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Me & My Money Series (Sunday Times)
Feb 13, 2011
me & my money
Free Willy
Research engineer's switch to insurance results in more control of his time, more money and more rewarding job
By Lorna Tan, Senior Correspondent
Mr Willy Tan cites several key reasons for making a significant career change in 2005, from working as a research engineer to venturing into the insurance sector.
One, plainly speaking, was the better money he believed he could earn as a full-time financial adviser at Prudential. But he also felt he would have more control of his time, and a more rewarding career.
He is now a financial services director at Prudential.
Before that, Mr Tan, 34, spent four years at the National University of Singapore (NUS) from 2001, working as a research engineer. Back then, he was involved mainly in energy policy pertaining to commercial buildings.
'I wanted a more rewarding career that recognises my contribution and one that allows me to have more control of my time. Thus going into financial planning practice as an entrepreneur seemed a good option,' he recalled.
A year after he joined Prudential, Mr Tan's gross commissions were three times his previous annual pay of $60,000 at NUS. He made it to the Million Dollar Round Table (MDRT), a prestigious select group of high achievers, in 2005, 2006 and 2007. His current gross commissions are about $400,000.
Last year, he became the top rookie agency manager at Prudential when his agency of nine financial consultants brought in annualised new business sales of $900,000. Currently, his agency has 11 consultants.
Putting aside monetary benefits, Mr Tan said the real significance of his work is when he delivers the promise to pay.
In 2009, he helped a 41-year-old female client claim $200,000 from her critical illness cover when she was diagnosed with colon and liver cancer.
Last year, he paid a death claim of $300,000 to the family of a 54-year-old male policy holder who died from a stroke. His financial advice to his clients is to get cover when they are still young and healthy.
Mr Tan graduated with an honours degree in engineering from NUS in 2001. His wife Adelia Huang, 30, joined him at his agency at Prudential in 2007 and has since made it to the MDRT and an even more select group, Court of the Table. They have two daughters, Calistia, six, and Velkissia, three.
Q: Are you a spender or saver?
When I was single, I could save 75 per cent of my income.
Currently, I save 30 per cent in cash while another 30 per cent is put regularly in an investment portfolio consisting of global real estate investment trusts (PruLink Global Property Securities Fund), emerging market equities (PruLink Emerging Markets Fund) and Asian infra-structure equities (PruLink Asian
Infrastructure Equity Fund) and PruLink China-India Fund. The remaining 40 per cent is for business and daily expenses.
Q: How much do you charge to your credit cards every month?
I have seven cards but I use two more often. I charge about $10,000 to my American Express platinum charge card and PruPrestige credit card monthly. This includes household expenditure and any other expenses incurred for my family. A part of this monthly expenditure also goes into paying our insurance premiums.
The advantage of charging these expenses to credit cards is that they 'discipline' me to always pay on time and not default on payment.
I do not have a lot of cash in my wallet. I withdraw about $200 per week for my miscellaneous expenses.
Q: What financial planning have you done for yourself?
My main investment portfolio consists of two regular premium investment-linked insurance plans (ILPs) which invest in a range of equity funds. I also own term, whole life and medical policies. My wife has two ILPs and my kids have one each too.
Last year, I invested in the badly battered S-chips such as Fuxing, China Sky and Yanlord. These stocks offer good value for money as they are heavily discounted. I maintain a stock portfolio, worth about $300,000, investing in counters like StarHub and ST Engineering.
I am covered $3.5 million on my life and $1.05 million against critical illnesses. I will also receive a weekly income of $2,000 if I am temporarily and/or partially disabled.
My family's premiums, including the recurrent single premiums in the investments I mentioned, work out to more than $100,000 per year.
Q: Moneywise, what were your growing up years like?
I grew up in a family that strongly believes in being frugal. I have one younger sister.
My father is a general manager at the government-linked conglomerate Singapore Technologies Group (which includes ST Engineering). My mother is a housewife.
As my father was stationed in Suzhou (in China) since I was in junior college, I learnt to spend not more than the pocket money given to me. I was given a supplementary credit card when I turned 21 which taught me to use credit sparingly.
My father is a good investor. He bought SPC and Citigroup during the recent crisis.
Among other things, my parents taught me not to spend unnecessarily, to save for a rainy day and not to be flashy.
Q: How did you get interested in investing?
It was in 1993 to 1994, during a time of exceptional GDP (gross domestic product) growth rate in Singapore, that I got interested in investing.
