
SUNÉL VELDTMAN
FINANCIAL ADVISOR. SPEAKER. WEALTH ENABLER. BLOGGER
Sunél Veldman is a veteran of understanding and strategically managing finances to build a wealth-enabled life. She is the founder and CEO of Foundation Family Wealth, the author of “Manage Your Money, Live Your Dream”, a recognised financial commentator in the media, wife, mom, and blogger.Sunél’s Blog | Just this moment. Just this day.
Happy 2021. Have you noticed how the customary wish at the start of a New Year has fizzled out this year? It is as if we lack the courage to wish people well when the first few weeks of the year have already been so difficult. 2021 seems to have punched us in the gut ...
Sunél’s Blog | Rest well
I don’t know about you, but I am exhausted. It is always difficult towards the end of the year, to gather enough energy to complete everything on the to-do list. This year is even harder.
I am bone-tired for all the reasons that made 2020 so tough.
Uncertainty.
Complexity.
Anger.
Compliance.
Loneliness.
Division.
Financial pressure.
Poverty.
Hunger.
Relationships breaking down.
Anxiety.
Sleeplessness.
Countless additional decisions.
I can go on. I ...
Sunél’s Blog | What happened to my intention for joy this year?
At the beginning of this year, I wrote about setting intentions for the year. My intention was to seek joy. Of course, I had no idea what was ahead for the world in 2020 but I wrote these words: ‘And to record the joy every day. I want to actively cultivate it, to look for ...
Sunél’s Blog | Who will make money from this trend?
During the past week media commentators jumped with joy when it became evident that a technical change to the definition of certain listed instruments, meant that one could now potentially invest up to 100% of one’s pension money offshore. Given how poorly South African investments have performed relative to offshore investments over the last 5 ...
Sunél’s Blog | Why we can’t help our love affair with forecasting
This week I received a newsletter from a market commentator who expressed surprise at the current levels of the Rand compared to the US Dollar. At R15.50/USD, the Rand was the best performing emerging market currency over the last month. According to the publication, the Rand is widely tipped to further advance in the months ...
Sunél’s Blog | What we can learn from conservation
In celebration of our wedding anniversary, we were fortunate to spend time at a reserve in the Kamdeboo near Graaff Reinet. Two decades ago, the land was eroded by overgrazing and most wildlife had disappeared from the famous Kamdeboo plains, where once herds of springbok kicked up dust clouds visible across the plains. Today, you ...
Sunél’s Blog | The other side
The end of democracy and capitalism is in sight. Should Donald Trump win the US election, the outcome is certain: a white supremacist apocalypse will follow. That’s how Biden supporters feel.
On the other hand, The Financial Times quotes Mike Pence declaring, “with frosty certainty that in Biden’s America ‘you won’t be safe’… that the Trumpian ...
Sunél’s Blog | How nearly losing it all, can bring everything in focus
In 2020 many people have been faced with loss – financial loss, loss of health or even the loss of loved ones to the pandemic. It’s been that kind of year. Many of our clients faced loss – a few faced death. It has been a privilege to listen to their stories and to see ...
Sunél’s Blog | Will Donald Trump trump again?
On my return from a few days off-grid, I was assaulted by reams of research on the possible impact of the American election on our future. How will a Biden administration impact global growth? Will a Trump win spur financial markets on? Speculation clothed as research or expert opinion claim to answer these questions.
The truth ...
Sunél’s Blog | What have we learnt?
As we slowly emerge from lockdown, I wonder, what have we learnt? Are we taking a moment to let the enormity of what’s just happened to us, sink in? Are we taking stock of the impact it has had on our bodies, minds and souls? Or our money? Have we taken a moment to express ...
Sunél’s Blog | What commitment means for your money
Next week, Piet and I will celebrate our thirtieth wedding anniversary. It is somewhat surreal, thinking that I have been married for thirty years. It is difficult to believe that all that time has passed.
It feels like our lives have come full circle – we started our married life in the City Bowl in Cape ...
Sunél’s Blog | The elegance of simplicity
I’m a fan of French elegance. I am drawn to the simplicity and minimalism of their style – the blue blazer paired with a crisp white shirt never dates. It’s timeless. If you build up this type of French wardrobe, daily dressing becomes easy and effective. The same is true for a property of good ...
