Don't Over-Concentrate

Diversification is the only free lunch in investing. (Widely attributed to Harry Markowitz.)

Concentration builds wealth; diversification keeps it. The danger for many professionals is that their retirement quietly rests on one or two bets they never consciously made.

Three traps are common. Home bias — a single property that dominates the household balance sheet. Employer concentration — salary, bonus, and a large holding of the same company's shares, so one setback hits income and savings at once. And single-market bias — a portfolio entirely in one country's shares, missing the rest of the world.

The fix is to spread money across return drivers that do not all move together: shares across regions, bonds, real assets, and guaranteed income such as CPF LIFE. The aim is not to dilute returns but to make sure no single event — a soft property market, one struggling employer, one weak decade for a home market — can derail the whole plan.

Illustrative example: where the wealth actually sits

The chart shows an illustrative household whose wealth is heavily tilted into property and a home market, with little elsewhere. Mapping where your money truly sits — including the home and employer shares — often reveals a concentration far larger than intended. Spreading it is the closest thing to a free lunch investing offers.