I first maxed out my 401k in 2021 when I was 29. I made $122k that year. It was tough, but it’s a great way to keep yourself accountable to living beneath your means.
I first maxed out my 401k at age 31 when my salary first bumped into 6 figures. This was also with having two kids in daycare. I am now 32 with 3 kids in daycare and I must admit it is getting pretty hard even with a 6-figure salary. I know it sounds silly but I am basically living paycheck to paycheck in order to do this. We are saving our income up front and then everything we take home pretty much gets spent after that. While It may be a little hard now, I know this will pay off for my family in the long run. Keep going people, you can do this!
You're not living paycheck to paycheck if you're saving money. Paycheck to paycheck means you only have exactly enough to cover your expenses and nothing left over.
@@justthebrttrkhence why I said it’s silly to say. It’s like a forced scarcity tactic if you are treating savings like an expense that is all of your margin.
@@klopad57 You're doing the right thing, and someday down the line, when you feel like giving yourself a break from the scarcity, you'll be able to! Comfortably! Kudos.
Maxed 401K, IRA, HSA [All Roth] last week! I’m 36 and my wife is 29. We both just recently crossed the 6 figure mark. I’ll get yelled at by half the audience but we just started investing seriously only 3 years ago. We put all of our energy into paying the mortgage off early [10 years] and can really crank up the savings rate comfortably. The freedom was definitely worth the opportunity cost! Good luck everyone!
"Just" started three years ago, when you were 33 and your wife 26? Yeah, that's not Erin early, but still much earlier than many. Plus the two of you already have sizable shovels. With the mortgage paid off too (!), the hard part will be avoiding serious lifestyle creep! :) Nice job!
That’s great and you do you, but it’s important to keep the long term in mind. Unless your mortgage was 8%, it definitely doesn’t make sense to pay that off before maxing out retirement accounts! Think about all the money you miss out on in interest! It’s easy to let anxiety about payments get the better of you, but just take a deep breath! Having a mortgage isn’t a bad thing at all unless it’s high interest
My wife and I just started really saving and investing this last year, kids are all on their own now. I do have a pension from the Army for the rest of my life. I’m 47 and she’s 41. It’s never too early to start. Both our 401k’s are maxed (and Roth 401ks), and we chunk $6k a month on the side into savings & investments because we live well beneath our means and haven’t allowed lifestyle creep. If I’d have started when I was your age? I’d be retiring at 55, not 60-62. Point being? I’m not going to yell at you, I’m going to congratulate you. You’re on the path to complete financial freedom way before I got on it! I’m trying to instill that in the kids… start now, I don’t care if it’s $20 a month.
In a one income household, it is since the age of 47 that I have been maxing out my 401k. I'm 53 now so it's been about 6 years. With my employer match I'm saving 27% into the 401k. I also contribute to a Roth IRA and that is about 7% and I've been maxing it out for the last 10 years. I save another 10% into our HSA and a brokerage account. Prior to maxing my accounts I had a savings rate of 10 to 15%, but my income was lower back then. My base income is 70 to 80k but with extra call days and shifts I have been able to almost double my income for the last decade.
My wife and I have been contributing to our 401K's for 25 years. I've been maxing it out for the last 16 years, and she has been maxing it out for the last 13. Maxing them out started when each of us started making 6-figures in our early/mid-30's.
I maxed at 28 the first year of my first serious job. I was making 76k. I also maxed out roth ira and hsa. I always try to save around 50% of my salary. I make a lot more now and I'm still at about a 50% savings rate. I'm enjoying my lifestyle inflation.
I’m doing to this right now at age 29 making 70k plus 5k for student loans. Hoping to have a similar path. Feel like my raises now will actually raise my living standards now haha.
Just maxed out my 401k, and roth IRA last year. That was tough, but worth it when I saw how much my account went up. This year trying the HSA. Unfortunately my 401k is all traditional so I'd like to slowly get that over in the roth direction. I'm 37 so started much later than I would have liked. I started in my 20's, but only did about 5%. I had income issues until recently when my salary doubled making this more reasonable. It's still tough though because it's about 50% of my income. I'll still be more than fine in retirement, but knowing I could have had so much more is rough to think about.
Mid30’s and I missed out on investing in my 20’s. I insist on maxing my accounts starting now, even though I have two kids. The way I see it, we can live frugally now or when we’re old. Better to get by on less now than to suffer in old age. I insisted on increasing my contributions as soon as I earned more to prevent lifestyle creep (a condition I call “dollar sign eyes”). It got possible around 150k per year in total income.
We have been maxing out for a long time. We own a company and have SARSEPs. We end up paying quite a bit in taxes every year. I consider it a problem, but a good problem to have. We used to have an HSA, but now are on Traditional Medicare, so now use the HSA money to cover the small things Medicare does not cover.
Lasr year, at age 49, on 120000 sallary, I maxed out my 403b and 457 accounts last year. But that was difficult. This year I decided to max out just my 457 account because I finally had the Roth option and the catch up option. This has given me more breathing space in my budget. Hopefully, I can fund my Roth IRA in the near future.
Believe a better title of this video would be, "What Age and Salary do most people achieve a 15 percent or higher retirement account (401K, 404b, 457, IRA, etc.) savings rate". While, I agree between 15 percent to 20 percent is a desirable goal it is very hard to reach if, you are also a person of faith. Assuming that you are also giving an offering of between 5 percent to 10 percent monthly of your "take-home-pay" to your church (smile...smile).
I’m 29. I started maxing out my 401k (22,500) and IRA (6,500) this year . Job income is 100k before taxes and deductions, and I also get VA disability which comes to $46,000 per year. After contributing the 29,000 to retirement, I still have some wiggle room to dump another 800 into savings every month.