Some of my friends in junior college were already trading shares using their parents' accounts. That was also the time of the initial public offering craze which lasted for quite a while.
I started a trading account when I was 21 in 1998 with my hongbao money saved over the years. I was a first-year student at NUS then.
Q: What property do you own?
A 1,562 sq ft freehold condominium in Upper Changi Road bought in end-2006. I bought it for $570,000 and it is now valued at $1.2 million. It is fully paid up.
In 2009, I bought a 698 sq ft studio apartment in Loyang for $500,000. It was sold for $583,000 last year.
Q: What is the most extravagant thing you have bought?
A Loewe sling bag bought in Barcelona last year when I was on a company trip. It cost 990 euros (S$1,700). It has been in my storeroom since then. It's one of those moments in life when you made a buying decision without knowing the difference between a want and a need.
Q: What is your retirement plan?
We will need about $20,000 a month in today's value when we retire. I am working towards being financially independent by age 40.
Having a home that is fully paid for and sufficient income-generating assets or business to fund my daily expenses is my definition of financial independence.
I will not retire. I realise I am someone who cannot sit still doing nothing. My mind must be constantly challenged.
Q: Home is now...
My condo in Upper Changi Road.
Q: I drive...
A phantom black Audi A6.
lorna@sph.com.sg
------------------------------------------------
WORST AND BEST BETS
Q: What has been your worst investment?
When I was a third-year student at NUS in late 1999 and early 2000, I invested in technology stocks such as Media Ring, Horizon.com and I-Comm. I put in $20,000 but when they were delisted I recovered less than 10 per cent of my initial outlay in 2001/02.
Q: And your best?
It is definitely my family and the financial planning practice business in Prudential. The former gives me the joy and internal motivation to excel, while the latter provides me with a sound remuneration package and a fulfilling career.
I see my agency manager job as a business in which I can bring value to my representatives and customers. This is especially true when I start to train and bring out the best in the financial consultants I have recruited.
I invest approximately $4,000 a month in staff costs and training, which in turn helps me in daily operations, administration and recruitment. The money is well spent as the agency was able to bring in more than $1 million annualised new business premiums last year. I project this to grow at least 20 per cent per annum for the next two years.
me & my money
Free Willy
Research engineer's switch to insurance results in more control of his time, more money and more rewarding job
By Lorna Tan, Senior Correspondent
Mr Willy Tan cites several key reasons for making a significant career change in 2005, from working as a research engineer to venturing into the insurance sector.
One, plainly speaking, was the better money he believed he could earn as a full-time financial adviser at Prudential. But he also felt he would have more control of his time, and a more rewarding career.
He is now a financial services director at Prudential.
Before that, Mr Tan, 34, spent four years at the National University of Singapore (NUS) from 2001, working as a research engineer. Back then, he was involved mainly in energy policy pertaining to commercial buildings.
'I wanted a more rewarding career that recognises my contribution and one that allows me to have more control of my time. Thus going into financial planning practice as an entrepreneur seemed a good option,' he recalled.
A year after he joined Prudential, Mr Tan's gross commissions were three times his previous annual pay of $60,000 at NUS. He made it to the Million Dollar Round Table (MDRT), a prestigious select group of high achievers, in 2005, 2006 and 2007. His current gross commissions are about $400,000.
Last year, he became the top rookie agency manager at Prudential when his agency of nine financial consultants brought in annualised new business sales of $900,000. Currently, his agency has 11 consultants.
Putting aside monetary benefits, Mr Tan said the real significance of his work is when he delivers the promise to pay.
In 2009, he helped a 41-year-old female client claim $200,000 from her critical illness cover when she was diagnosed with colon and liver cancer.
Last year, he paid a death claim of $300,000 to the family of a 54-year-old male policy holder who died from a stroke. His financial advice to his clients is to get cover when they are still young and healthy.
Mr Tan graduated with an honours degree in engineering from NUS in 2001. His wife Adelia Huang, 30, joined him at his agency at Prudential in 2007 and has since made it to the MDRT and an even more select group, Court of the Table. They have two daughters, Calistia, six, and Velkissia, three.
Q: Are you a spender or saver?
When I was single, I could save 75 per cent of my income.
