Talk Investing Podcast
The Talk Investing Podcast & Blog discusses investment advice from our previous podcasts and radio shows by Remo Greco & Marco Mellado. Learn all things around retirement and investing.
Talk Investing Podcast
Retirement Plan Audit Basics
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You can feel “close to retirement” and still have no clear idea whether your plan holds up. We put a spotlight on the big gaps people miss by running a Retirement Plan Audit, a simple checklist that turns vague intention into practical steps you can action today.
We start where the pressure usually sits: debt. If a home loan or other non-deductible debt stretches into retirement, it can quietly drain your cash flow and limit choices later. We also unpack what happens if you die with a mortgage, why the debt becomes an estate issue, and why wills and powers of attorney belong in the same conversation as superannuation and investing.
From there we shift into lifestyle and spending, because your retirement income target is really about how you want to live. We talk through how to picture retirement in a realistic way, why a spending range is more useful than a perfect budget, and how modelling your capital (super, shares, cash, property) with conservative assumptions can reduce the fear of running out of money. Listener calls bring the rules to life: how ASFA defines “comfortable”, what to do if you receive money after 75, the quirks of super contribution deadlines and mandated employer contributions, the Centrelink gifting rules when helping family, and the key contribution caps that matter when an inheritance lands.
If you want retirement planning advice that’s grounded in Australian super rules, Age Pension realities, and clear next steps, press play. Subscribe, share this with someone who’s putting it off, and leave a review with the one retirement question you want answered next.
DISCLAIMER: This podcast contains general financial information only. That means the information does not take into account your objectives, financial situation, or needs. Because of that, you should consider if the information is appropriate to you and your needs, before acting on it. If you’re confused about what that means or what your needs are, you should always consult a licensed and trusted financial planner. Unfortunately, we cannot guarantee the accuracy of the information in this podcast, including any financial, taxation, and/or legal information. Remember, past performance is not a reliable indicator of future performance. The Rask Group is NOT a qualified tax accountant, financial (tax) adviser, or financial adviser. Access The Rask Group's Financial Services Guide (FSG): https://www.rask.com.au/fsg
Welcome And What We Cover
SPEAKER_00The Talk Investing podcast and blog discusses investment advice from our previous podcasts and radio shows by Remo Greco and Marco Melado. Learn all things around retirement and investing.
SPEAKER_04On the money. Maybe you're someone who does New Year's resolutions, and maybe you're like, oh, not for me. But in any event, you might be looking at your finances and thinking, you know what? I've been putting it off. I need to think about retirement. So this morning, we are going to do a retirement plan audit, an RPA. Because we know that it's all about three-letter acronyms. Marco Mulato is here. He is our superannuation specialist, Marco. Good morning.
SPEAKER_09Hi, Lisa. Nice to be here.
SPEAKER_04Happy New Year.
SPEAKER_09And likewise.
SPEAKER_041-300-222-774 is our phone number. Anything we share here is general in nature and doesn't take into account your personal circumstances, financial situations, or needs.
What A Retirement Plan Audit Is
SPEAKER_04Marco, what is a retirement plan audit?
SPEAKER_09Okay, as you said, probably not the most interesting name. Maybe we can call it a checklist or a guide or something like that. But it really is something we put together a while ago now that helps people identify the key areas they should be thinking about when starting to plan for retirement. It doesn't necessarily give us any answers immediately, but it's like a bit of an ongoing checklist to make sure you're not missing any of the important bits that you need to start addressing, you know, well before retirement, to be honest.
SPEAKER_04Alright, get your pen and paper out uh or your you know laptop handy. Let's go through where we start. So where how do we kick off?
Debt Before Retirement And Estates
SPEAKER_09So I would be thinking about one of the biggest impediments we all generally have, which is debt. So most of us will have some form of debt, and that is often in the form of a home loan. But what we really want to be zeroing in on is how long is that debt going to take to pay off? How far uh into the future am I gonna continue with that debt and is it going to creep into retirement or not? Trevor Burrus, Jr.
