Retirement and a Gift Box

The Story
Ginger has always been good at being thrifty. It’s who she is. Though she had significant sources of income and had saved well, it was challenging for her to feel confident that her savings were sufficient to live on for the rest of her life. This is true for a lot of people: it is difficult to interpret the implications on day-to-day life by looking at one lump sum of one’s worth.
Ginger came to us wanting to know that what she had meticulously saved throughout her life would simply be enough.

The Right Questions
After analyzing all sources of her income and calculating her monthly spending budget accordingly, the result shocked Ginger. It wasn’t just significantly more than she anticipated. It was significantly more than she had ever spent, or desired to spend. With no children, she planned to donate her money to charity after she passed away, And in the meantime, she’d continue spending as always. But what if the question of what to do with the money was not a matter of lifestyle, of buying more or living more extravagantly, but rather was this: how can you use money to add value to your day? This question changed our conversations with Ginger
entirely.

The Plan
Ginger was so good at saving that she had to learn how to spend. Through our conversations, we had learned that she finds joy in giving back. So why wait until she’s not here to see the good come out of it? We helped Ginger set up an anonymous account, called The Gift Box. Each month, she has an allotted amount to give away in the name of that account – in her
name, sometimes, and anonymously, other times.

The Gift Box has impacted many local organizations to date. It has also given Ginger the opportunity to connect with a community that cares about the same things that she does. Her money wasn’t the determinant of her lifestyle – it was a tool by which she was able to add value to her day, and to the lives of many others.