I only just reached the IRS 401k limit of $22,500 this year. In prior years I was contributing about 21% which was about $19k a year. This is my first year making above $100k
Two income family with 2 children. One of us hit the max 401 at about 46 with about 120K salary. That company also has their own stock options which is close to 10k a year. The other contributes about 6% to 401K. We also max out the HSA, since 2020. By age 50 we should hit the 1 million mark, without including the house.
After my $320 deduction for my tax deferred account, my pension, taxes, medical insurance. I only had $2,200 to live on. I couldn’t have possibly maxed anything out. I did open an ira also. For over a decade I worked a 2nd job, but I still wouldn’t have been able to save that much. I am single, i learned to live below my means. I am 66. Between my pension, social security which I am planning on pulling at 70, my tax deferred investments, individual stock I have invested in through the years, and cash I stashed for retirement, I should be just fine. People should not be discouraged that they cannot invest $22,000 a year. I never made $50,000 a year, and will be living at a way higher tax bracket then all my years of working once I start collecting social security, then I will bump up again when I have to draw rmds
I think the difference in motivation is that those of us in the melinials and younger bracket are not expecting social security to be there when we retire. Granted,i don't think it will be gone entirely. I expect there to be something, or some UBI style program that takes its place. But I don't expect it to grow with inflation, or even to get out what I pay into it. Whatever is there I'll consider to be a small bonus, but the only things I'm counting on is what goes into my Roth, HSA, and 401k accounts. There won't be pensions any more, and whatever social security exists will be very small. What I find terrifying is young people nit only counting on social security, but they think that social security is all that a person needs for retirement. It was never intended for that! If you didn't or couldn't plan for retirement it is supposed to provide for some basic needs, but it was always intended as a supplement to other retirement options, not anyone's only option. People are in for a rude awakening.
@@CaedenV right, social security was only meant to cover like 40% of income. I was encouraged to work the 2nd job to save more because of seeing how little mother, but particularly my grandfather had to live on. My grandfather had 2 pensions and social security. I already knew to be concerned about inflation, just because of my grandfather. You cannot discount the affect of inflation.
I'm going to max my Roth Ira and 401k for the first time this year. 43, single, no kids and house paid off allowed me to do it. I will make about 85 or so this year but next year I will continue saving for my midlife crisis car.
The only thing that bugs me about going beyond the employer match in the 401k is 2:20. Imagine being 40 years old with 1.3 million and you can’t even touch it for almost 20 more years. My personal technique is 401k up to the match, Roth IRA, HSA, then regular ol brokerage account. Then if you are able to retire early, live off the brokerage account then if necessary Roth IRA contribution funds until you reach retirement age.
I am maxing out my Roth 401k. Yes I am not currently getting any tax savings. But my earnings and withdrawals in retirement will be completely tax free. What I love about the Roth 401(k) is it can help you save on taxes in retirement. Not only are withdrawals tax-free at 59 1/2 , it won't impact the taxation of your Social Security benefit and Medicare premiums.This is an important aspect of a Roth account that most people are not aware of. yes right now I prefer the Roth 401k! Because my effective tax rate is 19% ( it sometimes jumps to 22% ). That is for state and federal combined.
Crossed the 6 figure milestone at 42, but stayed around the 8% rate into 401k, totaling around 11-12% when including very consistent savings account contributions. Being debt adverse, my focus has been eliminating my mortgage (at the opportunity cost of reduced compounding). Mortgage should be paid early next year at which point I’ll be all in at 47! Maxed out a new Roth last year, and will continue with that theme as well.
Best advice I ever took was from my Father-in-Law. Back in 1980, when my wife and I first got married, he told me "as soon as you can, get started investing." Back then you had to wait a year before being eligible, and we only started at 2%. Every raise we bumped up our savings rate, up to 10% (yeah, it should have been more). Getting ready to retire this May with plenty in the IRA/403b.
So 43 years with a maximum rate of 10% and you are ready to retire. Mind me asking if your safe withdrawal rate supports more or less than your working years expenses?
@@IamR3D88 Short answer to your question: yes, more than enough, even if SS isn't part of the picture. Long version: My max annual income was my final year as a software engineer in 2012. 2013-2015 I made essentially pocket change to supplement my pension, about $10k/year and contributed zero. 2016 I found a job teaching engineering to high school students, which paid in the low-mid $40k range for the remainder of my career, which is ending this June. I contributed to the match in the state employee 403b plan during those 8 years. So, my teaching income needs to be offset by my SS income + funds from our investments. We just met with our SS agent last week, and my SS check almost offsets my teaching income exactly. Not perfectly, but close enough that our budget (which was below our take-home pay) is still covered. We're now working on figuring out how to covert our traditional 403b/IRA to Roth, primarily to prepare for survivorship (tax brackets jump painfully when transitioning from married filing jointly to single) and estate planning.
I could easily max out my 401(k) each year, but I don't because I am on pace to retire early and I'll need the money about 5-10 years before 59 ½. I max my Roth IRA, contribute enough to get the match in my 401(k), and the rest goes towards my individual brokerage and other investments.
Our goal was to max out our Roth IRA's first, then I started working on hitting the max in 401k. We achieved both for the first time last year at $140k. We also max out our HSA family contribution each year. Our savings rate is near 25% across all the account types.
I started maxing out my 401k contributions in 2016 and did so every year until I was laid off in early 2020. That's when I decided to take a good look at my finances and I saw that the majority of my money was locked away in retirement accounts. When I found my next job in late 2020, I decided to focus on putting money into my personal brokerage account to bridge the monetary gap to age 59 1/2. If I wanted to retire early, I needed access to the money without penalty. The only thing I maxed out was the 401k match. Once I had enough "bridge" money, I was going to go back to maxing out my 401k contributions.
If you separate from your job you can withdraw at age 55, you have to be 55 or older when you separate from that job, if you leave at 54 you need to wait till 59 1/2
I didn't max it out all my life but did for a majority of my career. It was a priority for me. It allowed me to retire at 52. That was 6+ years ago. It forced me to live below my income level. That was the key to a successful retirement plan at such an early age. I was single for all but 5 years of my life. It can be done!!!