SPEAKER_04What is that a bad thing? Should we be debt-free by retirement? Is that an aim?
SPEAKER_09We'd love to be debt-free by retirement. That is the aim. It doesn't always happen. But what we want to really make sure of is if that debt is significant enough that when we hit retirement, it's going to be a really, really big obstacle for us. So it's just going to chew up a lot of our cash flow because so much of our cash flow is going to go to it. That's not going to be a great position to be in. So we need to start thinking about how we either reduce that more quickly or whether the sale of assets needs to come into play to chop that debt down.
SPEAKER_04And actually, um what does happen to a a mortgage if you uh die with a debt?
SPEAKER_09Ah, right, okay. So if you pass away and you still have a debt left, it forms part of your estate. Then your executor really is uh essentially responsible or accountable for making sure debts are repaid first before any beneficiaries receive their inheritance. So it becomes more of an estate planning issue, which is on our audit, on our checklist, you know, right down the list. It's what happens if you pass away prematurely? What happens if you're incapacitated? Do we have wills, powers of attorney, clear instructions so that people know what they need to do with your assets? That's a big part of retirement that people often overlook.
SPEAKER_04Uh if you just tuned in, you're listening to ABC Radio Melbourne and Victoria on 774 AM, you're with Lisa Leong, and we are doing on the money with Marco Mulato, who's our superannuation specialist. We're doing a retirement plan audit, and we're starting with debt. Is there any priority when it comes to trying to reduce that debt?
SPEAKER_09Yeah, great question. So a lot of people will have what we consider two kinds of debt. One is called tax-deductible debt, which might be investment related. So think investment property, loan for shares, that sort of stuff. And the other is the debt I was talking about before, just normal, what we call sort of bad debt, which is a home loan, a personal loan, a credit card. There is no tax deductibility for those types of loans. So there's no benefit in having them. They're the ones we want to try and eliminate first, and then we move to the tax deductible loans, which are a little bit more friendly cash flow-wise, but ultimately we want to tackle both. We just start with the one that doesn't give us a tax benefit first.
SPEAKER_04Okay, so debt number one. Number two.
SPEAKER_09Two. Lifestyle.
Building A Real Retirement Lifestyle
SPEAKER_09Let's think about what retirement may look like. Let's think about the sorts of things you may want to do, the cost involved in doing those things. Are we going to help the kids? Are we going to travel a lot? Are we going to change vehicles? Are we going to stay in our home or not? What does my social life look like? Where am I going to live exactly? So this is about trying to and it won't be uh easy to get an accurate picture immediately and it will be evolving, but it's really important to have a framework for what retirement looks like because that directly relates to how much income we're going to need to to get you.
SPEAKER_04When you're talking people through these questions, it's very hard to picture sometimes what retirement is going to look like for people. And I think people have maybe a picture in their heads of pina colada at the beach, you know, but that won't last very long. So are there any questions or anything that you find particularly helpful when it comes to helping people picture what they're going to be doing in retirement?
SPEAKER_09Yeah, so a a lot of it is actually around uh friendship circles and community and the stuff they're kind of doing already that they want to do a bit more of. So there's a there's a lot of thinking around, well, if I had more time, how would I fill it? And it doesn't necessarily, maybe surprisingly, get filled with things that cost a lot of money. Sometimes it's just very simple and basic hobbies. It's just spending more time with certain friends, certain families, grandkids. There tends to be a bit of babysitting involved often. But you'd be surprised that it's not necessarily this uh grand, uh, you know, grandiose picture that they assume they have to meet. In the early years there may be some significant spending around some travel, but often we find that then tapers off and we get to a bit more of a realistic lifestyle.
SPEAKER_04Okay. So retirement plan audit, we've gone debt, we've tried to reduce it, we've looked at our lifestyle, so we've just pictured our retirement lifestyle, and now for number three, which is spending.
