Short Takes: European Bank Customer Abuse, Opening a RRIF at Questrade, and more

The word “millionaire” is frequently used to mean a person who doesn’t have any financial concerns and whose wealth is much greater than what the rest of us have.  However, imagine a couple whose house is now worth $750,000, they have a $300,000 mortgage, they owe $50,000 on their cars, and one has a public service pension now worth $600,000.  On paper, this couple has a million dollars, but they are hardly rich, and they definitely still have financial worries.  It’s time to start using “decamillionaire” to mean a very wealthy person.  Maybe $5 million is enough, but we don’t have a common word for that level of wealth.

Here are my posts for the past two weeks:

Debunking a Bogus Stock Market Prediction

Wilful Blindness

Here are some short takes and some weekend reading:

Andrew Hallam explains how European banks sell some horrific “investments” to unsuspecting consumers.  He also exposes the huge downside of index-linked investments that promise no down years.

Robb Engen at Boomer and Echo explains how to convert an RRSP to a RRIF at Questrade.

Big Cajun Man thinks it’s important to teach your kids to be frugal at back-to-school time.  I agree.  Just because some people call student debt “good debt,” it’s still better to finish school with your debt smaller rather than larger.