1 million dollars

[Appatite]

This may have caught your attention, and no I don't have 1 million dollars, but I was wondering about this benchmark.

Back when I was about 20 years old, in the service in 1989, we were given a finance's/economics/retirement class/seminar. And one of the things that stuck with me was the idea that I was going to need 1 million dollars for me to retire at 65. That was the number given to us. Now I know today, 22 years later that there are other variables such as pensions, SS, area in which I plan to retire, etc so on and so forth that affect this number.

I guess my question that I want to get to is, is 1 million dollars still that general benchmark for 20 year olds? 30 year olds? 40 year olds?:worried: Has it gone UP, UP, UP for me? Is my benchmark now 1.25 million? or 1.5 million?

 

[peterson82]

I would focus on the number you want to rake in (monthly/yearly) after you retire. For instance, if you want to make the same amount of money you are right now per year after you retire then you would take you current salary and subtract all the obvious stuff like Social Security, pension, etc. Now, the the number you have left is what you need to base the magic number on. With a safe investment that would be around 3-4% a year on whatever that magic number is.

Let's say you want $70,000 a year after your retirement.

70,000-SS-Pension = 40,000 (As example)

So, to get the other 40k a year you would need

.035 * x = $40,000
x = $40,000/0.035
x = $1,142,858

-peterson82

 

[Frixxxx]

I would focus on the number you want to rake in (monthly/yearly) after you retire. For instance, if you want to make the same amount of money you are right now per year after you retire then you would take you current salary and subtract all the obvious stuff like Social Security, pension, etc. Now, the the number you have left is what you need to base the magic number on. With a safe investment that would be around 3-4% a year on whatever that magic number is.

Let's say you want $70,000 a year after your retirement.

70,000-SS-Pension = 40,000 (As example)

So, to get the other 40k a year you would need

.035 * x = $40,000
x = $40,000/0.035
x = $1,142,858

-peterson82

The only way to make that simpler is if you didn't have to do the math.....

Very nice post peterson82!