S/O of the 100k Thread: Are you freaking out re: retirement?

[jenny1980]

One of the things reading through that thread got me to do was update all of our accounts in Mint so I could see a more realistic picture of everything. While it seems like we have "a lot" saved for retirement (a bit more than 2x our annual income at 36 and almost 37), all of the online calculators seem to say "LOL! You're fucked!" And they even took social security into the calculations! 

Argh. But I don't know quite what the answer is. We can try to up our contributions a little more but that's hard paying as much as we do for child care/school for the girls. At this point we're not saving for their college (crossing fingers for some scholarships and/or the ability to cash flow some when we get there) so it's not like we can hit pause on that. 

Both sets of our parents have retired (comfortably) recently in their mid 60s and I also want to be able to retire when we're young enough to really enjoy it. But they also have pensions in addition to 401ks and social security and medicare.

I guess I'm just curious to see where everyone else is with retirement planning and if you are also feeling sort of overwhelmed. 

[katfco]

I’m going to be paying off student loans 5 years after I’m dead, so I can’t see myself retiring. I’ll be one of those teachers who retires and then subs for decades.

[pixy0stix]

DH at 38yo is finally in a job where he can save for retirement. We're fucked. I'm banking on the world ending.

[heyjude]

Yes freaking out about retirement.

[waverly]

Our financial planner says we are OK, but we don't have 2 times our salary at all, so probably we are screwed anyway. What online calculator do you use? I wonder if it says differently than our planner?

[shauni27]

I'm not, but I know I should. Mostly I am in denial. I have my head in the sand and am just pretending magic will happen between now and then.

My hope is once daycare payments and IVF payments are finished then I will take that amount and add half to our 401K and half to our savings.

[jlt19]

I use Personal Capital and it says we're ok. It's the only calculator I can find that takes into account our defined benefit pension. All others say we're fucked. I'll just live in my happy bubble.

[bcv513]

No. I have a government pension from my job plus I contribute to a 457b. But H and I will never be in a place where we will be able to save enough to live for 20+ years without working. I've made peace with it.

[bex]

Ish.

Meaning, I just don't think about it that much. I should freak out more. I do save in my TSP, and H has a 401k but the match is "at the owners discretion," which meant last year there was no match. We need to step up his contributions a bit if theres not going to be a match. We are nowhere near where we need to be. I just started saving 8 years ago, and H just started 4 years ago or so. We are 35 and 36.

I will have a pension (hopefully) so that helps, but no, we are not where we should be.

[raangoli]

Both MH and I graduated from college without debt. He did so via scholarships and my parents paid for college. Our post-graduate degrees were paid in full by our employer. Because of that and high earning careers, we are privileged and have been able to make retirement savings (as well as general savings) a priority. Right now are are on and even ahead of target given our age.

I fully recognize how rare of an opportunity we were given and how fortunate we are.

[Dumbledork]

DH is on disability at 30 and I teach preschool.

I never stop freaking out about any and all kinds of money and the potential of medical bills.

[gibbinator]

No, I'm actually relatively confident in what we're saving, so long as dh's pension continues to exist at least. We're on track to potentially retire in our late 50's and dh and I both work in industries where picking up side jobs for extra cash is relatively common and easy.

[mbcdefg]

We don’t have any student loans, but we haven’t saved for retirement all that well either. I have a 401(k) but I stupidly lost a few years when I did contract work. He is supposed to get a pension but that’s all uncertain thanks to Chris Christie.

[bex]

I will say I'm freaking out more about my MIL. I am pretty sure she has less than 50k in her 401k, and I think shes basically just banking on Social Security. She's 55 so now I'm less worried because it seems likely that any changes to SS won't affect her, but even so. She said to me that she basically figures she'll work until she dies, but she works for a small company that could easily be sold or absorbed into another company and she could easily be out of a job. I also think she will be completely dependent on Medicare.

I don't think her husband has anything saved for retirement. He's a tradesman, I guess. (he's a "tree doctor.")

[eclaires]

This is why I live in TN and I talk a big game about leaving, but who can walk away from a pension these days?

Not us. We save like it's not there, but I think I'd be panicked if it wasn't, if that makes sense. But it's a stable pension that's well funded and has a forced contribution from us. So I think odds are it will be there. I just think the fear would be overwhelming if it wasn't even though I think we are technically on track.

My big concern is actually healthcare. MH could retire relatively early with his pension at 50% of ending salary but it would be before we'd be eligible for medicare... but who the fuck even knows what the world is going to look like then anyway.

I think I may have just talked myself into more panic.

[Jalapeñomel]

Dec 6, 2017 13:34:50 GMT -5 katfco said:

I’m going to be paying off student loans 5 years after I’m dead, so I can’t see myself retiring. I’ll be one of those teachers who retires and then subs for decades.

Same. Retirement isn't really something that I think I will be able to do, Dh is a professor and feels the same way. 

[meshaliuknits]

Dec 6, 2017 13:36:08 GMT -5 pixy0stix said:

DH at 38yo is finally in a job where he can save for retirement. We're fucked. I'm banking on the world ending.

word.

[bowies]

We are doing the best we can. Freaking out about it seems like a waste of energy I can put elsewhere. I’m more freaked out about what’s going to happen at a macro level.

