Share Your TSP Balance and Your Age Thread

[MrBowl]

I'm 46 and only have around $80,000 in my TSP act . I will work well into my 70s. I'll be aggressive with my investments to try to catch up to where I think I should be.

I'm an example of what not to do with your retirement acct. When I was single back in the late 1990s I had extra money and started an online acct and did very well. Fast Fwd to 2002 or so and the internet bubble bust had me about a year's salary in debt. I've been chasing the debt ever since. I almost got out of debt by 2006, but then came an expensive wedding, purchasing a house in 2007 in CA (DOH!!!), and a baby. CA is expensive and you have little chance of getting out of debt once you're in deep, outside of a windfall like an inheretence, lotto, or just dedicating yourself to extra jobs for a stretch. I have twice taken disbursements for a total of $83,000 to try and manage the debt. It didn't work - it only shifted debt to an almost equal amount of new taxes. I'm also paying off two TSP loans. One loan was for $50,000 to buy that 2007 home, which had the value cut in half by the time I lost it in 2011. The other was was to manage debt, again.

Its just another version of the same lesson we've all heard - ALWAYS spend less than you have and save more than you think you can. Don't act like your retirement acct is a checking acct. It's ok to rent or to go without some of the things you want. Oh, and its not a bad idea to marry into money.

 

[Frixxxx]

Oh, and its not a bad idea to marry into money.

First marriage is for love, second marriage is for money, third marriage is for suckers. :laugh: That was a joke for all you multi-marriage people (me included)!

 

[nnuut]

Boy am I glad I was CSRS! My TSP is our emergency fund.

 

[TalkaRound]

I'm new to TSP Talk. I'm 51 years old and I've been investing in the TSP for 27 years. I currently have $904,000. I invested aggressively the entire 27 years which includes putting the max amount in my TSP on a yearly basis. I also contribute the max catch up funds, which began when I reached the age of 50. During the 27 years I've been in the TSP I can remember the market taking a dive 2 or 3 times. During that time I NEVER jumped into the G fund. I remained pretty much in the C, S and I funds. I'm going to retire when I am 59. My goal is to hit the 2 million dollar mark before I retire.

 

[Intrepid_Timer]

I'm new to TSP Talk. I'm 51 years old and I've been investing in the TSP for 27 years. I currently have $904,000. I invested aggressively the entire 27 years which includes putting the max amount in my TSP on a yearly basis. I also contribute the max catch up funds, which began when I reached the age of 50. During the 27 years I've been in the TSP I can remember the market taking a dive 2 or 3 times. During that time I NEVER jumped into the G fund. I remained pretty much in the C, S and I funds. I'm going to retire when I am 59. My goal is to hit the 2 million dollar mark before I retire.

Good luck. Hopefully equities don't lose 30% when you are 58. Timing is everything and those 2 dives you mentioned both came this century (14 years). This ain't the same kind of market it was when you started.

Welcome to the forum!

 

[TalkaRound]

Intrepid Timer you are right, it is a different market from when I started. I plan to invest a little safer a couple of years before I retire, which may cause me to fall short of my goal. I will have to really keep an eye on the market around that time or a little sooner in order to try and avoid a 30% or more loss.

 

[TangoMike]

Intrepid Timer you are right, it is a different market from when I started. I plan to invest a little safer a couple of years before I retire, which may cause me to fall short of my goal. I will have to really keep an eye on the market around that time or a little sooner in order to try and avoid a 30% or more loss.

i'm 54yo w/ ~28 yrs of service(3 military time) I have ~410k. I missed the 2yk beat down, sat in the g for a year and took a little bit of a beating (was 20% in C) in 2008, but got it back and more in 2010...but the damage was done; I got scared and sat 100% in G paralyzed for the next 3 years. I've occasionally gone in 5 or 10% on C fund dips, but the craziness of QE pi just spooks me; the musical chairs game will end and it will be as ugly as 2008. My goal is to punch out in 6yrs, with 600k--I just upped my contrib to 15%. I used to trade 8-12 times a month back in the day, I was one of the few that got a letter for excessive trades. Is there a thread to discuss trading strategies--end of month trading versus the first of the month...that kind of thing? The 2x/month is so limited, it can be done but it is frustrating at times. Thanks in advance!