Spending Targets And Capital Modelling
SPEAKER_09Yeah, so this gets a bit harder, right? So and we've done a few shows on ASFA in the past, which give you an idea, but it's pretty important to have an idea of what kind of spending pattern we might have. And why that is important is because that can help us calculate what what starting asset base we need at retirement. So once we've pictured our lifestyle, we need to kind of do some kind of budget. Now it doesn't have to be exact, you don't have to get it right to the dollar. Even if you have a range, that range is important, and that might be I think I need 40 to 50,000 or 70 to 80,000. If we can nail that range, then we can work backwards, calculate the lump sum we might need, and do all sorts of wonderful financial projections that show us 20 or 30 years into the future around how your capital might look and behave, and therefore provide some reinsurance around not running out of money.
SPEAKER_04What do you mean by capital there?
SPEAKER_09Capital assets, money. So super shares, cash in the bank, investment property if you have it, so all of that lumped together we call capital, and that capital amount we really need to know what we need to get to at a point in time, and that is your retirement, and then we can extrapolate that out and really have give you a really good visual of right, I'm pretty safe, I'm not going to run out of money, or G, it's it's a bit dicey here. I might I might be low on capital in my 90s, for example, and then we reshape, refine, and strategize around that.
SPEAKER_04You're listening to ABC Radio, Melbourne and Victoria. Lisa Leong with you, back from holidays. It's 16 past ten, and I have Marco Mulado, who is a superannuation specialist, and we're doing a retirement plan audit, and we can take your questions right now. 1-300-272-774 or 0437-774-774. Marco, we've been talking about how to go through these things. I have
How Much Super Is Enough
SPEAKER_04a specific question here, which maybe we could work through it and might help this bring everything to life, right? So, how much should I have in super? writes Lisa from Geelong when I retire in two to three years. So retiring in two to three years. I'd like to have a comfortable living. So we'll talk about that. Going overseas at least once a year. I'm 63 years old, single, no dependence. I own my own house. I would like a new car.
SPEAKER_09Okay. So really common. Very common scenario. Set of circumstances. Whether you're single or couple, we often see this, right? We've got a target date. We think we know what our retirement's going to look like, but we haven't got any numbers around it, right? But but we've done a bit of work, so it feels like this call has already done a bit of bit of pre-work. So the sorts of things we need to think about is in two or three years' time, how old are we going to be? What do the next two or three years look like? Can we continue to save and bulk up our our capital, our investments, or not? Then we look at, right, that potential amount of capital, that potential lump sum we're going to have in two or three years' time, what is it? So we need to have a we need to have a figure around that. And then we would look at some very conservative assumptions around, right, if we retire and we have X amount of dollars now in the kitty, in the pot, and we earn a very conservative investment return over time of say five or six percent, and inflation runs at two or three, and we draw thirty, forty, fifty thousand dollars a year, how long does that money last? Right? So that's the process. To put some numbers around this, I mean ASFA's done some great work on this, and we've done this in the past, but this sounds like a lump sum of around five or six hundred thousand dollars. And that includes age pension at some point when we're eligible. But we do need to know how much we need to spend in retirement or how much we'd like to spend in retirement. So that number is missing at the moment. Retirement budget is how you try and get that number, right? Think about your lifestyle and try and put that down on paper.
SPEAKER_04And uh Lisa from Geelong is saying, you know, a comfortable lifestyle going overseas at least once a year. Is that a comfortable lifestyle as defined by ASFA? According to ASFA, uh no.
SPEAKER_09It's a modest to ASFA, it's an overseas holiday every six or seven years. So not every year. Right. A modest lifestyle would be a you know pretty basic domestic holiday per annum.
SPEAKER_04Okay. So um if we go with so the comfortable lifestyle was around fifty four thousand dollars for singles, and so then we would sort of take that figure roughly, wouldn't we, and say, well, actually, if I want to have an overseas holiday once a year rather than once every six years, and then you might bump it up.