My husband and I started maxing out retirement accounts in our 20s. Start maxing out as soon as you can. It's tax deferred, so it helps with taxes and it allows compounding to have a greater impact.
Increase to $23,000 in 2004 ? I just chuckled because you usually only have these in the blooper reel. Are you ever going to do one again ? And how is Steve Jr. doing ?
Oh no!! I miss the bloopers too - and maybe one day they will come back - but two things - quite simply as I have gotten used to filing, I have less bloopers, and two, that bloopers reel takes time to piece together 😂 and I’m low on time these days. Fun fact - this is the first video I filmed after baby was born (I still have a few others to release from before he was born though) he’s doing well, but needs to get better at sleeping!
No one ever says they retired with too much money but some wish they had lived more when they were younger. Save, save, save ... but don't miss out on life. When you're older you may not have the health to do everything you want to do ... and your loved ones may not be around to spend that time with.
So my wife and I were in an interesting situation and it took my niece to sort of suggest how to maximize things. My employer offers both the deferred comp plan and a HCSA. On my own salary I probably couldn't have maxed these out. But it was suggested to me to do so and my wife then deposits extra money into our joint account so that we can cover the bills. I will add, I provide the health insurance. Meanwhile, she is self-employed, opened her own 401K plan and maxes out as both the employee and employer contributions. So yeah, we save a lot and reduce our taxes. It just wasn't obvious to us at first, but it works out well. Now if we could just get back to some decent market returns we'll all be happy.
My wife and I were able to start maxing both Roth 401(k)s at 35. I had to lower retirement contributions to just employer match from 30-34 because of kids, and my wife took a few years off full-time work. We are doing okay though, with around $600k in 401(k) at age 38.
Ive been maxxing my 401k, HSA, and IRA for four years (since i was 29). My employer gives a 45% match that isnt capped, so every time the federal limit increases, so does their match. We just started maxxing my wifes IRA this year, and shes about to start a job with a 401k option which we will also max out. At 33 i have 362k in retirmenet assets, and shes just getting hers started so she has just over 1k
It hasn’t been too long ago. Maybe 45-48 years old. Fully doing it now with catch as well. Hit 1M in investments a few years ago. Hopefully hit 2M in 2025-26 and keep growing. Always concerned about working in IT as you age. Many can’t stay in the game until retirement
I could’ve maxed out my 401(k) decades ago (I’m 56 now), but either the most we could put away was 8% or 10% of our income, or, I work for companies that, if you contribute too much into your 401(k) compared to “the average employee”, it gets returned next year because you are a “highly compensated employee”…. We can’t have the rich getting richer now can we? It’s all about saving more, cutting back on your lifestyle/living below your means etc.
Been maxing out my Roth TSP since I was 30 making $75k a year. 38 now and additionally maxing out my Roth IRA and spousal Roth IRA for the last 3 years, while making ~$110k. No debt other than a mortgage. Student loans all paid off 10 years ago. My wife stays at home with our daughter. Net worth should be $1 million by 40 with our home, and retirement accounts over $1 million by 44-45. Plan on retiring at 58 when my daughter would be out of college.
I should be able to max this year for the first time at 28 years old. On top of my contributions my company raised their match up to 10% and I should receive $10,000 from them on top of my $23,000 thousand invested. It is mid April and already put $11,000 in for the year.
Maxed mine (401k mainly roth, plus Roth IRA) when i was 33 in 2019 making $118k. It's tough depending on lifestyle. My wife is a stay at home mom and we have 2 boys. In the last 12 months I bought a brand new house, and 2 months later bought 80 wooded acres so that will have an impact on my savings, but I forecast this year I will save $22k between all retirement accounts (mostly roth). Last year total savings (401k, IRA, Brokerage account) was $37,500.
I am 35, single, no kids, income of 300-350k a year. I max out my 401k and Roth IRA every year, and have about 200k left over in cash every year that I dont know what to do with it (curretly in HYSA).
Cannot remember when I started maxing out my 401k. Wife has 403 which is not fully maxed out, however soon will be. Roth IRA maxed HSA maxed. Credit card maxed…. Just kidding. New carried a Cc balance ever. House paid off cars paid off. Sons college tuition paid off. 53 for me 50 for my wife. Wife to get teachers pension in 5 years and not sure what we get in social that will be extra money not counting on it. Should be getting to a target of several M by retirement
I've started maxing out my Roth 401k as of this year. If it wasn't for daycare costs, we'd be maxing out my wife's as well and also both of our Roth IRAs. It's ridiculous how much daycare costs are.
40, but at 38 I purchased my first house without a mortgage. (I was saving for a nice down payment in the NYC area and decided not to settle there... my nice down payment in NYC purchased a house where I moved to).
Kids today make serious bank compared to us older folks. When I was 35 I barely made the 401k max as my whole salary. Today folks make 3-5xs that number so maxing out could be easy to do.
We started late (mid 40’s) but we currently max out our 401ks. The catchup is maxed for me but we likely can max my wife’s catchup until we get a new president….
For 2024 can I contribute Upto 23000 and my husband can also contribute Upto 23000 a total of 46000 to max out? Or are we only allowed a total of 23000 for year 2024?
Weird not max out till mid forties. But we paid off our home at the a few years later. We also paid off my kids prepaid college education. So it took us a bit !o her but we had three main goals : retirement t , co!I've and debt free. We have been debt free at 50 s and no mortgage, 2.8 mi!lion in retirement and both kids college paid for.
I don’t really see myself retiring. I plan on being at least part time until I decide otherwise. I enjoy my job, which pays enough to live on and then some. I’ve been getting steady raises each year, and work a low-impact job on the side. I save a bit each month, and put what I can into retirement. I also have a moderate investment account and it does alright. I just don’t think I could not work. It’s nice sometimes to realize I’m on a progression where I wouldn’t have to, but I honestly think without some of the challenges work can bring, I’d probably just decline and be waiting to die. Honestly, I’m kind of convinced if I get to a point where I legitimately can’t work, I’m basically probably there anyway.
