I Remember

Page 12

Saving habits

My mother taught me about financial concepts as I was growing up, not literally of course. She had no formal education but she knew a lot about money. I was influenced by her subconsciously because I bear her traits in money management.

When I was still a young boy, I would accompany my mother to the banks to either put in money or to withdraw interest on her savings. She would want me to check on the fixed deposit slip for accuracy before leaving the bank. She would also ask me to check the entries in the savings account book. My mother was a saver. When my siblings and I started work, we gave my mother some monthly allowances. Though not much, she would keep them until she accumulated enough for her to make a trip to the banks. Instead of using a single name for banking in the money, she would use joint-alternate account with each of my brothers and sister. This way, my siblings and I have some money in our names. My mother knew that there were risks with putting money in a bank. There were runs on some banks in the past. She opened accounts with several banks, namely POSB, DBS, UOB, Citibank, now-defunct Chung Khiaw Bank. So my mother spread her risks of losing her hard-saved money over several banks. Back then, there was no such thing as Deposit Insurance Scheme to protect her. On maturity of her fixed deposits, she would go to the bank to withdraw the interest income and roll over the same principal sum for another fixed period. This way she only spent on the interest income without touching the principal sum. She was not rich enough to compound the interest because she still needed money to spend on Chinese New Year. During her time, the fixed deposit interest rates were above 10% p.a. not like now. When my mother was still alive, she still had the fixed deposits (FD). Some FDs were started so many years back. Even when the fixed deposit interest rate was so low like 0.1% p.a., she still did not terminate the accounts. By saving and putting money in interest-bearing deposits is one way to put the money to work. She spread her risks by putting money in several banks. She planned her inheritance


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Epilogue

1min
pages 59-60

From Executive Diary to Smart Phone

1min
page 56

My Uncle from Malaysia

1min
pages 57-58

Coopers & Lybrand

1min
page 55

My Education

2min
pages 53-54

My First Driving Licence

0
page 52

My First Property to Live In

1min
pages 48-49

My parents stayed in rental flats of public housing

1min
page 47

Investing in Investment Property

1min
page 50

Joy of Reading

1min
page 51

My journey through National Service

2min
pages 45-46

My Parents stayed at Craig Road before

0
page 44

DBS Fixed Deposit in 1993

0
page 43

Do you plan for retirement?

1min
page 42

National Day Parade in 1971

1min
page 38

Matriculation for Accountancy course in 1978-9

1min
pages 39-40

GCE “O” Level Results were published in Newspaper

0
page 37

Enrolled in English-Medium stream in primary school (1964

1min
page 41

You write long-distance and then wait days for reply

1min
page 36

You will know this special bond

1min
page 35

PSC Undergraduate Scholarship 1976

1min
page 34

National Library of yesteryears

1min
page 31

My years in National Junior College

2min
page 33

Early years of bus transport

1min
page 30

My Hobbies

0
page 32

I did woodwork and metalwork

1min
page 29

My National Service Days

1min
pages 27-28

Bukit Ho Swee Fire

0
page 25

My First Savings Account (POSB

1min
page 26

From poor to rich

1min
page 24

Chinese New Year

1min
page 22

Games played

3min
pages 19-21

Credit facility

1min
page 23

My Home at Ganges Avenue

3min
pages 17-18

Living each day as it comes

0
page 16

A Private Person

2min
pages 14-15

Saving habits

2min
pages 12-13

I Remember

2min
pages 7-8

Preface

0
pages 5-6

My School Days

0
page 9

Career

2min
page 11

Inferiority Complex

1min
page 10
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