Sunél’s Blog | A chat with a friend, a stolen cell phone, financial independence and a pandemic
Three stories were woven into one experience for me during the past week.
A friend shared his dreams with me, daring dreams that may cost him a big chunk of his capital, perhaps most of it. He ended by saying that he’ll be happy to live a simple life if it all fails. He will be ...
Sunél’s Blog | What is the value of advice?
When I was a young parent, my dad gave me a piece of parenting advice that probably changed the course of my life and saved me and my children from the trauma of helicopter parenting. It freed me to enjoy my children as unique humans.
If I had to pay for that advice, I wonder what ...
Sunél’s Blog | A lesson from historical romance novels
I read historical romantic novels in old fashioned paper format before bedtime. Life is difficult enough, so what I read before falling asleep must help me escape and switch off from screens and the day’s challenges. However, historical novels are often more than an escape. They can be useful. They can expose ways of living ...
Sunél’s Blog | Spring is in the air, or is it?
From my office window I notice the dark oak branches sprouting delicate fresh leaves and the poplars’ twigs forming fat buds. The sun rises earlier and suddenly it feels lighter. The dark days of mid-winter and lockdown are behind us.
Can you still remember what it felt like? How hopeless and dreary the future seemed in ...
Sunél’s Blog | One way to deal with anxiety
When I searched my previous blogs, surprisingly, I found the word anxiety in only one previous blog. It is not a reflection of how I have felt or how most of our clients seem to feel. If you are like me, at some stage during this pandemic, you have probably felt anxious about the future, ...
Sunél’s Blog | What could happen?
What do you want?
What will happen if you focus your money, time and energy on the thing(s) you want?
It’s not complicated.
It’s just very difficult. It’s difficult to choose what you want. It means saying no to a lot of other stuff. And then it’s difficult to apply focus and resources to that thing.
Most people never ...
Sunél’s Blog | Don’t talk to me about Botox
I dread women’s month because I become inundated with pink invitations to industry events on topics ranging from Botox, self-esteem improvement coupled with the money mistakes women make. What are we thinking? I would love to know if any of my male readers have ever been invited to a comparable financial industry event? The industry ...
Sunél’s Blog | Why you need losers in your portfolio
Everyone knows. You should not put all your eggs in one basket. You should diversify so that your wealth is protected against the unforeseen.
What does this mean?
It means that the prospects of your investments should be linked to different factors.
If all your investments do well at the same time, then it probably means that your ...
Sunél’s Blog | Dare to dream
I believe in dreams. As a money expert, it is quite something to admit but my current reality exists because I dreamed: Foundation Family Wealth is the product of my dream to help people live their best life with their money; living in Cape Town is the result of my dream to live closer to ...
Sunél’s Blog | What’s on your mind?
Just when we thought it could not get worse, it did. Now we have lockdown and load shedding, all without alcohol. Yes, the winter cold fronts have been welcome and there is the silver lining of nearly full dams (in the Cape), but the freezing cold in the dark has come at a dark time ...
Sunél’s Blog | How scarce is money?
I spent the first few years of my life on a small Karoo farm. There was freshly baked farm bread with homemade butter every day, milk from our own cows, meat from our livestock, vegetables from our own garden and eggs from our own animals. Writing this now, I realise that for the reader this ...
Sunél’s Blog | Poor prospects, poor returns?
The return on an investment is determined by two factors – the prospects and the price you pay for those prospects. If you pay too much for the prospects, the total return on your investment can be as poor as an investment with poor prospects.
Imagine there was an investment with great prospects, but you had ...
Sunél’s Blog | Wealth built on inequality, is fragile
Last week, I took some time away from my blog space. I needed some time to process what has transpired since the outbreak of COVID-19. While away, I felt compelled to send this blog – a version of it was waiting in my outbox.
The world has never been a more unequal place. South Africa specifically, ...
Sunél’s Blog | The long-term will not fix this
On the 13th of
October 2000, I was standing at the end of a jetty on a lake high up in the
Drakensberg selling my clients’ Dimension Data shares. I remember the day
because it was my 10th wedding anniversary. My husband and I had
gone to a remote guest house to celebrate – the jetty was the only ...