I intentionally delayed maxing my 401k until after I could both get the full employer match and then max both my HSA& Roth IRA. Only then did I return to my 401k.
Will max out 401K this year at 52. I was not maxing out before because kids being at home and saving for college. I have also been saving in my employee stock purchase program at 15% of salary. Between ESPP (which I roll into ROTH IRA to max out for my wife and I now that kids are out of house) and 401K, we are saving 32.3% of my salary. That is NOT counting whatever I have set to go into HSA.
This will be my first year to max out my roth TSP. I'm 44, single, no kids, and gross $85k. I also max out my roth IRA and contribute the same to a brokerage account.
I am 25. Just got a raise to 72k and moved into my parents (working remote) chose to max Roth IRA and 401k now. Things feel about the same due to no rent. 😅
it's not only rent you are saving, but all the household living costs included like utilities, food, commuting if you had not been remote working, etc.
Erin, another great video and one to create discussion/debate! My problem is.. we have a 457(b) option, but we cannot change our 401k contribution rate. So between my wife and I, we would have to contribute close to $100k to max 401’s, 457’s, IRA’s, and HSA’s! I’d love to discuss this with you in detail if you are available via email? PS- congrats on the newborn! 👌👍
Many people who work for large employers can hit the real limit (69K) through an after tax provision in their 401K. I've had it available for years across 4 large employers. Just about nobody knows about it, ask your HR team to find out if your plan includes "after tax" and "in service withdraw), the 2 features you need to hit the "real max" of 69K. A LOT of them do, people just don't know about it.
I've maxed a Roth ($7500 for 2023) and HSA ($3850 for 2023) since the first year I opened them about 12 years ago. However, at 54 I'm only about 60% of the way to maxing my 403b and I may not get there at all before I retire, which is fine with me. It's difficult to reach this kind of savings rate when you're single, especially since I earn less than $80k, which puts my total savings rate at about 40%. That includes contributing about $5000 into a taxable brokerage account. Having a taxable account to pull from to cover the taxes on Roth conversions, instead of paying taxes out of the conversion, can significantly improve long term growth in your Roth account. I just hope Roth conversions are still a thing by the time I retire, Congress has been hinting at changing things.
I didn't know the max amounts had become this high. I'm 58 and contribute $2k/mo ($24k) and my wife is 53 and contributes $1500/mo ($18k) to her's so our combined is $42k. Maybe I'll try to reach for $30k in 2024, but that is a stretch. I had been maxxed out in the past when the limits were lower.
LOL at people not able to max out your 401k with a 200k salary. My wife and I raised a child and soon as our daughter graduated highschool we started maxing out our 401k's. We make 140k combined income and both maxed our 401k's two years running. We still blow money for fun occasionally too, we also paid our house off in under 9 years.
Two income family with a child and two dogs. Ages 33 & 32. Total salary around $235K. Live like we make 1 income of $110k. Just starting to max two Roth 401K's and a family HSA. Ineligible this year to contribute to our Roth IRA's. We have a very simple lifestyle and are ok with that.
42 and making over 250k annual income. I started maxing out my 401k since the age of 32 when I started making over 180k. I only got out school at the age of 28 because of 6.5 years of PhD program 😢
I started maxing mine at around 65k salary, 30 years old. It was very hard. I'm 33 now making about 85k and still maxing. The main reason I was able to do it that low was because of living in Alabama, no debt and no kids. Maxing that and IRAs has allowed me to go from 0 net worth to well over 100k net worth in just 3 years.
Going to max my 457b with a $65k or so salary this year, age 29. Also maxing the Roth IRA and put 6% to pension and 1% to a healthcare saving account. Will now only “add” going forward by converting some 457b contribution to Roth.
That’s awesome, but this blows my mind! 7% to those accounts, 22,500 max, and max IRA is over $33k. Congrats to saving over 50% of salary! How do you live?!? 😳
@@brandon8531 Haha thanks! First, I am single and have no kids so I can rough it a bit. But luckily, I got a great deal in a downtown apartment with great amenities like a gym, pool, sauna, and also walking distance to work. I own my car but the insurance is low and I pay annually so I get a decent discount. Plus it's a hybrid so I'm only filling the tank once every 2 months or so. I also invested in my cooking skills and cook like 95%+ of my meals and also learned to make cocktails. I'm vegetarian too so in total my food budget is about $225 per month or so and the meals and snacks are great + healthy. And then most of my hobbies are free or low cost. The most expensive thing I do is when I travel to see friends and family. I will say though, that it is pretty tight and I'll be making $70k in a week or so (raise from 60k and backpay to July) and then 76k next july. And I will for sure be raising my lifestyle with that money rather than investing more. But for the most part I someone who can be satisfied with the basics as long as I can have decent social interactions and creative outlets. I also started investing at a high rate immediately so haven't had to "regress" my lifestyle so I don't know what I'm missing yet haha.
Family wage income $94k but in Vermont that's quite a lot as median here is about $72k. At 56 about 20% of the taxable paycheck is saved these days but we weren't that aggressive until the pandemic. About 10% pay to the 401K. Also there's a sweet employer 401K match on that so effectively 20% into the 401K! The 401K is all low cost funds. We try to max the IRAs and my HSA from the brokerage account. The other 10% saved goes to that account. 2023 will be the first year maxing the IRA's and HSA. No plans on maxing the 401K since I enjoy researching and buying individual business much more than funds. My cap gains rate is about 0% since I usually only sell long and most of my dividends are qualified. Once the proceeds are in the HSA and IRA I often re-buy my same companies.
