Is this right?

Swaye said:

creepycoug said:

ntxduck said:

creepycoug said:

ntxduck said:

creepycoug said:

spuden said:

No, it’s not right.

The chart you included is slightly misleading, as it only captures accounts managed by Fidelity. It doesn’t capture 401k, IRA and other defined contribution (e.g. 403b) accounts managed by Vanguard, Schwab, TD Ameritrade, the Thrift Savings Plan, etc.

You’re right; it’s not. The Yahoo version of the article was a little misleading. The WAPO version made it more clear it was limited to Fidelity plans.

So I assume VG has at least Fidelity-like numbers and then there are smaller players.

Even extrapolating from the Fidelity numbers using rough guesstimates, seems there aren’t a lot of Americans with 7 digits in their 401k.

One of my buddies runs the annual American finance report for one of the big 4. He always sends me a free copy where you can segregate by age/education/savings type etc etc. it’s very depressing to look at (especially for the older gen x types).

Millennials are actually doing a pretty good job stowing away cash (probably from habits learned while living at home with their parents 2008-2011ish). Gen x though...woof. Hard to envision how many of them will ever be able to retire

In your estimation, what should a Gen X-er about 8 years from retirement have in retirement investments? Is it fair to include the lump sum value of a pension benefit?

Yes—id include that for sure. Everyone’s situation is unique, so I don’t want to name a number (and to be honest I don’t know enough about it for your age group, I’ve only really given it thought for my own age range which is completely different, since I don’t think we will have SS to dependably rely on) but I would assume you’re in good shape, esp in comparison to your peers.

When I say woof about gen x, I’m talking how 35% of 50 year olds have

I struggle with the number. I am aiming at $5 to $6M in investments. House is paid; will finance construction of the lake place in the next year or so. Stand to inherit some money/property. Kids college is done and they have no debt. Two more weddings and I’m free.

Goal is to live off investment returns and leave the corpus to my kids. Will likely rent the Seattle place out when I pull up stakes. Want to keep my foothold in Seattle because I’m convinced long-term it’s gong to be a hard place to move back to if you left the market.

This is far and above what 90% of America ever aspires to. 5-6M is still serious money. We have been conditioned to think that everyone has Bentley's and shit now. They don't. Sure, the top 10% live very well in this country, but for the most part most people are still working poor.

I have a good friend who is well placed at Fidelity and manages a portion of their "asset management" business for top 10%'ers. I asked him to run some numbers for me.

I said how much money do I need to maintain a 100K per year lifestyle (that is actually pretty modest) in retirement. I was mid-40s at the tim, and I told him to expect a retirement cap at 60. The 100K per year was in today's (2018) dollars, and he could adjust that for inflation so the figures would make sense 15 years in the future (2033). I also told him to do it based on index funds. He crunches numbers for awhile, asks some questions, and says 3M, assuming no mortgage and no major debts (student loans for kids, etc.). So then we run the calculation for me specifically, as I have that glorious military retirement, and it cut the amount I need to save down to 1.2M - to live that same 100K a year lifestyle. Huge difference.

100K a year might sound like a bunch to some people, but my property taxes alone eat the first 8K of that, throw in cable, phone, other normal bullshit and I probably start the year down 20K of that 100K before I have purchased one item of food, powered my house, bought a tank of gas, taken a trip, or done any home repairs/upgrades. Or bought a new car. Or anything else. To me a 100K per year retirement is a modest, but very comfortable, retirement (provided you are mortgage free which is my focus right now). You aren't driving a Bentley and wintering in Monaco, but you have plenty of money for a few small trips a year and to eat out as much as you want.

The point I am making is 5-6M is over a 200K per year retirement I assume (I no gud at maff), which is beyond a comfortable retirement. You will love life. Goddamn swarthy Cubans.

So I axed my buddy what percentage of Americans are going to retire with that 3M and no mortgage figure to have a comfy but not outlandish retirement. He laughed. Less than 5% was his very serious answer. I think social media sometimes makes us think everyone is Park Avenue rich, but it just ain't so. I could be wrong of course, but I'm not usually wrong.

Also thanks to everyone on this bored. You paid for me to blow up terrorists all those years, and now you are paying me to only need 40% of what everyone else needs for a nice retirement. 1.2M and a paid for house seems super doable. Hell I'm aiming for 1.8M just to have some extra to hit the strip clubs when I'm 70.

whlinder said:

Back of the envelope maff:

The max contribution annually to an IRA is 6K (7K after you're 50). Contributing a full 6K, with 10% return takes around 30 years to hit a million. At 15% return it is still ~23 years.

Doing that for a 401K using 19K as the assumed contribution takes 16 years at 15% return and 20 at 10% return. Sure you can go higher than the 19K, with employer match (Love my 6.5% extra there) but it obviously takes a long time to hit 1m with optimistic assumptions on the contributions during the early years.