Sunél’s Blog | You may acknowledge that you’re sad
Emotion has such a bad reputation. The general
belief is still that emotions should be ignored or repressed. Worse still, is
the belief that emotions are signs of immaturity and should not come into play in
decision making. Some emotions seem more acceptable, like happiness or surprise,
whereas fear and sadness frequently leave us uncomfortable or are regarded as ...
Sunél’s Blog | Put up your fences
Most of us know how to take care of our physical security. We put up burglar bars, fences and walls. We raise the walls and top them with electric fences. We install alarm systems. We have panic buttons linked to armed response. We belong to village watch groups. We may even have permanent bodyguards. We ...
Sunél’s Blog | How confident should you be now?
Correlation does not equal causation. Confusing the two is a basic error in critical thinking. For example, if there is a declining trend of COVID-19 infections in Italy at the same time that more people are wearing masks, it does not mean that the declining trend was caused by the mask-wearing.
But let’s first backtrack to ...
Sunél’s Blog | The last of the human freedoms
This week, as I digested President Ramaphosa’s speech, I was struck by the enormity of what we are experiencing. Not for the first time, an acute anxiety about the outcome of the Great Lockdown overwhelmed me. The economic consequences will be extremely difficult to deal with.
Maybe you haven’t felt anxiety. Perhaps you have felt powerless, ...
Sunél’s Blog | The stories we tell ourselves
A blog by Carl Richards (they are the shortest, most impactful blogs on money and life that you do not want to miss) alerted me to the gap between facts and stories. And the potential impact of that gap.
COVID-19 is a good example for illustrating this: the facts, the story and the gap.
Right now, there ...
Sunél’s Blog | A different kind of capital is now
Most of us toil, throughout our lives to convert human and physical capital into financial capital. We derive income from our human and physical capital, and then we save enough to fund our future income through our investments, culminating in retirement.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, we have focussed on the demise of financial capital as a ...
Sunél’s Blog | What I learnt about change through moving
Note: I wrote this blog some time ago and then Coronvirus
happened and it seemed more appropriate to talk about that. I guess by now,
you’re also weary and perhaps heartsore from all the Corona stories, so I’m
sharing the story of our move to Cape Town with you. Because despite what we are living now, life
will go ...
Sunél’s Blog | Facing that big question
As the lockdown continues, our realities diverge. Some are
working hard to survive by revamping their business models or changing their
products. Others are locked out of their shops and cannot do much about it.
Others are trying to juggle home schooling kids and jobs. Others may already
have lost their jobs or shut down their businesses. Some may ...
Sunél’s Blog | The Wisdom of our Grandparents
During my childhood, my grandmother lived with us from time to time. Her presence had a lasting impact on my childhood memories. I remember how she scraped the bowl clean when she was baking, how she saved the leftovers of lunch for dinner and how she cared for her clothes. She wore a dress to ...
Sunél’s Blog | Do we care enough?
COVID-19 puts a spotlight on the plight of millions of South Africans who are living in poverty. They don’t have access to decent healthcare and sanitation. They live in shacks. The lucky ones have jobs far from their homes. Even the lucky ones know hunger intimately. Unless our country tackles this problem with the urgency ...
Sunél’s Blog | So really, how are you feeling right now?
When you read this, South Africa will be at the start of its
lockdown, following our European and Asian friends who have been in lockdown
for some time. We have been called to fight a war against an invisible and
silent enemy, by staying home. And, even if we do not want to admit it, most of
us are ...
Sunél’s Blog | Corona and the human mind
The COVID-19 virus fall-out is a great example of the flaws in human thinking.
For a complex problem – like, what is the most appropriate response by a country’s government to the spread of a deadly virus – you need complex thinking. However, most people rarely apply the rational, thinking part of their brains. Most human ...
Sunél’s Blog | On swings and roundabouts
The last week of February was one of the worst in the
history of markets – global markets declined by more than 10% in USD. Pervasive panic as a result of the spread of
the COVID-19 virus from China to the rest of the world dominated the news and
social media. The virus has already brought much of ...
