You Don’t Need A Million Dollars To Retire
I’ll show you how to “retire” with much less than a million saved
Before you do anything, let go of traditional conceptions of retirement.
If you’re under 50, you’re probably not going to retire the way your parents did anyway.
The math retirement calculators spit at you helps very little with your present financial situation. Even if you make a lot of money, what the experts say you need to save to retire tends to trigger anxiety over sustainable action.
According to NerdWallet’s retirement calculator, a 25-year old who makes $60,000 a year, has current savings of $30,000, and saves $500 a month will amass $1.74 million by the time she’s 67, assuming 2% annual salary increases and a 6% rate of return. This same calculator argues that $1.74 million won’t even be enough. It notes that you’ll actually require about $2.11 million to retire at 67.
The days of working, consistently, for 42 years and retiring as a senior citizen are long gone. The days of scrimping to do this ought to be long gone.
Retirement investing that focuses on hitting some arbitrary nest egg number north of a million belongs in history’s dustbin. It’s out of step with reality for an increasing number of us.
