You're going to be poor if you're not investing at LEAST 20% of your gross pay in index funds.

I am 47 and would like to start investing for my retirement. What is the best path for me to go forward with. I currently make $92,000/yr.

jewbacca wrote:

I feel sad for so many people in this thread.

The average wage at my work is about $90k. Every single person nearing retirement has $1-2 million in retirement accounts. 5% match from the company and aggressive saving.

What do you do at work that you know how much everyone has in their retirement accounts? Do you manage the accounts?

What percentage did those folks invest? At what age are they retiring?

so what do i do wrote:

I am 47 and would like to start investing for my retirement.

How much have you saved already? If it is nothing or close to nothing, you need to start investing massive amounts of money into your 401k, Roth IRAs, and mutual funds.

I currently have $7500 put away for the retirement. I think this is a decent start, not great, but decent. I had planned to begin getting more serious about putting more money away when I get to 50 but just wondered how much it would help to get a jump on things and start my investment strategy here. I want to start putting about $1000 away each month so I can think about an early retirement. My wife thinks putting that much away is kind of risky and we can wait a few more years. What do you think?

so what do i do wrote:

I currently have $7500 put away for the retirement. I think this is a decent start, not great, but decent. I had planned to begin getting more serious about putting more money away when I get to 50 but just wondered how much it would help to get a jump on things and start my investment strategy here. I want to start putting about $1000 away each month so I can think about an early retirement. My wife thinks putting that much away is kind of risky and we can wait a few more years. What do you think?

I think you are trolling.

3 wrote:

I think you are trolling.

Not trolling. I really think I can hang out at this level while prices get settled and then I will hit the market, and hit it kind of hard ($1000/month).

If you aren't trolling then dont put any money away. Its too late to save and $1,000 a month wont be close to what you need. You need to live it up for a few years and blow all your money. Then when you get old ask for the government to pay or just die.

Hypothetically speaking, If you start with 7500, add 1000 a month, for the next 20 years. With an amazing 12% compounding interest, you would still come up short of a million. That would give you 10 years of living off your $91,000 salary, which accounting for inflation would probably be what you need. that puts you at 77 when you run out of money.

so what do i do wrote:

3 wrote:

I think you are trolling.

Not trolling. I really think I can hang out at this level while prices get settled and then I will hit the market, and hit it kind of hard ($1000/month).

No rational mature person thinks it is a good idea to wait until their late 40s or 50s to start saving for retirement. A lot of people do it but they know it isn't the right way to save for retirement. Did you flunk out of personal finance classes or something? How do you make $90,000/year and have a mindset like that?

If you ARE serious, start investing and saving TODAY. Go open an account THIS AFTERNOON. And hope that social security doesn't lower its benefits in the next 20 years.

I bump you up to a 4.

I'm 24 and just got a really (realllllly) big pay bump. I've heard there are salary limits for tax-sheltered retirement accounts. Does anyone have info on this?

Do you mean tax advantaged retirement accounts? The annual limits for those are:

$18,000 traditional IRA

$5,500 Roth IRA

I mean what is the maximum salary you can have and still contribute and receive the tax benefits. I'm having trouble finding it, but I have seen the limits you posted.

The income limit for Roth IRAs is $127k/year (single person)

Even with the income limit you can still do a backdoor contribution.

TAA wrote:

The income limit for Roth IRAs is $127k/year (single person)

Even with the income limit you can still do a backdoor contribution.

Ok thanks, is that different for married? Also is it different for 401(k)? Would you mind linking me to some info on that?

ya..... wrote:

TAA wrote:

The income limit for Roth IRAs is $127k/year (single person)

Even with the income limit you can still do a backdoor contribution.

Ok thanks, is that different for married? Also is it different for 401(k)? Would you mind linking me to some info on that?

Here's a good vanguard page for IRAs:

There's no income limit for 401k contributions.

Hmm OK, I guess I'll just leave it up to our CPA on what to do. I'm just under the married filing jointly limit, but with my wifes income we're over it. So if the tax advantage is high enough maybe they will have us file separately, due to the disparity in income. I just don't want hand over all of this money to uncle sam when the taxes on the new income are so high already. The new job is contract, so I'm already putting almost all of it in savings for quarterly taxes.