SPEAKER_09Yeah, so you might need a bit more, or there just there just may be some years where you're very lean with your spending, right? This just comes back to basic budgeting money management. You might spend a year or two being quite lean, and then you might be able to take a trip every three or four years. So, you know, these are just aspiras are just guides, right? There's no perfect scenario.
SPEAKER_04It's 20 past ten on ABC Radio Melbourne and Victoria. Lisa Leong with you, Marco Mulato in the house. We are doing superannuation retirement plan and we are taking your questions. 1-300-22-774-0437-774-774.
After 75 Rules And Early Retirement Gap
SPEAKER_04This one from Jack in Bendigo. Hello, I'm turning 75. Coming into some money after that age. If I can't put it into super because of that age, what do you suggest I do?
SPEAKER_09Okay, so this is uh it could be borderline here because we're turning 75.
SPEAKER_04We're not seventy-five yet, so But he's coming into the money after the turning 75 is reads. And coming into some money after that age.
SPEAKER_09So it depends how long after, because there's uh another quirky little rule in Super that allows you to contribute up until the twenty-eighth day of the mu of the following month that you turn seventy-five, right? So that's confusing. But let's say we turn 75 in January, you'll have until the twenty-eighth of February to make a contribution. So if that money comes in just after that, we can get it into super. If it doesn't, and and it's well after that, then really what we do all the time for clients is just a an investment portfolio, right? So it's really similar to a super fund, it's just not in a super fund, it's in your name. But it's a selection of assets that we tailor to what you want, whether it's income needs or capital growth needs or a specific goal you want to meet at a particular point in time that costs X amount of dollars. So we just put together a a range of assets to try and make sure we get that investment goal met.
SPEAKER_04And after 75 or the 28th day after the following month that you tend 75. No super. You cannot contribute to super.
SPEAKER_09It uh it used to be more restrictive than that, so they've actually made it less restrictive. But look, I doubt it. You know, 75's uh up there, and so we've got the downsizer contribution, which in some way plays kind of that role if we sell our home.
SPEAKER_04After 75, though?
SPEAKER_09Yep, there's no Really? Yeah, downsize is the only contribution that almost doesn't have any uh well doesn't have any age limit. It can be at any age provided you're fifty-five or over, but that's the same.
SPEAKER_04And you've lived in the house for over ten years?
SPEAKER_09Well, you have to owned it for ten years. And it has to has to have been your main residence at least for some of that time. Um not all of that time, just some of that time. Really? So it could be an investment property for nine years and it could be a residence for one year. It would still qualify.
SPEAKER_04Wow, there's all these little There's a lot in there.
SPEAKER_09There are all these new ones.
SPEAKER_04Every time we lift a cover on something, there's something else.
SPEAKER_09Just a can of worms, isn't it?
SPEAKER_04Just a can of worms, and you're a worm farmer.
SPEAKER_09I wouldn't know about that, but we get through it, right? So we're constantly ahead in the books.
SPEAKER_04All right, let's go to the phone lines now. Steve from Mooney Ponds. Hello, Steve.
SPEAKER_05Hi guys, how are you?
SPEAKER_04Good. What's your question for Marco Mulato, Steve?
SPEAKER_05Um for a couple to retire at 60, um, what is for a very comfortable lifestyle, how much should you be aiming to have in your superfunds?
SPEAKER_09Okay, so we get this kind of question all the time, and people are disappointed and maybe a bit shocked with our answer because they're they're all questions back to you. They're all things like, well, what kind of retirement are you going to live? How much do you think you might spend? What sort of travel do you want to do? Do you want to leave an inheritance or not? So all of these questions will shape how much you actually need. There's not one figure for a couple that's 60 to aim for. ASFA does the guide, which we've talked about, and that will go through a whole budget with you around what they think, you know, the average couple at 60 might spend. But that is the average couple, and everybody's very different, right? It's individualistic. So you've got to go back and do the work first and go, right, this is the kind of retirement I think we like. This is roughly what we think it's going to cost us per annum. We're going to have some extra ad hoc expenses at times, so we need to cover that. Once we know those sorts of things, then we can come up with a figure. Does that make sense?