 

[Handballer]

Boy am I glad I was CSRS! My TSP is our emergency fund.

I was not. I am okay with that with that.:laugh:

 

[berg1315]

I just turned 30, I have 5.5 years of service and I currently have $130,000 in my TSP. I've always been very interested in learning about personal finance, debt, and the math side of compounding. I've maxed out my TSP for the last 4 years and plan to continue to do so as long as I can. Being that I have a long future ahead of me and that I am somewhat skeptical about my pension being there or at least being as good as it is now when I retire, my goal is to be able to retire off of my TSP alone. I'm a long time lurker on TSPtalk and am very thankful for everyone who has put in the work to maintain the sight and keep the discussions active!

 

[flybaby]

I’m 48… with 17 years of service. I plan to retire in 3 years, right at the 20year mark.I’ve got $305,000 in acombination of Civilian and Uniformed accounts.I did what most of us do… contribute some… but not all of the federal maximum limit… also took a loan when I was younger. Basically… everything wrong!
For the last 10 years… contributing the max. Got crushed in 2008-9 because I didn’tunderstand the market, charts, trends and sage advice.
I feel I’ve rectified most of that by joining TSP Talk. Staying informed and not getting too greedy, are the keys.But… if nothing else…. CONTRIBUTE the MAXIMUM allowed under law. Dollar cost average and get that money working.
Hoping to have as close to $500,000 when I retire, as I can… but plan on letting that money work, without using it for years.. One million fun tickets before I really need it? …. Possible.

 

[Globalpack]

Thanks for sharing your saving experience.

 

[GUCHI]

I'm 55 yrs old and retired 5 months ago with 35 yrs of service. Doing the math I started with NRCS/SCS on 10/1979 two years out of high school. Being 20 years old with no direction other than to live like a 20 year old I had my money in the G fund starting 9/1989. Of course if I knew what I know now things would be different. Anyway back then as it is now we never received any guidance and therefore I put in G fund and left for awhile(dumb dumb move). Fast forward 10 years (9/1999) and I'm in the C fund with $38,977. Another 5 years 9/2004 I'm spread in the C,S!and I fund with $61,438. 9/2010 I had a short stint in the L2040 and I fund with a balance of $108,204. I took out a tsp loan in 3/2011 for $50,000 to consolidate some rental properties and9/2011 I find my balance at $76,756. I know people say not to use tsp for stuff like that , but it worked like a charm for me. 9/2012 my balance rose to $105,350. 9/2013 my balance was $155,887 before loan payoff. I knew that I wanted to retire when I did and I had to pay off the tsp loan or face high penalty tax,so my wife and I went to the bank and took out a equity loan at a low rate and I payed off the balance of my loan 9/26/2013 of $25,940 this brought my tsp to $183,466. Recently my highest was $215ish but has dropped with this recent dip. I'm pretty much a buy and holder and I never had plans of using my tsp for income when I retired,just my pension. So far so good. With that thought in mind I decided to stay fully into equities long time ago and just let the compounding continue. I have talked to my broker at tdameritrade he would like me to move inot an IRA, but I have not as of yet. Retirement has been good and I added a little blip in the retirement forum. My 26 yr old son with his masters in EE ( proud papa)just started with FERC and I told him to go balls to the wall right away since he has many years to accumulate cash and time is on your side with the compounding thingy. I told him to pay himself first from the jump and you won't be sorry. Oh and one more big factor I went to the school of hard knocks and attained gs 10 status before I retired. I don't think that's too shabby for a dummy like me heehee. So you brains out there have a lot more potential,so save early and reach for the stars.

 

[James48843]

FYI:

 

[tspnewbie]

9 years. $125,000.

 

[Boghie]

What advice would you give to a young guy just starting off

You are probably beyond this in the thread, but...

When Tom says 'Get Aggressive' he means investing ALL of your assets and contributions in C/S/I. At your age and at your balance there is NO reason to have assets sitting in the G/F. For the rest of us - those who remember the FDR presidency, yuk, yuk - we should have some G/F.

 

[PessOptimist]

Re-reading this from the beginning and making some comments about some of it.

10 times your annual salary. Yikes! Is that starting salary or the last year’s salary? I am doomed! Maybe not, everyone’s situation is different.

