Bucket Planning

[AssetHound]

Retirement goal planning by "buckets" is helpful to me to make sure allocations are aligned with cash needs over time. I use the asset type labels for allocation decisions and the goal labels for goals. The problem is that I really have two types of goals -- a bucket goal and a normal goal (like income, inflation hedging, growth, etc.).

I know that everyone always asks for all sorts of enhancements, but it would really be nice to be able to do a crosstab report (by current value) of bucket goals versus normal goals. This would really help in making sure allocations are aligned to bucket goals.

If this is possible, I can't figure out how to do it. Just a thought. Thanks.

[Mark]

Hi AssetHound,

I didn't quite understand what you're looking for... In Fund Manager terminology, are you asking for a side-by-side comparison of asset type values against investment goal values? If not, maybe you could try to explain more, using Fund Manager terminology.

[AssetHound]

Think of it like an Excel spreadsheet. Across the top -- column headings -- would be the investment goals. Down the left side -- row headings -- would be asset types. The cells would represent the column percentages based on current value. Each column, in other words, would total 100% so that we can see the mix of asset types across investment goals.

I was originally thinking that we needed another investment goal field, but it would be fine to use the existing fields without any changes.

This would be extremely helpful in ensuring that asset types support current goals (i.e., buckets). For immediate cash needs, or short-term buckets, for example, you might want to have mostly short-term income asset types (money market, short-term bonds, etc.). The report would give you a quick look at how investments are positioned against goals. Very helpful.

[Mark]

Hi AssetHound,

Thanks for the explanation, I understand now. That makes sense.

[AssetHound]

Last comment. If you had a filter in the existing asset allocation report that would filter for goals, that would work -- although you would have to run separate reports for each goal. That's fine. Whatever would be easiest.

[Mark]

Hi AssetHound,

Thanks for the feedback. That would be easier, although I can see it not being quite as useful as the other report you described.