SPEAKER_05No, yeah, automark and the investment is saying roughly 700 grand uh at the age of 67. So in a ballpark figure at 60 for a comfortable lifestyle for a couple, or is that a million, million half of it?
SPEAKER_09Oh, right, okay. Yeah. So you So again, we can't come up with the with an answer on the spot, but the way to think about it is you need to fund essentially seven years of that gap, if you like. Right? So it's seven years of funding. If you wanted to spend, say, for example, fifty thousand dollars a year in retirement over those seven years, it's a very simple calculation, but that's $350,000, right, that you need. Just to fund that gap. Now there'll be some earnings on that money because it's not just sitting earning zero, so you might need a bit less than that. But that's the calculation you have to do. You have to say, right, I've got seven years to fund between 60 and 67. What does that look like for me? How much do I want to spend? And therefore you do a bit of a reverse calc. And there's uh pretty good calculators online, you can go to super fun websites, etc., where you can plug in the amount you want to spend over a certain period, and that'll do a what's called a net present value calculation, and it'll tell you what lump sum you need today to uh to enable that to happen.
SPEAKER_04Oh, that's helpful. Thank you, Marco, and thank you, Steve. Good questions here. Uh 25 past ten on ABC Radio. We're taking your calls. 1300 272 774.
Gifting Property And Pension Pitfalls
SPEAKER_04Judy has a question. Hello, Judy.
SPEAKER_07Hello.
SPEAKER_04What's your question for Marco?
SPEAKER_07Uh Marco, so I'm uh 62 this year, and I have two homes. I live in my own home, no uh mortgage, and I have a second home that I wish to transfer to my son um before I'm 62. Uh by the time I get to super age in another five years' time, I'll have about 400,000 in super. Will I qualify for the aged care pension if I my only capital is my own home and my super balance to live on?
SPEAKER_09So on the basis of that, yes, you should. It mightn't be the full pension, but it will be a part pension. You just have to be careful with the gifting of that second home to your son. So I guess in two ways. Number one is tax, because if you've made a gain on that, that's a a change of ownership, and so there'll be a a capital gain tax event. The second one is the gifting rules of Centrelink. So what Centrelink do is they count any gift you've made in the previous five years, so this is the f yeah, from age pension age prior, and they will count that as a gift. So that window's really important. If you do it within that five years, it's going to count as a gift for a period of time. That may knock you out for a period of time. But if you're gifting it before the five years, so five years then a lapse and then your age pension eligible, then that won't be counted by Centrelink. So I think you need a bit of advice here because Centrelink's not my forte, but the gifting rules are there, and so that's what you need to watch in particular.
SPEAKER_07Yep. Thank you very much. I'll call Centrelink and my accountant.
SPEAKER_04You're welcome. Good on you, Judy. Thank you so much. Great questions there. Let's continue with the questions. We've got Jan here. Hello, Jan.
SPEAKER_06Hi, good morning.
SPEAKER_04Good morning. And your question for Marco.
SPEAKER_06Um, I will still I'll almost certainly still be working after I'm 75. I know I can't put any money into my super, but will my employer still be able to put money into super and what happens with that?
SPEAKER_09Uh yeah, okay, so that is that that's actually the one exception. The only super that can go in post-date 75 is what's called mandated super, which is which is exactly that, what what your employer is mandated to contribute. So that will just go into super as per normal and be invested as per normal.
SPEAKER_04Right, okay, thank you. Oh, good. What another one of those little little things. Quirky things. Quirky things. Quirky super. My goodness. Quirky retirement. 28 past ten. You're listening to ABC Radio. We are doing on the money with superannuation specialist Marco Mulado, and we will continue the conversation after this.