I'm also curious if these are numbers for a single account or across multiple accounts. IRAs having so many are surprising given the lower contribution allowances, but perhaps with 401K rollovers to IRAs boost those numbers.

USMChawk said:

Swaye said:

creepycoug said:

ntxduck said:

creepycoug said:

ntxduck said:

creepycoug said:

spuden said:

No, it’s not right.

The chart you included is slightly misleading, as it only captures accounts managed by Fidelity. It doesn’t capture 401k, IRA and other defined contribution (e.g. 403b) accounts managed by Vanguard, Schwab, TD Ameritrade, the Thrift Savings Plan, etc.

You’re right; it’s not. The Yahoo version of the article was a little misleading. The WAPO version made it more clear it was limited to Fidelity plans.

So I assume VG has at least Fidelity-like numbers and then there are smaller players.

Even extrapolating from the Fidelity numbers using rough guesstimates, seems there aren’t a lot of Americans with 7 digits in their 401k.

One of my buddies runs the annual American finance report for one of the big 4. He always sends me a free copy where you can segregate by age/education/savings type etc etc. it’s very depressing to look at (especially for the older gen x types).

Millennials are actually doing a pretty good job stowing away cash (probably from habits learned while living at home with their parents 2008-2011ish). Gen x though...woof. Hard to envision how many of them will ever be able to retire

In your estimation, what should a Gen X-er about 8 years from retirement have in retirement investments? Is it fair to include the lump sum value of a pension benefit?

Yes—id include that for sure. Everyone’s situation is unique, so I don’t want to name a number (and to be honest I don’t know enough about it for your age group, I’ve only really given it thought for my own age range which is completely different, since I don’t think we will have SS to dependably rely on) but I would assume you’re in good shape, esp in comparison to your peers.

When I say woof about gen x, I’m talking how 35% of 50 year olds have

I struggle with the number. I am aiming at $5 to $6M in investments. House is paid; will finance construction of the lake place in the next year or so. Stand to inherit some money/property. Kids college is done and they have no debt. Two more weddings and I’m free.

Goal is to live off investment returns and leave the corpus to my kids. Will likely rent the Seattle place out when I pull up stakes. Want to keep my foothold in Seattle because I’m convinced long-term it’s gong to be a hard place to move back to if you left the market.

This is far and above what 90% of America ever aspires to. 5-6M is still serious money. We have been conditioned to think that everyone has Bentley's and shit now. They don't. Sure, the top 10% live very well in this country, but for the most part most people are still working poor.

I have a good friend who is well placed at Fidelity and manages a portion of their "asset management" business for top 10%'ers. I asked him to run some numbers for me.

I said how much money do I need to maintain a 100K per year lifestyle (that is actually pretty modest) in retirement. I was mid-40s at the tim, and I told him to expect a retirement cap at 60. The 100K per year was in today's (2018) dollars, and he could adjust that for inflation so the figures would make sense 15 years in the future (2033). I also told him to do it based on index funds. He crunches numbers for awhile, asks some questions, and says 3M, assuming no mortgage and no major debts (student loans for kids, etc.). So then we run the calculation for me specifically, as I have that glorious military retirement, and it cut the amount I need to save down to 1.2M - to live that same 100K a year lifestyle. Huge difference.

100K a year might sound like a bunch to some people, but my property taxes alone eat the first 8K of that, throw in cable, phone, other normal bullshit and I probably start the year down 20K of that 100K before I have purchased one item of food, powered my house, bought a tank of gas, taken a trip, or done any home repairs/upgrades. Or bought a new car. Or anything else. To me a 100K per year retirement is a modest, but very comfortable, retirement (provided you are mortgage free which is my focus right now). You aren't driving a Bentley and wintering in Monaco, but you have plenty of money for a few small trips a year and to eat out as much as you want.

The point I am making is 5-6M is over a 200K per year retirement I assume (I no gud at maff), which is beyond a comfortable retirement. You will love life. Goddamn swarthy Cubans.

So I axed my buddy what percentage of Americans are going to retire with that 3M and no mortgage figure to have a comfy but not outlandish retirement. He laughed. Less than 5% was his very serious answer. I think social media sometimes makes us think everyone is Park Avenue rich, but it just ain't so. I could be wrong of course, but I'm not usually wrong.

Also thanks to everyone on this bored. You paid for me to blow up terrorists all those years, and now you are paying me to only need 40% of what everyone else needs for a nice retirement. 1.2M and a paid for house seems super doable. Hell I'm aiming for 1.8M just to have some extra to hit the strip clubs when I'm 70.

My number has always been 2M, which seemed like a pipe dream 30 years ago. But, once you start seriously saving, it snowballs in a hurry. Now, thanks to the Swaye ‘blowing up terrorists’ retirement plan, I don’t need to really touch those assets. Having medical included with my retirement is huge. Something I didn’t appreciate when I was 17 but understand completely now that I’m 55.