By age 35, aim to save one to one-and-a-half times your current salary for retirement. By age 50, that goal is three-and-a-half to six times your salary. By age 60, your retirement savings goal may be six to 11-times your salary. Ranges increase with age to account for a wide variety of incomes and situations.
Retiring in comfort at 45 with $1.5 million is likely doable as long as your retirement living expenses are no more than average, your investments generate a typical return and you have good health. Challenges include waiting 17 years for Social Security and 20 years for Medicare.
Financial planners often recommend replacing about 80% of your pre-retirement income to sustain the same lifestyle after you retire. This means that if you earn $100,000 per year, you'd aim for at least $80,000 of income (in today's dollars) in retirement.
If you have $400,000 in the bank you can retire early at age 62, but it will be tight. The good news is that if you can keep working for just five more years, you are on track for a potentially quite comfortable retirement by full retirement age.
Just 16% of retirees say they have more than $1 million saved, including all personal savings and assets, according to the recent CNBC Your Money retirement survey conducted with SurveyMonkey. In fact, among those currently saving for retirement, 57% say the amount they're hoping to save is less than $1 million.
As a result, an oft-stated rule of thumb suggests workers can base their retirement on a percentage of their current income. “Seventy to 80% of pre-retirement income is good to shoot for,” said Ben Bakkum, senior investment strategist with New York City financial firm Betterment, in an email.
The $1,000 per month rule is designed to help you estimate the amount of savings required to generate a steady monthly income during retirement. According to this rule, for every $240,000 you save, you can withdraw $1,000 per month if you stick to a 5% annual withdrawal rate.
According to estimates based on the Federal Reserve Survey of Consumer Finances, a mere 3.2% of retirees have over $1 million in their retirement accounts. The number of those with $2 million or more is even smaller, falling somewhere between this 3.2% and the 0.1% who have $5 million or more saved.
Gen Z and Millennials expect to need more than $1.6 million to retire comfortably. And although a long way from leaving the workforce, the survey showed Millennials currently have just $62,600 saved, a gap of $1.59 million between what they feel they need and what they have saved.
Yes, it's possible to retire on $1 million today. In fact, with careful planning and a solid investment strategy, you could possibly live off the returns from a $1 million nest egg.
The final multiple — 10 to 12 times your annual income at retirement age. If you plan to retire at 67, for instance, and your income is $150,000 per year, then you should have between $1.5 and $1.8 million set aside for retirement.
The 4% rule is a popular retirement withdrawal strategy that suggests retirees can safely withdraw the amount equal to 4% of their savings during the year they retire and then adjust for inflation each subsequent year for 30 years.
Probably 1 in every 20 families have a net worth exceeding $3 Million, but most people's net worth is their homes, cars, boats, and only 10% is in savings, so you would typically have to have a net worth of $30 million, which is 1 in every 1000 families.
The average household retirement income in the United States is $27,617, according to an analysis by Wisevoter of data from the U.S. Census Bureau's American Community Survey. However, depending on where you live, your local average may be much higher or lower.
According to data from the Social Security Administration, as of January 2024, the average monthly retirement benefit payment was $1,909.01, which comes to about $22,322 per year.
In simplest terms, take a $2,500 mortgage payment out of the picture and you've just reduced your annual expenses by $30,000. Now, factor that against the amount of money you'll need to manage retirement: between 55% to 80% of your current annual income, according to Fidelity.
You can start receiving your Social Security retirement benefits as early as age 62. However, you are entitled to full benefits only when you reach your full retirement age. If you delay taking your benefits from your full retirement age up to age 70, your benefit amount will increase.
If your spouse dies, do you get both Social Security benefits? You cannot claim your deceased spouse's benefits in addition to your own retirement benefits. Social Security only will pay one—survivor or retirement. If you qualify for both survivor and retirement benefits, you will receive whichever amount is higher.
Your net worth is what you own minus what you owe. It's the total value of all your assets—including your house, cars, investments and cash—minus your liabilities (things like credit card debt, student loans, and what you still owe on your mortgage).
Rich retirees: In the 90th percentile, with net worth starting at $1.9 million, this group has much more financial freedom and is able to afford luxuries and legacy planning.