In this Written Assignment, I will be Completing the Assignment from, Personal Finance by Rachel Siegel and Carol Yacht (2009); Page 23. Exercise 2. I will be using the S.M.A.R.T. planning model and information in this section to evaluate Alice’s goals which are given as: A. Pay off student loan. B. Buy a house and save for children’s education. C. Accumulate assets. D. Retire. E. Travel around the world in a sailboat. A. Pay off student loan – paying off her student loan is a classic S.M.A.R.T. goal. It is specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, and timely. Paying debts is always a priority as usually the longer one postpones paying a debt, the bigger the interest will be. Paying off her loan is a top priority for Alice as this will result in having more money to pursue her other goals in the longer term. Paying off her debt will also go a long way in terms of improving her credit score. Having a good credit score is vital in Alice’s case as she has indicated that buying a house is one of her goals and without a good credit score she will find it difficult to secure a good mortgage. Securing a good mortgage …show more content…
Buy a house and save for children’s education – this goal is less S.M.A.R.T. than goal A’ in that it is a long-term goal (depending on Alice’s salary of course – if she can secure a job as a director of a big company, then this goal can be an intermediate future goal, however this is unlikely.) So, depending on the market price, her salary, savings and credit score, it has the potential of being unattainable. There are many variants that influence purchasing a house. For example, what kind of mortgage Alice can secure. Another point is the housing market condition, the area where the property is located and the type of house. Saving for her children’s education is measurable if we knew more about Alice’s income and the length of time she would like to save for. Also, we don’t know the amount she wants to reach and how many children she wants to save