I was a six figure earner but NOT in the top 10 percentile. I retired 2 years back at the age of 56 assuming zero social security income. I not only maxed out 401 K contributions but also additionally invested in a Vanguard brokerage account. So far despite facing the sequence of returns risk, I am comfortable and am not worried about my retirement.
Currently saving at 9% and I’m 28 years old with an income of $75,000 after bonus. All the sudden I feel very pressured to increase to 15% but I’m also trying to pay off a car loan and student loans.. 😬 Dreaming of being debt free (other than my house) but I think that will take 2 or 3 years. It’s hard to keep my priorities straight and pay that off before really upping my savings rate! I want to get going on building wealth NOW! I just have to remember that interest avoided is the same as a rate of return on my money (once the debt already exists, of course. Not advocating people to take out debt). It’s just hard!
34 and low 6 figures. This was only because I focused on maxing out our 2 Roth IRAs first. We have been maxing the Roths for 3 years while putting in about 15k into 401
I think a good rule of thumb is to just contribute to your 401k to the extent necessary to get the full extent of whatever match your employer is offering and to max out your Roth IRA at least until 35.
I'm getting close-ish. We probably could do it, but have other priorities. We are maxing out my and my wife's Roth accts, plus our HSA which we treat as a retirement acct with preretirement benefits, and contributing just enough to get the full 401k employer match. But rather than going forward to max the 401k the rest of the way, we are investing the rest in a non retirement account with a focus on dividends. The goal here is a sort of super emergency fund that acts like a 3rd income. First goal is to have it generate an average of $1k/mo in dividends, and the end goal is $2-3k/mo. Once it hits $2k/mo then I think we would divert into maxing out the 401k (if we get that far). I realize that this isn't the most efficient from a tax perspective, but $2k/mo isn't going to bump us into the next tax bracket. Plus my wife is self employed and has rather variable and seasonal income, while I work in IT which can be a volitile job market at times (knock on wood, so far no issues though). Plus we have some health concerns to contend with and won't get better with age. So the goal is to have a sort of 3rd income where if the chips are down, and we are out of work, or can't work, (or don't want to work lol) then we would have the flexibility to not work for a while, or work less, with less worry about tapping into savings or derailing retirement plans. I would love for the numbers to tell me that if we stopped retirement savings then we could join the fire movement... But we would hit FIRE just a couple years before retirement age anyways lol. So it makes sense to max out the post tax retirement options, understanding that we will have a sizeable normal investment acct, plus a 401k generating taxable income in retirement. So we can let the Roth and HSA accts continue to compound at the start of retirement, and slowly drain the 401k and investment acct early on, and then have less tax burden towards the end when we potentially need our dollars to stretch further.
Maxed out our Roth since we were 26/29. Maxed out 401 39/42. Could have done that way earlier, but wanted to use the money for our brokerage account. Ever since we maxed out our 401k, we have been doing maga backdoor Roth with both of our employers. Granted we are not maxing out the mega though lol. Income 280k not including hubby’s RSU. We also invested 529 for our 2 boys and pay double of our mortgage. Really hoping in 8 years job is an option. Fortunately we do enjoy our careers, and both with great companies.
Great video! I’d be able to max out now at 35 if I wasn’t paying off debt. I’m paying off in debt annually the equivalent of the max. I can’t wait until the first time I can contribute the max! It’s one of my financial goals.
I’m 26 and have been maxing out my TSP ever since starting my full-time career (age 22). Of course, it’s much more feasible to live below your means and super save when you’re single and don’t have any dependents. Here’s to discipline and delayed gratification! 🍻
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I first maxed out my 401k in 2021 when I was 29. I made $122k that year. It was tough, but it’s a great way to keep yourself accountable to living beneath your means.
I first maxed out my 401k at age 31 when my salary first bumped into 6 figures. This was also with having two kids in daycare. I am now 32 with 3 kids in daycare and I must admit it is getting pretty hard even with a 6-figure salary. I know it sounds silly but I am basically living paycheck to paycheck in order to do this. We are saving our income up front and then everything we take home pretty much gets spent after that.
While It may be a little hard now, I know this will pay off for my family in the long run. Keep going people, you can do this!
Do you have an emergency savings account?
You're not living paycheck to paycheck if you're saving money. Paycheck to paycheck means you only have exactly enough to cover your expenses and nothing left over.
@@pixelpoppyproductionsno. Just a little buffer in checking and taxable brokerage account.
@@justthebrttrkhence why I said it’s silly to say. It’s like a forced scarcity tactic if you are treating savings like an expense that is all of your margin.
@@klopad57 You're doing the right thing, and someday down the line, when you feel like giving yourself a break from the scarcity, you'll be able to! Comfortably! Kudos.
Maxed 401K, IRA, HSA [All Roth] last week! I’m 36 and my wife is 29. We both just recently crossed the 6 figure mark. I’ll get yelled at by half the audience but we just started investing seriously only 3 years ago. We put all of our energy into paying the mortgage off early [10 years] and can really crank up the savings rate comfortably. The freedom was definitely worth the opportunity cost! Good luck everyone!
"Just" started three years ago, when you were 33 and your wife 26? Yeah, that's not Erin early, but still much earlier than many. Plus the two of you already have sizable shovels. With the mortgage paid off too (!), the hard part will be avoiding serious lifestyle creep! :) Nice job!
Do you also do the mega back door Roth as well? That’s another level 😮
That’s great and you do you, but it’s important to keep the long term in mind. Unless your mortgage was 8%, it definitely doesn’t make sense to pay that off before maxing out retirement accounts! Think about all the money you miss out on in interest! It’s easy to let anxiety about payments get the better of you, but just take a deep breath! Having a mortgage isn’t a bad thing at all unless it’s high interest
No kids😂
My wife and I just started really saving and investing this last year, kids are all on their own now. I do have a pension from the Army for the rest of my life. I’m 47 and she’s 41. It’s never too early to start. Both our 401k’s are maxed (and Roth 401ks), and we chunk $6k a month on the side into savings & investments because we live well beneath our means and haven’t allowed lifestyle creep. If I’d have started when I was your age? I’d be retiring at 55, not 60-62.
