what's your exposure?

One of the "best practices" of retirees is the protection of their identity for financial security, and many have turned to Lifelock or similar companies to provide that protection.  However, there may be a better alternative so long as you won't be applying for credit anytime soon.

The purpose of identity protection is to avoid someone else opening up credit accounts using your personal information, because you are liable for what they do, and extracting yourself from that mess is time-consuming and costly.  Nor do you want someone accessing your bank or credit card accounts without your knowledge, because they can literally steal you blind.

So the solution is to a) prevent anyone, including yourself, from opening any credit account and b) monitor those bank/credit card accounts regularly.  You can accomplish the former by contacting each of three consumer credit companies to freeze your account.  The cost is $20/person (depending on your state of residence), and continues in place until you have it removed.  It will cost a similar amount to have it removed, again depending on your state of residence, since your state will regulate the amount that can be charged.

The three companies are Equifax, Experian, and Transunion.  Just google "how to freeze your credit" and you will be directed to those sites.  You can also get more background information on the rationale and downside by clicking here.

For you and a spouse the cost will be around $40 for each company, or a total of $120.  The cost of Lifelock or similar protection is $120/year/person, and though though that protection is effective, it's an annual fee.  You just need to be sure you won't be applying for credit anytime soon because then you have to go through the rewind process.

The second half of your protection comes from the regular monitoring of your accounts, which is extraordinarily easy anymore with online banking.  If you check your account every week or two you can see if anything is fishy, and downloading regularly could be a part of that checking process.  Quicken is an excellent program for that purpose.

You may already know that a thief can use a computer to generate random numbers with extraordinary speed, connecting simultaneously with retailers and credit card companies until they have a "match" and then are able to charge on your account like they've found gold at the end of a rainbow.  Fortunately, if you catch it quickly because you watch the charges, you likely won't be held responsible, or if you have a card from a bank with outstanding monitoring systems, they will call you before you're even aware.

Lifelock, and to my knowledge any identity theft program, does not/cannot monitor your banking/credit accounts for you.  Their function is to guard against new credit accounts being set up, not to monitor the existing accounts, so even with a Lifelock program in place, you are still susceptible to having someone dip into your checking account.  And if you never balance your checkbook, well . . .

This may be a bit outside the norm of the blog, but it's an extension of the post a few days ago about the habits of retirees.  As a retiree you have presumably done all you can to collect your nest egg - and now you need to know how to retain it.  Do you?

class of '57 reunion

Click on the Founders Day link at the right to get more information about the reunion scheduled for this September for the Class of '57.

Richard Holstad has prepared a video that highlights the music and memories for that class.  To watch that video, click this link . . .

More from Grade School

Here's another chance to grab a glass of wine, lean back, and laugh at yourself.  Marilyn Weidler sent another handful of photos, the "official school photos" taken each fall, including several of the same person taken over a period of years.  Rather than create a new album with a select group, they're now included in a grouping of 105 photos.  Get that glass of wine.  You can always restart the album. 

Click any photo to go to the online album and view a larger version.

more banquet photos

Merrilee made it back to California and has forwarded a boatload of photos that have been added to the online albums.  Here is the updated album from the reunion banquet.  Note there are 110 photos included, so put it on pause, grab a glass of wine, slip off your shoes, sit back and relax.  You have time.

you might remember this day

Sorry - couldn't resist.  Click on the picture for a larger view.

I don't know if anybody feels just this way on retirement, and labeling it Best Senior Moment may not always be appropriate.  The larger point may be that retirement provides a new outlook on living, on motivation, attitude, desire, interests, and other attributes that are important for living.

The freedom to do what you want when you want is the best part of it.  There's always something to do, unless you're just not looking, and it's nice to be able to say, "I guess I can do that tomorrow."

A neighbor retired several years ago, and I asked him one day how he was adapting.  He was a teacher, so he was accustomed to summers off, but it was still a transition for him.  Until one day he was painting a window on his garage and he said, "I suddenly realized - I'm retired - I don't HAVE to do this today.  So I put the brush into the can and just walked away."

In the last couple years before I retired from financial services I was putting on seminars at various offices.  Since retirement is a key focus of financial services the seminar was popular.  The title was "What's My Number?"  Attendees were folks in their 50's or later looking at retirement and trying to figure out how/when, or they were folks already retired.

The basis of the seminar was a book by that same name, a book that explored issues of retirement, and preparing to live well in retirement with that new outlook mentioned above.  I found several commonalities in the attendees, no matter where we did the presentation.

• An adjustment period was common.  "He" sometimes got in the way in the kitchen, "they" needed to learn how to spend time together, and one or the other, mostly "he" would need to have his escape location, a Man Cave.  In all cases that adjustment was done amicably, and both parties had the ability to laugh about it.
• Everyone was busy.  There was never a lack of things to do, and grandkids consumed a lot of time.
• Every bit as much as they had experienced in their working years, retirees would use "To Do" lists regularly.  At first that caught me off-guard, thinking if you have plenty of time and no other demands for your time, why not just do things as the moment allowed?  Very likely it's just an old habit hard to break, because I do the very same thing myself today, trying to allocate time and events with preparation.

There were other interesting habits and practices but those three were the ones that hit the top of the list.  I suppose we all adapt in our own way, but I have yet to hear anybody say he/she regrets having made the move.  Life is good.  Except for those who failed to plan ahead.

One more "retiree"

It's not officially a "retirement" but it is a "slowing down" that put Robert Hall on the front page of the Anchor this week.  He's moved his auto business from Central Avenue to their home on Thrush Avenue, reducing his "drive" from 10 miles to a nice walk across the driveway to the other side of the yard.

Bob opened his shop downtown in 1973 and after 39 years made this big jump.  

The online format of the Anchor doesn't make it easy to download or copy their photos, at least for insertion here on the blog, so the scan at right is the best alternative.

To read the first part of the story on Page 1, click here.

To read the finish on Page 2, click here.

Personally I dread the thought of packing up to move, so even though there are places I might prefer to be, I plan to stay where I am for now.  And I can't imagine the process that Bob Hall had to go through when he made his move on that recent day.  I can imagine he did some cleaning out.  Congrats, Bob.

we've come a long ways

There's a moral in here somewhere.