How seriously do you guys take saving for retirement?

[IndyRed128i]

If saving more for retirement ment delaying your dream car by years, would that be worth the sacrifice to you?

[nerdogray]

Nope. I don't plan on ever retiring. Couldn't care less about it. If something happens where I can't work, I have a Maverick 88 just for that scenario.

[cmyx6go]

Originally Posted by IndyRed128i

If saving more for retirement ment delaying your dream car by years, would that be worth the sacrifice to you?

I'm assuming you're a youngster. Start saving for retirement as early as possible and delay your dream car. Your old self will thank you. Your dream car will be long gone when you retire.

[oVeRdOsE.]

no that seriously , 36 here.

Ive hired a financial planner, and Ill have more money than Ill need for my retirement, based on my lifestyle yes, but also statistically from people doing the same job. p.eng.

also, being a p.eng, it's not hard on the body and the role and task you can do are almost infinite. Always something fun to do, so not planning to retire anytime soon.

I know people having a blast at their retirement, but most of them do NOTHING, and few of them are sick or died , so they can't do something...

This is why, I enjoy the life RIGHT now, always staying out of any debts.

I dont wait to travel, I dont wait to get my project car, I dont wait to get my dream house.

[JMcLellan]

I didn't really take retirement savings seriously until I was in my early thirties and I wish I had started much earlier. Now after about 10 years the savings is starting to pile up and the path to retirement is clear and predictable for the wife and I.

I did buy one of my dream sports cars this year and it isn't tied to/affecting my long term saving and retirement goals. We decided to do it after assessing our shorter term financial goals (2 to 3 years out) and it didn't really impact those items either so we went for it. We just had to accept the trade offs that we would have to wait a couple years to do more home improvements, post pone a vacation, etc.

[reallymarkedup]

Originally Posted by cmyx6go

I'm assuming you're a youngster. Start saving for retirement as early as possible and delay your dream car. Your old self will thank you. Your dream car will be long gone when you retire.

Conversely, don't forget to enjoy yourself and accidentally let your youth pass you by just so you can have more money when you're old and broken. Enjoy some of your earnings. Travel. Buy nice things. Having a lot of money when you're old and no memories to talk to your friends about is also a waste.

TL/DR; saving is important, but so is living.

[zx10guy]

Very seriously.

If I have a regret, it is that I didn't start sooner to save. Made young, dumb decisions. The fact is the sooner you start saving, the less you have to put away each month to reach the same savings goal over starting later; losing the commodity that is more valuable than even money....time. You talk to any investor/financial advisor they'll tell you the most important thing is time in the market.

Also, Charlie Munger, who is the VP of Berkshire Hathaway, stated do what ever you can to save $100k. The reason being is this is the point where compounding really starts to take off so your money is starting to really make you additional money. There are a few videos out there demonstrating this effect with compounding/time from $100k on.

Another thing I wish I redo again is my lack of focus with non qualified (non retirement) investments and Roth. Wish I had focused on those buckets and diversified more. My investment portfolio is heavily loaded on the IRA/401k side. I've been making corrections to that over the past few years to try to have more balance.

My current issue is when do I slow down with saving/investing to start YOLOing more.

[cmyx6go]

Originally Posted by reallymarkedup

Conversely, don't forget to enjoy yourself and accidentally let your youth pass you by just so you can have more money when you're old and broken. Enjoy some of your earnings. Travel. Buy nice things. Having a lot of money when you're old and no memories to talk to your friends about is also a waste.

TL/DR; saving is important, but so is living.

Agreed but start saving early. Put $X per week away automatically. You don't have to choke yourself, just do something. You should definitely live but prepare for your future.

[Esteban]

Originally Posted by cmyx6go

I'm assuming you're a youngster. Start saving for retirement as early as possible and delay your dream car. Your old self will thank you. Your dream car will be long gone when you retire.

^ This is what we did. Started putting a little away every month when we first got married, 49 years ago. Retired now and living comfortably.

[M_Six]

Wifey and I started maxing out our supplemental retirement contributions maybe 20 years ago. Although the limits have gone up lately, so she isn't maxed out now. I'm retired, so no contributions from me at this point.

For us, maxing out didn't strap us so badly that we couldn't afford vacations and cars, etc. And that's the main point here. Whether or not you should delay getting a dream car is entirely dependent on your current financial state. If getting a dream car means going into debt so far that you can't save anything for retirement, then you should hold off on the car. But if you can bank a good bit of your income and still afford the car, then go for it.