Sunél’s Blog | The risk of going it alone
What goes through a successful man’s mind when he pulls the trigger a day after his retirement? From the outside, he had it all: an illustrious career, a happy family, a big circle of friends and the trip of a lifetime planned. But he harboured a secret. He never told his inner circle that he ...
Sunél’s Blog | You may not die from old age, but from retirement.
Retiring is dangerous. Who would have thought? While people may initially report improved health after retirement due to lower stress levels, studies show that the risk of death increases by as much 20%; and the risk of suffering from a heart attack or stroke increases by as much as 40% after retiring.
It is not ...
Sunél’s Blog | Why Buffet is wrong
You believe in yourself. You have done your homework. You go for it.
Go big or go home, is what they say. After all, Warren Buffett said “diversification is protection against ignorance. It makes little sense if you know what you are doing.”
You think it’s certain. You are in control.
You are wrong.
And so is Warren Buffett in ...
Sunél’s Blog | You can’t take it with you
When babies come into the world, they are naked, vulnerable, all wrinkly and truth be told, ugly. Similarly, people typically leave the world vulnerable, wrinkly and yes, ugly. In a lifetime, we gather our possessions, properties, bank accounts, investments and all sorts of other links to the world around us. When we die, we die ...
Sunél’s Blog | Managing money through the rearview mirror
My eldest
is learning to drive and I am becoming more conscious of my driving. Driving is
one of those things that you do without consciously thinking about when to look
in the rearview mirror. But I have now become aware of looking in the mirrors
again. Although looking in all your mirrors is essential for safe driving, the
most ...
Sunél’s Blog | Habits of Small Things
Habits, scientists say, emerge
because the brain is constantly looking for ways to save effort (Charles
Duhigg, The Power of Habit). They are the legs of resolutions and without them,
resolutions typically fail. Research increasingly shows that they are worth
pursuing (the good kind at least) and that it is even possible to change behaviour by making tiny
changes to ...
Sunél’s Blog | A year of intention
2020 is
here. It has a good ring to it – a new year and a new decade. A blank page on
which we can continue to write the story of our lives. If the 2010s didn’t work
out well for you, here’s a new chance. A new chance for a new beginning. What
will you do with it?
I’m ...
Sunél’s Blog | Sit dit af, sit dit af! (Switch it off, switch it off!)
When
Apartheid was at its height, Johannes Kerkorrel created the protest song, Sit
dit af, sit dit af! against State propaganda at the time. It’s been ringing
in my ears for a long time. It’s how I feel about news these days. The news
media has become an endless source of negative noise. Almost every time I tune
in, I ...
Sunél’s Blog | What are holidays for?
This will
be my last blog post for a month. Not only are we relocating to Cape Town from
Johannesburg as you read this, but it is the holiday season for most South
Africans. Many make the trek to their home towns, their families or their usual
seaside resort. As we all do so, it might help to think ...
Sunél’s Blog | What is the worst thing that can happen?
Last
week, I wrote about uncovering the root of anxiety about money, which starts
with awareness. But awareness is not enough.
When
we worry about money, we often have vague fears about the worst thing that can
happen. What if a global recession wipes out half of my capital just before I
retire? Experts will placate you and say that ...
Sunél’s Blog | How is your money anxiety working out for you?
You may be aware of the beliefs that you have consciously adopted or rejected but you may be completely unaware of the beliefs which drive your anxiety. What are your beliefs about money? How are your beliefs working for you and how are they affecting the most important relationships in your life?
Sunél’s Blog | What is your number?
Worth is not determined a number. Worth is permission, from yourself, to treat yourself with honour and to require that from others, regardless of any monetary number that can be attached to yourself.
Sunél’s Blog | About Changing Your Mind
Have you changed your mind about your money or your life principles? Ever or recently? Hopefully, you have because it will indicate that you are open to learning. A learning mindset is essential for building wealth and for a meaningful life.
There are several good reasons for changing your mind: new data or research emerges; tax ...
Sunél’s Blog | How to read…financial news
There has
been a proliferation of financial news. You can drown in waves of it if you do
not wear a life jacket. Most of it is badly written, poorly researched and
aimed at selling you something…typically fear. We should know this by now. Fear
sells.