SPEAKER_03Right now, Victorians are facing devastating losses from bushfires. You can help by donating to the 2026 Victorian Bushfire Appeal. Visit abc.net.au slash Melbourne for details.
SPEAKER_04On the Money. Getting up to 10 30 right now on ABC Radio. You're with Lisa Leong and On the Money is back. And superannuation specialist Marco Millado is helping us with our retirement plan. audit and we are taking your questions as well. 1-300-322-774-0437-774-774.
Budget Now Plus Super Admin Fixes
SPEAKER_04Just a recap on the retirement plan audit. So we've looked at debt and you said the first priority is to reduce any debt that we can leading into retirement. The second one was build a picture of the lifestyle that you want in retirement because then that helps us build out um the next part which is what will we need to um spend when we're in retirement. And then we work out the capital amount. So therefore you need to figure out okay so if that's going to be our spend each year then how much do I need and how much how much we extrapolate and come backwards and go, okay, how much do we need now? Exactly. Is it helpful to look at our spend budget sort of stuff now? Yes. So this is because there's this idea of what we have and then we look at our spend and we go oh okay this is our budget. This is what we actually spend.
SPEAKER_09This is this is where we start with everyone we say right you need a current budget before you do your retirement budget. Because there are some fixed costs that we know are just not going to change. And we all know what they are just you know groceries and utilities and all sorts of things. And so we can nail those fixed costs pretty well the process of doing a current budget also really brings to light where we can reduce some spending and if not now certainly in retirement. So just knowing where your current position is allows you to build your future position a lot more accurately.
SPEAKER_04And we will continue part two of this conversation as well because we're getting to that time when we might need to once again never quite get through everything. But we do have a question from Stuart who's called through on 1300 7274.
SPEAKER_02Stuart far away good morning um I've my I've got a problem with uh it's not actually on on topic but um it's a quirky part of of SuperArch as far as I can discover I put in a notes of intent to uh you know to put in to claim tax deduction for a payment I made it was a mistake on my behalf um the the tax fund uh sorry the super fund withheld $15,000 and or nearly eight sorry nearly $18,000 and um apparently transferred that to the tax department. I then another mistake probably but moved to a different fund and the original fund closed my account my soup account. They're now I because I made a mistake I don't what didn't want to claim that money but I'm they're still refusing. I'm I'm putting it and I've gone to what are they called? AFSA no not AFCA. AFCA yeah but I'm not but I'm just wondering whether you've got any suggestions or that's the best avenue AFCA.
SPEAKER_09Yeah so it I mean with the details you've given me it sounds like the Superfund's probably done the right thing but what needs to be taken into account is it is it was a genuine mistake by you. So that would be the argument. So AFCA is the place to go and have that heard. So AFCA is the Australian Financial Complaints Association so that's where all of these sorts of cases are heard. That is the best option for you Stuart at this stage.
SPEAKER_04Thank you Stuart good luck. And Linda is here.
SPEAKER_08Hello Linda Hello how you going?
SPEAKER_04Good what's your question for Marco?
SPEAKER_08I have um about to receive the first part payment of my mother's estate and the second part from her shares will come in in October. But my first question is well my main question is sorry um I'm going to pay the mortgage I know that it will cover that but how much can I put into a super my super account and when without causing any impact I still work full time and plan to for the next year.
SPEAKER_09Okay. So there's a couple of limits you need to be aware of the first limit is what we call the concessional limit or the tax deductible amount you can put in. So that's a contribution you can make of up to 30,000 it includes your employer's contributions but you might benefit from that because it gives you a personal tax deduction. So it lowers your personal tax you just don't pay as much. So you say you can do $30,000 every year and then the much larger one is called the non concessional one and you can do either $120,000 per annum or you can group three years together right now and do $360,000. But that will knock you out for the next two years.