As others have pointed out, once your retirement savings reach a certain point, they really begin to take off. I haven't contributed to mine since I retired 2-12 years ago, yet I'm still amazed at how much it's increased since then. I'm lucky in that I don't need to touch mine yet, so it keeps growing nicely.

[SW111]

Originally Posted by reallymarkedup

Conversely, don't forget to enjoy yourself and accidentally let your youth pass you by just so you can have more money when you're old and broken. Enjoy some of your earnings. Travel. Buy nice things. Having a lot of money when you're old and no memories to talk to your friends about is also a waste.

TL/DR; saving is important, but so is living.

Amen brother.

Started saving early, but not to the point of eating ramen everyday. Have some nice cars, traveled, have a nice house in a good neighborhood.

Time made our savings big and our retirement comfortable. Retirement is great and we have the time and money to travel and do what we want. Fly to San Diego to watch an international rugby match? Sure. Spend 5 weeks in New Zealand or 3 weeks in France? No problem. BMW driving events at Laguna Seca and Thermal? Yes please.

Make sure to take advantage of any employee matches to retirement funds. I was lucky, I had good jobs with employers who made generous matches to my retirement savings.

It’s a balance. Our financial advisor helped us figure out saving while still being able to live a good life.

[David70]

I always took retirement savings seriously, enjoyed life, saved money where I could, now 54 have a full time job that is ok but if I decide to retire tomorrow I can. Makes life easy and work stress very low. I never bought a car I really wanted until 42 (2006 BMW Z4M).

At 7% return money doubles every 10 years. People like to act like they can save later but the mountain is far taller the longer you wait.

I'm also completely good with people not caring about saving, just get tired of listening to old people that didn't bother and now complain about it. People also act like there are two options, one is to spend whatever you make "live life" and the other is to save every penny and there is a huge amount of options in the middle.

[zx10guy]

Originally Posted by David70

I always took retirement savings seriously, enjoyed life, saved money where I could, now 54 have a full time job that is ok but if I decide to retire tomorrow I can. Makes life easy and work stress very low. I never bought a car I really wanted until 42 (2006 BMW Z4M).

At 7% return money doubles every 10 years. People like to act like they can save later but the mountain is far taller the longer you wait.

I'm also completely good with people not caring about saving, just get tired of listening to old people that didn't bother and now complain about it. People also act like there are two options, one is to spend whatever you make "live life" and the other is to save every penny and there is a huge amount of options in the middle.

I also get tired of those complaining about their finances with no desire to actually learn anything about economics or money. All I have to point to is the living wage narrative. But where it does become a problem for those of us that have been responsible is that we're becoming the backup plan for those that YOLO their entire life. You can see this with all the pressure to bail people/groups/entities out when we had nothing to do with their poor decisions.

[David70]

Originally Posted by zx10guy

I also get tired of those complaining about their finances with no desire to actually learn anything about economics or money. All I have to point to is the living wage narrative. But where it does become a problem for those of us that have been responsible is that we're becoming the backup plan for those that YOLO their entire life. You can see this with all the pressure to bail people/groups/entities out when we had nothing to do with their poor decisions.

For the people I get tired of -

Guess what, retiring and living off of just social security sucks, always has, always will, should have seen that coming. Don't plan on the government fixing it for you as it isn't going to happen. People love to talk about dying before they need it but change their tune as they get close. Or they talk about the government being the problem. No, you are the problem.

I have a coworker that is 48, has a new Corvette, a boat, buys a new pickup every 2 years, and recently told me he needs to start saving for retirement. Loves to tell me about all the stuff he has, like watching a train wreck in super slow motion, I finally told him he is going to pay the price in the future. He didn't like me saying it but doesn't talk about all his stuff as much.

[zx10guy]

Originally Posted by David70

For the people I get tired of -

Guess what, retiring and living off of just social security sucks, always has, always will, should have seen that coming. Don't plan on the government fixing it for you as it isn't going to happen. People love to talk about dying before they need it but change their tune as they get close. Or they talk about the government being the problem. No, you are the problem.

I have a coworker that is 48, has a new Corvette, a boat, buys a new pickup every 2 years, and recently told me he needs to start saving for retirement. Loves to tell me about all the stuff he has, like watching a train wreck in super slow motion, I finally told him he is going to pay the price in the future. He didn't like me saying it but doesn't talk about all his stuff as much.

Here's the problem. Years ago, the fear of living on social security without any savings was enough to get people motivated to do better with their lives. Now there's this expectation to have a high hourly rate for jobs that were never meant to be a career. Or the expectation of free money. Tax breaks and bailouts for poor decisions; ie student loan bailout anyone? In the end, who gets left holding the bag? Those of us that have been responsible paying taxes that have been diverted towards "stimulus" checks or forgiveness programs. And if there are any funding issues to pay for all of this, raise taxes...on guess who?