Since I’m in the xmas spirit or into the xmas spirits, I will share. I am 62 yo, have 17.5 years fed service and $400-500k in my TSP. I am currently maxing out contributions and hope to continue that until my projected retirement date in December 2017.

The subject of military TSP and matching brings mixed feelings. Old lifer says in my day all we had was savings bonds. True, I retired 30 Nov 96. I appreciated all the sentiment about matching for military but some good points are brought up about why there are none. Burrocrat makes good points but I feel the need to clarify some of them.

they also have lifetime medical care built into that retirement package

True but it is not free. It is cheap. At age 65 it becomes a medicare wrap around coverage IF you buy medicare part B. This will be about a 113% increase in premiums for me last time I figured it out. Plus in most cases you are on the street at age 65 looking for a new primary care manager.

tax free income while serving abroad

Just want to make sure everyone understands this is only if serving in a hostile fire zone or something like it. I did about 10 years outside the US and paid taxes on every dime of my base pay during that time.

a person can possibly gain a military pension, a civilian pension, participate in tsp some of the time with 5% match, earn social security benefits after active duty career, utilize discounted opportunities not available to the general public, and have private investments outside of that to shore up their safety net

Yes, I hope it works out. The discounts are way over rated for what I want to buy. But they are there.

Someone later mentioned the VA home loan. Yes a very nice thing as getting together a down payment was not easy at the pay rates back in the day and is probably not easy now.

Commissary use is also over rated as it is not really a good deal except for a few products. IMO I suppose. The commissary is only 8 miles away but we do most of our shopping at local chains.

At 4.5 years I had 38k in TSP. At 3.5 years I had 32k.

Reading through the thread it doesn’t appear I am doing that badly compared to some and better than some. Just like any sampling of anything.

Best of luck everyone.
PO

 

[bmneveu]

At 4.5 years I had 38k in TSP. At 3.5 years I had 32k.

Reading through the thread it doesn’t appear I am doing that badly compared to some and better than some. Just like any sampling of anything.

Best of luck everyone.
PO

Shoot, better than me! I am closing in on my 4th full year and am behind your pace by a considerable amount.

On a good note, it looks like I will end this year with 400% more $ in interest paid to me than any previous year. 2012 was my best year before this, and I should quadruple that as long as nothing crazy happens here near the end. 2014 Q4 alone has brought me double the total interest $ than all of 2012 combined so far. It's been a good year. Hopefully many more to come.

 

[PessOptimist]

Shoot, better than me! I am closing in on my 4th full year and am behind your pace by a considerable amount.

On a good note, it looks like I will end this year with 400% more $ in interest paid to me than any previous year. 2012 was my best year before this, and I should quadruple that as long as nothing crazy happens here near the end. 2014 Q4 alone has brought me double the total interest $ than all of 2012 combined so far. It's been a good year. Hopefully many more to come.

Good deal on the gains and I too hope many more to come. I stated in my overlong post, everyone's situation is different. What I had going for me at the start of my .fed career was 24 years military time and that annuity. It paid PITI and some of the bills so no matter what happened I would have a roof to live under. Plus I lucked in to a .fed job that had a duty description ripped out of the AF classification manual for my specialty. Life has been good to me so far. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BXWvKDSwvls

Not as good as Joe Walsh's but my old Dakota does 107 if you are crazy enough to hold you foot down that long. One time experiment since at about 90 it started making funny noises and doing funny things. A brick can only take so much wind.

So back on topic, I was able to contribute a lot to TSP early on. During my first year my balance was below my accumulated contributions at one point and if I had been monitoring it closely I would probably have quit contributing. It turned out OK by me ignoring it until later years. All my best to you and thanks for your service. I am starting to get annoyed with that cliche at times but mean it sincerely.

PO

 

[ATCJeff]

49 years old
27.75 years ATC
max since day 1
1.54 million in my TSP

 

[OBGibby]

49 years old
27.75 years ATC
max since day 1
1.54 million in my TSP

Very impressive! An excellent example to others of what can be achieved. Can you expound on your TSP management actions (i.e., passive/active, put it on auto-pilot, used a premium service, etc.)? I'm curious to know how much of the $1.54 million balance is your employee contributions.