Point being? I’m not going to yell at you, I’m going to congratulate you. You’re on the path to complete financial freedom way before I got on it! I’m trying to instill that in the kids… start now, I don’t care if it’s $20 a month.
In a one income household, it is since the age of 47 that I have been maxing out my 401k. I'm 53 now so it's been about 6 years. With my employer match I'm saving 27% into the 401k. I also contribute to a Roth IRA and that is about 7% and I've been maxing it out for the last 10 years. I save another 10% into our HSA and a brokerage account. Prior to maxing my accounts I had a savings rate of 10 to 15%, but my income was lower back then. My base income is 70 to 80k but with extra call days and shifts I have been able to almost double my income for the last decade.
Great job
What is a “call day”?
@abrahams.lincoln6749 meaning you are on call that day.
@@Abraham.Lincoln22 An overtime day, aka a day you get called to come in and work.
My wife and I have been contributing to our 401K's for 25 years. I've been maxing it out for the last 16 years, and she has been maxing it out for the last 13. Maxing them out started when each of us started making 6-figures in our early/mid-30's.
I maxed at 28 the first year of my first serious job. I was making 76k. I also maxed out roth ira and hsa. I always try to save around 50% of my salary. I make a lot more now and I'm still at about a 50% savings rate. I'm enjoying my lifestyle inflation.
I’m doing to this right now at age 29 making 70k plus 5k for student loans. Hoping to have a similar path. Feel like my raises now will actually raise my living standards now haha.
Just maxed out my 401k, and roth IRA last year. That was tough, but worth it when I saw how much my account went up. This year trying the HSA. Unfortunately my 401k is all traditional so I'd like to slowly get that over in the roth direction. I'm 37 so started much later than I would have liked. I started in my 20's, but only did about 5%. I had income issues until recently when my salary doubled making this more reasonable. It's still tough though because it's about 50% of my income. I'll still be more than fine in retirement, but knowing I could have had so much more is rough to think about.
Mid30’s and I missed out on investing in my 20’s. I insist on maxing my accounts starting now, even though I have two kids. The way I see it, we can live frugally now or when we’re old. Better to get by on less now than to suffer in old age. I insisted on increasing my contributions as soon as I earned more to prevent lifestyle creep (a condition I call “dollar sign eyes”). It got possible around 150k per year in total income.
Started maxing out my Roth TSP (Military 401k Equivalent) last year at age 38 by contributing 21% of my income.
We have been maxing out for a long time. We own a company and have SARSEPs. We end up paying quite a bit in taxes every year. I consider it a problem, but a good problem to have. We used to have an HSA, but now are on Traditional Medicare, so now use the HSA money to cover the small things Medicare does not cover.
Lasr year, at age 49, on 120000 sallary, I maxed out my 403b and 457 accounts last year. But that was difficult. This year I decided to max out just my 457 account because I finally had the Roth option and the catch up option. This has given me more breathing space in my budget. Hopefully, I can fund my Roth IRA in the near future.
Believe a better title of this video would be, "What Age and Salary do most people achieve a 15 percent or higher retirement account (401K, 404b, 457, IRA, etc.) savings rate". While, I agree between 15 percent to 20 percent is a desirable goal it is very hard to reach if, you are also a person of faith. Assuming that you are also giving an offering of between 5 percent to 10 percent monthly of your "take-home-pay" to your church (smile...smile).
At age 53 was the first year I maxed out my Roth 401k and a Roth IRA for me and a Roth IRA for my wife.
I’m 29. I started maxing out my 401k (22,500) and IRA (6,500) this year . Job income is 100k before taxes and deductions, and I also get VA disability which comes to $46,000 per year. After contributing the 29,000 to retirement, I still have some wiggle room to dump another 800 into savings every month.
35 is when I started maxing the 401K.
Not even close too much bills and stuff. Not enough pay.
age 29/ @98k maxed out Roth 401k & Roth IRA
Before thirty!! That’s awesome 👏
I only just reached the IRS 401k limit of $22,500 this year. In prior years I was contributing about 21% which was about $19k a year. This is my first year making above $100k
Two income family with 2 children. One of us hit the max 401 at about 46 with about 120K salary. That company also has their own stock options which is close to 10k a year. The other contributes about 6% to 401K. We also max out the HSA, since 2020. By age 50 we should hit the 1 million mark, without including the house.
After my $320 deduction for my tax deferred account, my pension, taxes, medical insurance. I only had $2,200 to live on. I couldn’t have possibly maxed anything out. I did open an ira also. For over a decade I worked a 2nd job, but I still wouldn’t have been able to save that much. I am single, i learned to live below my means. I am 66. Between my pension, social security which I am planning on pulling at 70, my tax deferred investments, individual stock I have invested in through the years, and cash I stashed for retirement, I should be just fine.
People should not be discouraged that they cannot invest $22,000 a year. I never made $50,000 a year, and will be living at a way higher tax bracket then all my years of working once I start collecting social security, then I will bump up again when I have to draw rmds
I think the difference in motivation is that those of us in the melinials and younger bracket are not expecting social security to be there when we retire.
Granted,i don't think it will be gone entirely. I expect there to be something, or some UBI style program that takes its place. But I don't expect it to grow with inflation, or even to get out what I pay into it. Whatever is there I'll consider to be a small bonus, but the only things I'm counting on is what goes into my Roth, HSA, and 401k accounts. There won't be pensions any more, and whatever social security exists will be very small.
What I find terrifying is young people nit only counting on social security, but they think that social security is all that a person needs for retirement. It was never intended for that! If you didn't or couldn't plan for retirement it is supposed to provide for some basic needs, but it was always intended as a supplement to other retirement options, not anyone's only option. People are in for a rude awakening.
