You will be able to plan goals one after another so each gets full funding for its period.
After ranking their goals in lesson 8.2, Mei and Daniel had a plan that funded the wedding and the home in full, gave the diploma S$150 of the S$250 it needed, and gave the car nothing. Daniel's reaction was reasonable: "So my diploma just never gets funded?" It does. It has to wait its turn, and the turn comes sooner than he expected, because of something the ranking alone doesn't show: goals end.
This lesson is about planning goals one after another instead of all at once. All figures are the made-up ones from earlier lessons.
Sequencing means giving one goal most of the available money until it is funded, then moving that money to the next goal. Instead of four goals each receiving a slice for five years, each goal gets a large share for a shorter time.
The wedding is the clearest case. It takes S$850 a month, more than half of what Mei and Daniel save, but only for 30 months. On the day after the wedding, S$850 a month is suddenly free. An even split would have kept spreading money thinly across all four goals for the whole period. Sequencing hands the freed money to the next goal in line.
The total saved is the same either way. What changes is that each goal is fully funded on its date, instead of every goal being partly funded on every date.
Splitting suits goals with similar dates. If two fixed goals fall due in the same year, you can't fund one and then the other, because the second would have no time to build up. Both need money at the same time, and both get their full figure.
Sequencing suits goals whose dates are far apart, or whose dates can move. Mei and Daniel's wedding and home are both fixed, but their payments are years apart, and both fit in the budget at once, so they run side by side. The diploma, the car and the child's pre-birth goal from lesson 6.4, Build a child's first-years budget, are the ones that line up behind them.
The diploma was meant to start in month 24, but at S$150 a month it would only have S$5,600 by then, not the S$8,000 it needs. Starting it on time would mean borrowing or taking money from the wedding.
Daniel's course runs several intakes a year, so he moves his start date to month 40, a little over a year later than planned. At S$150 a month from today, plus the S$2,000 he already has, the diploma goal reaches S$8,000 in month 40. A move of a little over a year on a flexible goal made it fit without touching either fixed goal.
The same trick often works for two goals that clash. Pushing one of them back by a year, or bringing one forward if it is smaller, can separate two goals that seemed impossible together.
Here is the sequence they end up with, with their S$1,500 a month for goals.
Months 1 to 30: wedding S$850, home S$500, diploma S$150 Months 31 to 40: pre-birth goal S$850, home S$500, diploma S$150, so the diploma reaches S$8,000 in month 40 Months 41 to 50: pre-birth goal S$850, home S$500, car S$150, so the pre-birth goal reaches S$17,000 in month 50 Months 51 to 60: home S$500, car S$1,000, so the home cash goal is complete by month 60 Months 61 to 66: car about S$1,416.67, CDA deposits about S$83.33, so the car reaches S$20,000 in month 66
Every period adds up to S$1,500. The wedding money moves to the pre-birth goal, as lesson 6.4 planned. The diploma's S$150 moves to the car when the diploma is funded. The pre-birth money moves to the car when that is funded, and so on.
Under the even split from lesson 8.1, every goal would have been short on its date. Under this sequence, every goal is funded in full. The diploma waits 16 months longer and the car six months longer, and the plan says so in writing.
A sequence is a plan for the life you expect. Life rarely follows it exactly, so the order needs checking whenever something big changes.
A new job with a higher salary might add money to every period, or let the car come forward. A pregnancy earlier than planned would move the pre-birth goal ahead of the diploma and push the car back. A rise in COE prices, a higher renovation quote or a change in grants would change a target, and the months after it.
When one of these happens, go back to the scores from lesson 8.2, rescore any goal whose answers have changed, and redraw the sequence. It usually takes ten minutes with the sheet open.
Your own timeline will have different goals and dates, and a rough version on paper is enough to begin with.
Draw a simple timeline of your goals showing which one is being funded in each year.
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