Most
financial news is unhelpful to wealth creation because wealth creation requires
optimism – optimism ...
Sunél’s Blog | Trust your gut…or not?
In my work, when I hear the words intuition or gut, my radars switch on for what comes next. When someone says, ‘I just have a good gut feeling about this investment or my gut tells me that the currency will be at 20 by year-end’, I listen up.
Gut feeling or intuition can mean many different ...
Sunél’s Blog | How we decide
Have you ever paid attention to how you decide? What is your process when you make an important life decision and what information do you consider? Do you process data, or do you just go with your gut? What happens when you must decide as a team or a family or a couple?
This year our ...
Sunél’s Blog | Leave…or make a positive contribution
This year an already depressed sentiment about the prospects of our country plunged to new depths. For some, anything from a potential IMF bailout to the NHI or the credit downgrade have been rational reasons for negativity. They are indeed reasons for concern, but it doesn’t necessitate that every real and social media conversation dive ...
Sunél’s Blog | Lessons from the Camino
The Camino de Santiago was not on my bucket list. It never occurred to me that I might want to do it until earlier this year when I mentioned to a friend that I wanted to take some time out and she said, “You should do the Camino.”
The Camino de Santiago is a network ...
Sunél’s Blog|The importance of walking through the woods
At the end of last year, after seven years of building Foundation Family Wealth, I was exhausted. I felt that 2019 had to be a year of rejuvenation. I wanted to learn new skills, expose myself to new ideas and renew my life and business vision. I also wanted to take some time off.
We ...
Sunél’s Blog | The value of loss
If you cannot stomach the loss or simply cannot afford the thing you want to do next because you bargained on obtaining the higher price, you must wait; but you may have to make peace with the fact that you will wait a long time. Or forever.
Sunél’s Blog | What is it worth to you?
As an
adviser, I am frequently asked about the investment merits of lifestyle assets
such as holiday homes, art, yachts or vintage cars. In South Africa, holiday
homes are popular and a signal for some, of status and wealth.
I married
into a family with a holiday cottage at the coast and have been going there for
thirty years. That ...
Sunél’s Blog | 55%
That’s the ratio of people living below the national poverty line of R992 per month in South Africa. That’s 30-million people.
I knew that it was bad. But that number hit me between the eyes again.
These are the homeless and the unemployed. It excludes our domestic Mercy who worked 6 days a week at the local ...
Thoughts create reality
Where I grew up in the Karoo everything was scarce. Water was always scarce. If the wind didn’t blow, we couldn’t even get water from the boreholes. I learnt to bath in a few centimetres of water only when the water tank was full. I learnt to keep the dishwater standing just in case ...
Measure it
I have repeatedly seen how the angst literally dissolves away from clients when we show them the concrete steps they can take to make a comfortable retirement a possibility or better yet, that their retirement capital is already enough. By focusing on what they can control, instead of a distant disaster, they can control their ...
The world is a good place right now
Last year when I mentioned in a speech that the world has never had it so good, people asked me afterwards whether I was trying to be funny. I don’t do funny well. My family are forever telling me that I should lighten up.
The thing is, compared to the rest of history – the average ...
What will make this day great?
The year is speeding ahead. We pile on the busyness as our annual holidays become distant memories. But where does this busyness get us? What exactly are we trying to achieve? Are we trying to earn more money so that we can be happier? Add more achievements to our CVs? Boost our egos with a ...
The small steps matter
“Small choices are the difference between health and sickness, loneliness or friendship, financial freedom or distress.”
Daily Dose of Gratitude
As a wealth strategist, the space I occupy is a junction between the hard currency of how money structures clients’ lives and the softer side of listening to clients’ dreams, goals, concerns and hopes for their lives. I have many observations about this space. One of the most notable being how the contact point between money ...
The cost of recency bias
2018 was a
difficult year, one of the most difficult of my career. An overriding pessimism
enveloped us: Trump was fighting with China over trade, Brexit turned out to a
big mess, Europe stood, once again, on the precipice of a recession, the
currency declined, South Africans learnt more about the extent of our leader’s corruption
and financial markets tanked. ...