@@CaedenV right, social security was only meant to cover like 40% of income. I was encouraged to work the 2nd job to save more because of seeing how little mother, but particularly my grandfather had to live on. My grandfather had 2 pensions and social security. I already knew to be concerned about inflation, just because of my grandfather. You cannot discount the affect of inflation.
I'm going to max my Roth Ira and 401k for the first time this year. 43, single, no kids and house paid off allowed me to do it. I will make about 85 or so this year but next year I will continue saving for my midlife crisis car.
What kinda car?
The only thing that bugs me about going beyond the employer match in the 401k is 2:20. Imagine being 40 years old with 1.3 million and you can’t even touch it for almost 20 more years. My personal technique is 401k up to the match, Roth IRA, HSA, then regular ol brokerage account. Then if you are able to retire early, live off the brokerage account then if necessary Roth IRA contribution funds until you reach retirement age.
I am maxing out my Roth 401k. Yes I am not currently getting any tax savings. But my earnings and withdrawals in retirement will be completely tax free.
What I love about the Roth 401(k) is it can help you save on taxes in retirement. Not only are withdrawals tax-free at 59 1/2 , it won't impact the taxation of your Social Security benefit and Medicare premiums.This is an important aspect of a Roth account that most people are not aware of.
yes right now I prefer the Roth 401k! Because my effective tax rate is 19% ( it sometimes jumps to 22% ). That is for state and federal combined.
Crossed the 6 figure milestone at 42, but stayed around the 8% rate into 401k, totaling around 11-12% when including very consistent savings account contributions. Being debt adverse, my focus has been eliminating my mortgage (at the opportunity cost of reduced compounding). Mortgage should be paid early next year at which point I’ll be all in at 47! Maxed out a new Roth last year, and will continue with that theme as well.
Best advice I ever took was from my Father-in-Law. Back in 1980, when my wife and I first got married, he told me "as soon as you can, get started investing." Back then you had to wait a year before being eligible, and we only started at 2%. Every raise we bumped up our savings rate, up to 10% (yeah, it should have been more). Getting ready to retire this May with plenty in the IRA/403b.
So 43 years with a maximum rate of 10% and you are ready to retire. Mind me asking if your safe withdrawal rate supports more or less than your working years expenses?
@@IamR3D88 Short answer to your question: yes, more than enough, even if SS isn't part of the picture.
Long version: My max annual income was my final year as a software engineer in 2012. 2013-2015 I made essentially pocket change to supplement my pension, about $10k/year and contributed zero. 2016 I found a job teaching engineering to high school students, which paid in the low-mid $40k range for the remainder of my career, which is ending this June. I contributed to the match in the state employee 403b plan during those 8 years.
So, my teaching income needs to be offset by my SS income + funds from our investments. We just met with our SS agent last week, and my SS check almost offsets my teaching income exactly. Not perfectly, but close enough that our budget (which was below our take-home pay) is still covered. We're now working on figuring out how to covert our traditional 403b/IRA to Roth, primarily to prepare for survivorship (tax brackets jump painfully when transitioning from married filing jointly to single) and estate planning.
We have been maxing out the yearly 401k limits since 1997 (my first full time job) at gross combined income of
I could easily max out my 401(k) each year, but I don't because I am on pace to retire early and I'll need the money about 5-10 years before 59 ½. I max my Roth IRA, contribute enough to get the match in my 401(k), and the rest goes towards my individual brokerage and other investments.
Our goal was to max out our Roth IRA's first, then I started working on hitting the max in 401k. We achieved both for the first time last year at $140k. We also max out our HSA family contribution each year. Our savings rate is near 25% across all the account types.
I started maxing out my 401k contributions in 2016 and did so every year until I was laid off in early 2020. That's when I decided to take a good look at my finances and I saw that the majority of my money was locked away in retirement accounts. When I found my next job in late 2020, I decided to focus on putting money into my personal brokerage account to bridge the monetary gap to age 59 1/2. If I wanted to retire early, I needed access to the money without penalty. The only thing I maxed out was the 401k match. Once I had enough "bridge" money, I was going to go back to maxing out my 401k contributions.
Look up Substantially Equal Periodic Payments. You can generally set these up from a 401k or IRA before 59.5 without penalty.
There are plenty of ways to get the money out before 59.5 without paying any penalties. Plus you get the added bonus of tax free growth.
@@justthebrttrk Can you explain some of the ways to get to 401k money before 59.5??
If you separate from your job you can withdraw at age 55, you have to be 55 or older when you separate from that job, if you leave at 54 you need to wait till 59 1/2
@@Zombiebeast1995 plenty of other ways.
I didn't max it out all my life but did for a majority of my career. It was a priority for me. It allowed me to retire at 52. That was 6+ years ago. It forced me to live below my income level. That was the key to a successful retirement plan at such an early age. I was single for all but 5 years of my life. It can be done!!!
My husband and I started maxing out retirement accounts in our 20s. Start maxing out as soon as you can. It's tax deferred, so it helps with taxes and it allows compounding to have a greater impact.
Increase to $23,000 in 2004 ? I just chuckled because you usually only have these in the blooper reel. Are you ever going to do one again ?
And how is Steve Jr. doing ?
Oh no!! I miss the bloopers too - and maybe one day they will come back - but two things - quite simply as I have gotten used to filing, I have less bloopers, and two, that bloopers reel takes time to piece together 😂 and I’m low on time these days.
Fun fact - this is the first video I filmed after baby was born (I still have a few others to release from before he was born though) he’s doing well, but needs to get better at sleeping!
3:40 Emphasis on "aligned with your same goals."
Side note, enjoy the baby and vacation!