I always tell people when they were bragging about the check they got from the Feds. I say, "You're welcome". Then the puzzled look. I say, "You're welcome because that money you have in your hand was courtesy of people such as me that pay up the nose with taxes." We make too much to enjoy any of the handouts/bailouts yet make too little to be able to have tax attorneys or shelters that lower our tax exposure. This is why I aggressively hit the IRS yearly limit for my 401k and take advantage of the over 50 catch up clause. It's one of the very limited options for me to lower my taxes rather than pay into a system that pisses it away.

[JMcLellan]

Originally Posted by zx10guy

Here's the problem. Years ago, the fear of living on social security without any savings was enough to get people motivated to do better with their lives. Now there's this expectation to have a high hourly rate for jobs that were never meant to be a career. Or the expectation of free money. Tax breaks and bailouts for poor decisions; ie student loan bailout anyone? In the end, who gets left holding the bag? Those of us that have been responsible paying taxes that have been diverted towards "stimulus" checks or forgiveness programs. And if there are any funding issues to pay for all of this, raise taxes...on guess who?

I always tell people when they were bragging about the check they got from the Feds. I say, "You're welcome". Then the puzzled look. I say, "You're welcome because that money you have in your hand was courtesy of people such as me that pay up the nose with taxes." We make too much to enjoy any of the handouts/bailouts yet make too little to be able to have tax attorneys or shelters that lower our tax exposure. This is why I aggressively hit the IRS yearly limit for my 401k and take advantage of the over 50 catch up clause. It's one of the very limited options for me to lower my taxes rather than pay into a system that pisses it away.

I have been hitting the yearly IRS max as well with my 401K. My financial advisor is bullish on this tactic since I'm investing tax free and to your point bringing down my annual taxable income. However, there are some financial folks out there that worry if tax rates go up folks like us will get punished when we retire and advise to only contribute the % to maximize your employer contribution then divert the other % of money to Roth or something else. I have been thinking a lot about this.

What if the people you are sour on (people making poor decisions requiring tax hikes) continue to push our tax rates up?? I hate the idea that I might be essentially stock piling future tax dollars for the Feds. I'd like to think though that if tax rates had to go up significantly in the future they would take into account how that could heavily punish 401K money but who really knows.

[vreihen16]

Originally Posted by cmyx6go

I'm assuming you're a youngster. Start saving for retirement as early as possible and delay your dream car. Your old self will thank you. Your dream car will be long gone when you retire.

I am going to ditto the above, with a footnote that I'm living the nightmare right now.

I spent my younger days "investing" all of my money in rubber, trophy futures, and racing expenses. Got married around age 40, to a wife who is younger than me and also had not planned for retirement.

Long story short, my employer of almost 39 years made me an early retirement offer that I *shouldn't* refuse (as in take this deal or else layoff) in June.

My retirement account is severely under-funded for me, and will still need to support my younger wife after I'm gone. As you can see in my forum signature, I had to sell my BMW rather than pay insurance on it to sit in the driveway with nowhere to go. My dream car (purchased new when I was young/stupid) is sitting in my enclosed race car hauler, and will qualify for NY State historic license plates in January. It hasn't even been started since 2019, and will likely be the living room centerpiece if I can scrape up enough money to build our retirement Garage Mahal down south without incurring any more debt.

If that isn't enough motivation to start saving, let me tell you about a colleague that I used to work with. In the 1970's, he had a job in college that made him open a retirement account. He put $1,500 into that account, and totally forgot about it. When it came time for him to retire, he discovered the long-forgotten retirement account. How much do you think was in it? $87,000! Yes, enough cash to buy a pretty nice dream car if he wanted one. (His primary retirement account had over $2 million in it when he retired, and using the 4% rule he can pull out almost $7,000/month to live on without touching his balance.)

Back about 10 years ago, I went on a campaign to get all of my younger colleagues at work to sign up for the retirement plan and get the employer match. Don't make me have to come and hit you over the head!!!!!

[cmyx6go]

Originally Posted by vreihen16

I am going to ditto the above, with a footnote that I'm living the nightmare right now.

I spent my younger days "investing" all of my money in rubber, trophy futures, and racing expenses. Got married around age 40, to a wife who is younger than me and also had not planned for retirement.

Long story short, my employer of almost 39 years made me an early retirement offer that I *shouldn't* refuse (as in take this deal or else layoff) in June.

