Retirement ? Its Sooner Than You Think!! (Honestly) - Answering Service Resources

Home
>
Investing
>
Retirement ? Its Sooner Than You Think!! (Honestly)

Retirement ? Its Sooner Than You Think!! (Honestly)

Many people hear "retirement" and think- what? 401K? Roth vs. Traditional IRA? Stocks, bonds, mutual funds? Do they?

Or do many people put money away according to the suggested amount and then simply hope that when retirement comes all will work out?

One report I read estimated that 66 million Americans have put away a Whopping $0 towards retirement.

Many people are still thinking there might be a thing called Social Security around when they retire. Social Security: as of 2004, the average annual Social Security retirement benefit is approximately $11,000. That is not a lot to live on folks. Plus, we all hear the news periodically that there might not be any Social Security around when we get older and need it.

And as a further WAKE UP call, I found a calculator which estimated (without Social Security):

a couple at 40
bringing in $90k a year (together)
with very modest investments

would need to save an additional $2,690,000.00 ( yes 2 million +) in order to retire at 65-- OR ? plan on working an additional 29 years!!

Now before you get overwhelmed and click over to another article-lets put our heads together and simply cover a few very very basic start up basics.

1) Standard Of Living: You need to know at what standard of living you will want to live during retirement.

2) Basic Living Expenses: You will need to calculate the cost of basic living expenses (at that level) i.e. electric bill now of $200 = what in 2030?

3) Hobbies and Leisure Activities: Know what type of hobbies, and leisure activities you will keep busy with and what their cost might be then.

4) Family Visiting / Travel: Realize that more and more children move away when grown. So while they work out of state-YOU may need to do the traveling to see them. Plan for these costs.

5) Convalescent Care (nursing home costs) provincially run about $100/day median. You will need to multiply that times the same 4% inflation rate. Then multiply that times the number of years before you may need it-to approximate how much you may need to afford for your housing when you need assistance. Truth be known-WE need to plan to handle that cost ourselves, rather than think our children will be able to take on that kind of additional cost.

You will need to total yearly amounts. You will need the approximate yearly cost to live (at your desired level) during regular healthy retirement. And, you will need the total yearly amount of costs to live in assisted or full care living facilities ( for each ? you and mate).

Multiply each yearly amount by the number of years you might be living in that circumstance. Example: Retire at 65. Live healthy retirement- 15 years (so 15 x yearly cost of healthy living) . Live assisted ? 8 years ( so 8 x yearly cost of living in care).

You now have two totals that when added together equal your estimation of the total dollar amount you will need to draw from in order to live after retiring. NOW you are ready to begin planning your investments in such a way that you can achieve that TOTAL number by the time you retire.

Here are some tools to help you now that you are ready to take that first step:

USA Today retirement cost calculator: http://www.calcbuilder.com/cgi-bin/calcs/RET2.cgi/usatoday

Motley Fool's retirement area: http://www.fool.com/retirement.htm?source=PFinAg

Metlife's retirement area: http://www.metlife.com/Applications/Corporate/WPS/CDA/PageGenerator/0,1674,P1946,00.html

About.com's HUGE retirement resource area: http://www.retireplan.about.com/

Until next time-all the best,

Kate

About The Author

Kate Hufstetler is a well established Personal Life Coach. Her clients come from both the United States and overseas. She offers coaching services via email and phone consultations. For more information and current highlights please visit: http://www.comedreamwithme.com/start_today.html

Kate@comedreamwithme.com

In The News:

Fidelity hires new head of personal investing
Boston Globe, United States - 11 hours ago
Fidelity Investments has hired ING Groep NV's Kathleen Murphy as president of its personal investing unit. Murphy, 45, will start at Fidelity on Jan. ...
Highest-Level Executive In State To Leave ING Hartford Courant
ING to split annuities and retirement units InvestmentNews
all 4 news articles

Forget the Investing Gene
Motley Fool - 34 minutes ago
Just as some parents will inevitably use this test as the sole reason to keep their kids from certain sports, we sometimes keep ourselves from investing for ...

Seattle Post Intelligencer
Dump the CEOs Before Investing in US Industry
OpEdNews, PA - 32 minutes ago
... investment banking, airlines, automakers, credit-card companies, or raw material producers will result in predictable repetition of the dismal patterns ...
Video: Chrysler Exec: Failure Could Spark Depression AssociatedPress
Valuing Lemons: GM and Ford Wall Street Journal Blogs
Bankruptcy for Big Three should be an option Metro Spirit
Chicago Tribuneall 1,981 news articles

UPDATE 1-Baosteel to speed overseas investment, eyes Spain
Reuters - 7 hours ago
By Alison Leung HONG KONG, Dec 5 (Reuters) - Baosteel Group, China's largest steelmaker, plans to speed up overseas investment to take advantage of lower ...
Baosteel May Delay $4 Billion Vale Slab Venture By Nine Months Bloomberg
all 6 news articles

Global Investing Roundups
Money Morning - 7 hours ago
AT&T Inc. (T) said it would scale back 12000 jobs, about 4% of its workforce, between now and the end of 2009 to fight "economic pressures, ...

Telegraph.co.uk
CIC Head Wary of Investing in Western Banks
Wall Street Journal - Dec 2, 2008
Lou Jiwei, who head's China Investment Corp., said the uncertainty surrounding Western banks and the policy decisions that may determine their fate makes it ...
CIC weary of Western banks Thomson Merger News (registration)
China's sovereign wealth fund to avoid western financial firms: report AFP
CIC Now Very Wary of Investment in Foreign Financial Firms ChinaStakes.com
Reuters - In-Forumall 274 news articles

GoldMorgan Stanley, Investing For Deflation, And ETFs Gain By Default
IndexUniverse.com, NY - 1 hour ago
... bonds slip further into negative territory, this article summarising some recent Merrill Lynch research, on investing for deflation, caught my eye. ...

slow and steady investing
CNNMoney.com - 16 hours ago
Investor Daily: During the flat market of 1966-1982, investors who kept investing every month earned better returns. By Adam Lashinsky, senior writer SAN ...

Investing in Pure-Play Companies
Motley Fool - 29 minutes ago
By Selena Maranjian I've written before about the advantages of concentrated or "focused" investing. Focusing your investing attention and dollars just ...

Ball State Investing $17.7M In Emerging Media Reseach Initiative
Broadcast Newsroom, CA - 16 hours ago
By John Eggerton Ball State is in investing $17.7 million in a new Emerging Media reseach initiative. The goal of the initiative, funded with money from the ...

investing - Google News

Answering Service ResourceAnswering Service Resource