.
  5. Review the Action plan, and then click Finish.


Figure 7-8: Lifetime Planner summary screen
Make a quick change to your lifetime plan

If you have a change in your life, such as the purchase of a new car, you may want to update your lifetime plan without reviewing the whole plan.

  1. Click Planning, click Planning Tools, and then click Lifetime Planner.
  2. In the left pane, click Results, and then click Comparing plans.
  3. In the lower-right corner of the screen, click Edit Current Plan.
  4. Review the list of life events, and then click the one that describes your situation.
  5. Make your changes, and then click Done.
Set a lifetime plan as a baseline plan

  1. Click Planning, click Planning Tools, and then click Lifetime Planner.
  2. If you have not already done so, make any changes to your lifetime plan that you want to include as your baseline.
  3. In the left pane, click Results, and then click Comparing plans.
  4. Review the chart and make sure that your updated plan is satisfactory.
  5. Click Set New Baseline.
What's next

By now you've probably realized that Money contains a wealth of information to help you with your finances. The next chapter, Using Microsoft Money with the Internet, shows you the wonderful world of online banking, online bill paying, and much more!

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