My retirement account is severely under-funded for me, and will still need to support my younger wife after I'm gone. As you can see in my forum signature, I had to sell my BMW rather than pay insurance on it to sit in the driveway with nowhere to go. My dream car (purchased new when I was young/stupid) is sitting in my enclosed race car hauler, and will qualify for NY State historic license plates in January. It hasn't even been started since 2019, and will likely be the living room centerpiece if I can scrape up enough money to build our retirement Garage Mahal down south without incurring any more debt.

If that isn't enough motivation to start saving, let me tell you about a colleague that I used to work with. In the 1970's, he had a job in college that made him open a retirement account. He put $1,500 into that account, and totally forgot about it. When it came time for him to retire, he discovered the long-forgotten retirement account. How much do you think was in it? $87,000! Yes, enough cash to buy a pretty nice dream car if he wanted one. (His primary retirement account had over $2 million in it when he retired, and using the 4% rule he can pull out almost $7,000/month to live on without touching his balance.)

Back about 10 years ago, I went on a campaign to get all of my younger colleagues at work to sign up for the retirement plan and get the employer match. Don't make me have to come and hit you over the head!!!!!

Somehow I can't bring myself to "like" this post so I'll say thank you for sharing.

[zx10guy]

Originally Posted by JMcLellan

I have been hitting the yearly IRS max as well with my 401K. My financial advisor is bullish on this tactic since I'm investing tax free and to your point bringing down my annual taxable income. However, there are some financial folks out there that worry if tax rates go up folks like us will get punished when we retire and advise to only contribute the % to maximize your employer contribution then divert the other % of money to Roth or something else. I have been thinking a lot about this.

What if the people you are sour on (people making poor decisions requiring tax hikes) continue to push our tax rates up?? I hate the idea that I might be essentially stock piling future tax dollars for the Feds. I'd like to think though that if tax rates had to go up significantly in the future they would take into account how that could heavily punish 401K money but who really knows.

My financial advisor brought up targeting a tax bracket when I retire. He showed me the current tax tables and it was eye opening as to the increase in percentages as the income brackets move up. With this in mind, I'm looking to try to have as lean of a base monthly living expenses as I can. Would probably mean having one of my homes paid off so I don't have to draw as much monthly from my qualified accounts and therefore not be in an undesirable tax bracket.

The other thing I mentioned above is have diversified buckets of funds. I have a small Roth IRA account that I mentioned I should have funded more. I'm making up for some of it by using the over 50 catch up money to be allocated into my Roth 401k. I started this last year in anticipation of the changes in Federal law where the catch up money has to be invested into a Roth. I think that section of law goes into effect either next year or 2026.

The other thing I'm doing is putting money into a non qualified/regular investment account. If tax laws hold, the tax on the money I pull out of that account will be only capital gains.

Having three buckets of money to pull from provides lots of flexibility in controlling where I land in a tax bracket come retirement with also considering required minimum distributions at some point.

[mjj]

My kids were my dream car purchase in my 30 & 40’s. I saved along the way. Kids are now graduated and houses are paid for so I can purchase dream cars as I wish (within reason - no Bugatti’s). Find a balance but always pay yourself first.

[vreihen16]

Originally Posted by cmyx6go

Somehow I can't bring myself to "like" this post so I'll say thank you for sharing.

Feel free to "like" that post. I made my bed, and I have to sleep in it (or in a cardboard box under a highway overpass). I'm a good example of a bad example, and hope that sharing my mistakes will help someone else avoid being in the same position.

One thing that I did do right is buy a modestly-sized house right after I got married. I've been paying the mortgage at an accelerated rate, and it will be paid off in December even with the involuntary retirement. If Zillow can be believed, it's worth $100K more now than what we paid for it. That includes the 2008 housing bubble pop, that caused house prices to tumble and many who purchased houses that they couldn't afford with jumbo mortgages to walk away in foreclosure.

Paying rent to someone is just paying the landlord's mortgage on their appreciating asset. I'll only be paying taxes and utilities for housing starting in January, and we can sell at any time to build down south where the taxes and cost of living are much lower than in NY State.

Don't think that I don't kick myself daily for turning down the mother-of-all offers to buy a brand new E36 M3 Lightweight (stripped track/racing version with no AC or radio) back in 1995 for $19,800 when the dealer wanted to unload a special order that the buyer backed out on, but in reality that dream car would be worth 12 cents per pound as scrap metal today given how my younger self would have thrashed it in competition.....

[c1pher]

The younger you start, the less you have to put away each month. You can afford both if you balance it out.