The best investment I have ever made!
Spring is a time for taxes and a reminder for me to check up on my current investment plans and investigate future opportunities. This time around I thought I would share my best investment tip with you that offers high returns with minimal risk. Do yourself a favor and invest in health, to be more exact in your own health; present and future.
Is regular exercising a part of your current portfolio? If not please add it as soon as possible; and here is why.
If investing in the market you are probably weighing the potential for growth and profitability against the risk of loosing part or all of your investment. Let’s do the same for fitness and exercising. Your investment could be a new Fitness Center membership, a home gym or a Personal Fitness Trainer. Memberships run somewhere between $60.00 and $100.00 per month ($85.00-$150.00 for families), quality cardio equipment starts at about $1,500.00, home gyms cost between $2,500.00 and $6,000.00, a Personal Trainer here in the Bay Area charges on an average $65.00 per hour. Hiring a trainer for two meetings per week would cost you therefore an estimated $6,500.00 per year.
The next step would be to examine the chances for growth. In order to do that we need to understand what it is we are investing in and how it can help us save money. If you have access to the internet (I already know you do as you are reading this article on my website) you can research the benefits of exercising on health simply by using your search engine. You will find thousands of studies that deliver not just probabilities but proof that regular fitness training can help you get and stay healthy. I am sure none of your current investments came with proof beyond reasonable doubt!
Now let’s look at the possibilities for making money. I believe you are starting to get early returns on your “Health Investment” within a short period of time. You will feel more energetic and are less likely to get ill which leads to increased productivity and a chance for greater income as well as savings in health care (lower amounts on co-payments for doctor visits and medication). Beyond that regular exercisers report an increase in quality of life which I can’t place an exact amount on. The far larger return on this investment however reaches you at a time when you need it most, the time of retirement.
As our population’s life expectancy and average lifespan has increased so has the need for care. Assisted Living Homes and Nursing Homes are being built at every other corner in major cities around the country. According to a Met Life market survey from 2006 the average nationwide cost for assisted living is $35,616 per year, with an average cost of $43,632in the San Francisco Bay Area. The average nationwide cost for nursing care (semi-private room) is $75,190 annually with an average annual cost of $110,000 here in the Bay Area. The average home health care aide cost $17.00 per hour nationwide and approximately $21.00 per hour in San Francisco. All of these costs are expected to rise over the next years and decades. This explosion in the cost for health care is your opportunity to make money. If a regular fitness program with an average investment of $2,500 per year can help you stay out of Assisted Living for an additional three years and out of Nursing Care for an additional year or two you can save somewhere between $250,000 nationwide or $350,000 in the Bay Area. And these savings don’t include further price hikes for assisted living and nursing care. I am sure after doing the math you will agree with me this is an investment opportunity you can’t afford to miss out on.
A Sante,
Hartmut Broring
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