Pruactive retirement, Aviva myretirement choice or Manulife retire ready plus?

Hi Anon,

Wow, great that you are looking to plan for your retirement so quickly!

I personally... would rather you look at getting a savings plan because the commitment for a retirement plan might be pretty high in the beginning. Cause the concept of it is, taking a portion of your income now to pay you for your future. So if you are hoping to get 1k/ mth from the policy upon retirement, your premiums at the start might be the same amount, which be pretty high for someone who just started working.

Of course I do not know your situation and I might be wrong. But I do think a savings policy might be more affordable and also possible give you better returns upon maturity, and higher flexibility on how much you would like to withdraw

Hi anon,

Firstly, consider if a retirement plan is something you'd like to have. All asset classes have their pros and cons.

If you are looking for a retirement plan, then you'll have to look at various factors which will determine what suits you. One of them is the guaranteed yield. A good retirement plan will have guaranteed yields in the region of 2.5+%. I've seen 2.61% guaranteed. Considering that these yields are guaranteed when the plan start, and that you will have bonuses credited over the years to the policy, by the time the payout starts, you will have a yield that will be higher than what was shown, which makes retirement plans a good complement to CPF LIFE.

(Note that retirement plans are meant to complement CPF LIFE, not replace it. CPF LIFE is the best annuity around, and you'd want that as a foundation for your retirement. If you work till retirement, I don't think there's an issue for you to meet the prevailing FRS. The question then becomes, where else can you get more guaranteed income, and that is where retirement plans come in)

Another factor you'll want to consider in a good plan is the fact that premiums can be waived upon TPD or CI, which means your plans will not be interrupted even if something happens to you. Contrast this to CPF, whereby if you don't work, you won't have contributions and cannot grow your SA/RA.

These are amongst the criteria that you'll want to consider when looking at a retirement plan. Now, because I don't know your current age or your desired age to retire, it will be hard to comment on which plan will suit you better. I do suggest you to have a chat with an independent financial advisor for more in-depth analysis so that you will have an idea of what may suit you, and get quotes that suit your particular situation.