Currently, I save 30 per cent in cash while another 30 per cent is put regularly in an investment portfolio consisting of global real estate investment trusts (PruLink Global Property Securities Fund), emerging market equities (PruLink Emerging Markets Fund) and Asian infra-structure equities (PruLink Asian
Infrastructure Equity Fund) and PruLink China-India Fund. The remaining 40 per cent is for business and daily expenses.
Q: How much do you charge to your credit cards every month?
I have seven cards but I use two more often. I charge about $10,000 to my American Express platinum charge card and PruPrestige credit card monthly. This includes household expenditure and any other expenses incurred for my family. A part of this monthly expenditure also goes into paying our insurance premiums.
The advantage of charging these expenses to credit cards is that they 'discipline' me to always pay on time and not default on payment.
I do not have a lot of cash in my wallet. I withdraw about $200 per week for my miscellaneous expenses.
Q: What financial planning have you done for yourself?
My main investment portfolio consists of two regular premium investment-linked insurance plans (ILPs) which invest in a range of equity funds. I also own term, whole life and medical policies. My wife has two ILPs and my kids have one each too.
Last year, I invested in the badly battered S-chips such as Fuxing, China Sky and Yanlord. These stocks offer good value for money as they are heavily discounted. I maintain a stock portfolio, worth about $300,000, investing in counters like StarHub and ST Engineering.
I am covered $3.5 million on my life and $1.05 million against critical illnesses. I will also receive a weekly income of $2,000 if I am temporarily and/or partially disabled.
My family's premiums, including the recurrent single premiums in the investments I mentioned, work out to more than $100,000 per year.
Q: Moneywise, what were your growing up years like?
I grew up in a family that strongly believes in being frugal. I have one younger sister.
My father is a general manager at the government-linked conglomerate Singapore Technologies Group (which includes ST Engineering). My mother is a housewife.
As my father was stationed in Suzhou (in China) since I was in junior college, I learnt to spend not more than the pocket money given to me. I was given a supplementary credit card when I turned 21 which taught me to use credit sparingly.
My father is a good investor. He bought SPC and Citigroup during the recent crisis.
Among other things, my parents taught me not to spend unnecessarily, to save for a rainy day and not to be flashy.
Q: How did you get interested in investing?
It was in 1993 to 1994, during a time of exceptional GDP (gross domestic product) growth rate in Singapore, that I got interested in investing.
Some of my friends in junior college were already trading shares using their parents' accounts. That was also the time of the initial public offering craze which lasted for quite a while.
I started a trading account when I was 21 in 1998 with my hongbao money saved over the years. I was a first-year student at NUS then.
Q: What property do you own?
A 1,562 sq ft freehold condominium in Upper Changi Road bought in end-2006. I bought it for $570,000 and it is now valued at $1.2 million. It is fully paid up.
In 2009, I bought a 698 sq ft studio apartment in Loyang for $500,000. It was sold for $583,000 last year.
Q: What is the most extravagant thing you have bought?
A Loewe sling bag bought in Barcelona last year when I was on a company trip. It cost 990 euros (S$1,700). It has been in my storeroom since then. It's one of those moments in life when you made a buying decision without knowing the difference between a want and a need.
Q: What is your retirement plan?
We will need about $20,000 a month in today's value when we retire. I am working towards being financially independent by age 40.
Having a home that is fully paid for and sufficient income-generating assets or business to fund my daily expenses is my definition of financial independence.
I will not retire. I realise I am someone who cannot sit still doing nothing. My mind must be constantly challenged.
Q: Home is now...
My condo in Upper Changi Road.
Q: I drive...
A phantom black Audi A6.
lorna@sph.com.sg
------------------------------------------------
WORST AND BEST BETS
Q: What has been your worst investment?
When I was a third-year student at NUS in late 1999 and early 2000, I invested in technology stocks such as Media Ring, Horizon.com and I-Comm. I put in $20,000 but when they were delisted I recovered less than 10 per cent of my initial outlay in 2001/02.
Q: And your best?
It is definitely my family and the financial planning practice business in Prudential. The former gives me the joy and internal motivation to excel, while the latter provides me with a sound remuneration package and a fulfilling career.
I see my agency manager job as a business in which I can bring value to my representatives and customers. This is especially true when I start to train and bring out the best in the financial consultants I have recruited.
I invest approximately $4,000 a month in staff costs and training, which in turn helps me in daily operations, administration and recruitment. The money is well spent as the agency was able to bring in more than $1 million annualised new business premiums last year. I project this to grow at least 20 per cent per annum for the next two years.
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