[goldengirlz]

I’m surprised the calculators say you’re fucked. The rule of thumb I always heard was 1x income in your early 30s and 2x by 40.

We’re behind on retirement (DH is dragging us down! I started saving years before he did) but I’m way more worried about my parents. I think they have less in their 401k at age 64 than I have in my own, at about half their age.

[goldengirlz]

Dec 6, 2017 13:53:58 GMT -5 bowies said:

We are doing the best we can. Freaking out about it seems like a waste of energy I can put elsewhere. I’m more freaked out about what’s going to happen at a macro level.

Same. We’re doing everything we’re supposed to and just kind of hoping/assuming it’ll be enough.

But maybe that’s my privilege talking.

[glw]

Not right now. I don't really think about "retirement" as being able to stop working voluntarily at some particular age, but rather to just to be able to afford to live after I can't work anymore. It's really been my only goal, ever.
I graduated undergrad early and put everything left in my paychecks toward paying off my student loans. I've maxed out my jobs' retirement plans. I did grad school one class per semester so that I could pay it off as I went. MH and I are not having children and cost was a huge factor in that decision. Rent in our area is crazy so we bought our fixer-upper in an area with lower property taxes and plan to live here forever. I took a 10% pay cut last year in order to get a job that offers the state retirement plan. MH makes good money, but we live well below our means because of our focus on retirement.
I grew up poor; my dad has been disabled for 25 years and my mom & stepdad will never be able to afford to retire (voluntarily). I worry about them and I've made it my goal to set myself up for a more secure financial situation.

[gerberdaisy]

I'm not worried about retirement. I have been contributing to my TSP and 401K for over 10 years and have 3.5x my income in there. Not quite sure how it adds up when I add H into the picture, but I definitely have more. I also have a defined benefit pension. Not saying we're set for life, but we are doing what we can.

Day to day finances though, I worry a lot.

[nomad100]

Is it sad that I am less freaked about my retirement now that I am divorcing than I was before? Because STBX has almost nothing saved for retirement in his mid 40s and has both grown kids and a mom with awful financial sense that would have been a drain on our savings?

I have been saving for retirement since I was a college grad. I currently have about 5x my salary in a Roth IRA in my late 40s. House will be paid off next year. And I still have about 20 years of time for it all to grow before I retire.

Though as pixy0stix was saying, I am also thinking that the world will be ending before this all ever becomes an issue.

[simpsongal]

Not really. We both have desk jobs that we can stay in for a long time. I’m more concerned for my brother who cashed out his 401knto buy a house and has a physically demanding job. My dad retired on disability after years or physical labor. I fear for what Republicans have in mind for entitlement reforms, esp social security disability.

[wawa]

I'm not freaked out, mostly because I just tend not to really be a worrier. It gets me nothing to freak out.

I think we'll be ok, but the biggest question mark for me is medical expenses. I have no idea what Medicare is going to look like by the time I'm in that age range. But in that same vein...I also have no idea what like, the world is going to look like? We're as well set up as we can be short of actually building a bunker once the war for resources starts so...hey, we're good there. *weeps*

In all seriousness though, I'm in a niche field that lends itself to partial retirement picking up a consulting job here and there, so there's that. We save pretty aggressively, and our house will be paid off before the kids start college if all goes according to plan, so we should coast into the finish ok. Assuming the world doesn't end.

[OscarQ]

My feelings about retirement have really shifted in the past year. I can’t see ever retiring and I want to pull the funds (or simply stop contributing) and use that money to enjoy life now. I have not done that yet but it’s been hard resisting. H and I have had serious conversations about it and about how we’re sure we’ll never retire. At 44 that’s kind of bleak.

[carmenere]

I don't know that freaking out is the right term but we definitely think a lot about it. DH is finishing his MBA soon and thinking about a career change, and retirement (along with student debt and buying a house) seems to be driving that decision. We're both putting in 10% and are adjusting our household budget so that we can contribute more, but every calculator makes it feel like it just won't be enough.

[bugandbibs]

No, and not because we have a lot saved. We do what we can and am just hoping we can work it out. It's one of the reasons we have tried to keep our overhead low. We are hoping that our overall expenses will go down enough that we can live on less. I have spent my career working in public schools and have a small pension which will help.

[minionkevin]

I'm not really worried. We are well ahead of retirement savings calculators say we should be, even without any sort of employer-sponsored retirement on my part (I save in a Roth IRA). I think we're probably the only ones among our friends who save adequately for retirement, or at all in some cases. I think DH's BFF and his wife are pretty set because of inheritances and family businesses on both of their sides, but a lot of other people in our circle are not well-prepared.
FIL is pretty wealthy, so we don't worry at all about us supporting him, and he has healthcare covered from MIL's (deceased) former employer. My mom has a healthy pension and 401k which she doesn't draw from yet, along with paid healthcare for her and my dad for as long as they both live. My dad is over the age where he has to take RMDs from his IRA; my mom is younger. All 3 of them also collect SS, plus my mom works PT.

[underwaterrhymes]

H has a pretty good pension that should bring in around 70% of an average of his highest three salaries if he stays another 20 years.

So - provided it’s still around when we retire, he can work another twenty years, and nothing else happens to threaten his job - we should be okay.

However, given the above caveats and the fact I only have roughly $7,000 saved for retirement, I’m still freaking out.