Thanks Luke 😊 baby is wonderful and exhausting 💙
No one ever says they retired with too much money but some wish they had lived more when they were younger. Save, save, save ... but don't miss out on life. When you're older you may not have the health to do everything you want to do ... and your loved ones may not be around to spend that time with.
im able to max 401k contributions at 22 years old with only a 70k salary! i live extremely frugally
im also single income and live on my own. luckily i live in the midwest where it is LCOL
So my wife and I were in an interesting situation and it took my niece to sort of suggest how to maximize things. My employer offers both the deferred comp plan and a HCSA. On my own salary I probably couldn't have maxed these out. But it was suggested to me to do so and my wife then deposits extra money into our joint account so that we can cover the bills. I will add, I provide the health insurance. Meanwhile, she is self-employed, opened her own 401K plan and maxes out as both the employee and employer contributions. So yeah, we save a lot and reduce our taxes. It just wasn't obvious to us at first, but it works out well. Now if we could just get back to some decent market returns we'll all be happy.
My wife and I were able to start maxing both Roth 401(k)s at 35. I had to lower retirement contributions to just employer match from 30-34 because of kids, and my wife took a few years off full-time work. We are doing okay though, with around $600k in 401(k) at age 38.
Ive been maxxing my 401k, HSA, and IRA for four years (since i was 29). My employer gives a 45% match that isnt capped, so every time the federal limit increases, so does their match. We just started maxxing my wifes IRA this year, and shes about to start a job with a 401k option which we will also max out. At 33 i have 362k in retirmenet assets, and shes just getting hers started so she has just over 1k
I achieve my fire movement retire at 35 years old this year 2023.
Congratulations! 👏👏
It hasn’t been too long ago. Maybe 45-48 years old. Fully doing it now with catch as well. Hit 1M in investments a few years ago. Hopefully hit 2M in 2025-26 and keep growing. Always concerned about working in IT as you age. Many can’t stay in the game until retirement
I could’ve maxed out my 401(k) decades ago (I’m 56 now), but either the most we could put away was 8% or 10% of our income, or, I work for companies that, if you contribute too much into your 401(k) compared to “the average employee”, it gets returned next year because you are a “highly compensated employee”…. We can’t have the rich getting richer now can we? It’s all about saving more, cutting back on your lifestyle/living below your means etc.
Been maxing out my Roth TSP since I was 30 making $75k a year. 38 now and additionally maxing out my Roth IRA and spousal Roth IRA for the last 3 years, while making ~$110k. No debt other than a mortgage. Student loans all paid off 10 years ago. My wife stays at home with our daughter. Net worth should be $1 million by 40 with our home, and retirement accounts over $1 million by 44-45. Plan on retiring at 58 when my daughter would be out of college.
I should be able to max this year for the first time at 28 years old.
On top of my contributions my company raised their match up to 10% and I should receive $10,000 from them on top of my $23,000 thousand invested. It is mid April and already put $11,000 in for the year.
Maxed mine (401k mainly roth, plus Roth IRA) when i was 33 in 2019 making $118k. It's tough depending on lifestyle. My wife is a stay at home mom and we have 2 boys. In the last 12 months I bought a brand new house, and 2 months later bought 80 wooded acres so that will have an impact on my savings, but I forecast this year I will save $22k between all retirement accounts (mostly roth). Last year total savings (401k, IRA, Brokerage account) was $37,500.
No shortage of biosolar heat this winter!
I was maxed until i turned 50 :) 17% going into 401k, 5% roth 401k, max a regular roth, max individual HSA, 5% into espp.
I am 35, single, no kids, income of 300-350k a year. I max out my 401k and Roth IRA every year, and have about 200k left over in cash every year that I dont know what to do with it (curretly in HYSA).
Cannot remember when I started maxing out my 401k. Wife has 403 which is not fully maxed out, however soon will be. Roth IRA maxed HSA maxed. Credit card maxed…. Just kidding. New carried a Cc balance ever. House paid off cars paid off. Sons college tuition paid off. 53 for me 50 for my wife. Wife to get teachers pension in 5 years and not sure what we get in social that will be extra money not counting on it. Should be getting to a target of several M by retirement
I've started maxing out my Roth 401k as of this year. If it wasn't for daycare costs, we'd be maxing out my wife's as well and also both of our Roth IRAs. It's ridiculous how much daycare costs are.
I’ve been maxing my Roth IRA out since 2020
I’ve maxed out my 401k starting in 2022
I’m 36
No kids
No partner
Just bought a home in 2021
40, but at 38 I purchased my first house without a mortgage. (I was saving for a nice down payment in the NYC area and decided not to settle there... my nice down payment in NYC purchased a house where I moved to).
Kids today make serious bank compared to us older folks. When I was 35 I barely made the 401k max as my whole salary. Today folks make 3-5xs that number so maxing out could be easy to do.
We started late (mid 40’s) but we currently max out our 401ks. The catchup is maxed for me but we likely can max my wife’s catchup until we get a new president….
For 2024 can I contribute Upto 23000 and my husband can also contribute Upto 23000 a total of 46000 to max out? Or are we only allowed a total of 23000 for year 2024?
Weird not max out till mid forties. But we paid off our home at the a few years later. We also paid off my kids prepaid college education. So it took us a bit !o her but we had three main goals : retirement t , co!I've and debt free. We have been debt free at 50 s and no mortgage, 2.8 mi!lion in retirement and both kids college paid for.
My goal is to max out hsa and roth ira before trying to max out my 401k. Currently doing 5% to each account
Class is in session 🥇✅️💸
I earn $135k a year and still don’t max out my 401k. I contribute 13% of my income. $17,550.
It’s really easy to max out your 401k when you stop wasting money on alcohol and Cabo trips. Nothing of value to gain with those things.
I don’t really see myself retiring. I plan on being at least part time until I decide otherwise. I enjoy my job, which pays enough to live on and then some. I’ve been getting steady raises each year, and work a low-impact job on the side. I save a bit each month, and put what I can into retirement. I also have a moderate investment account and it does alright. I just don’t think I could not work. It’s nice sometimes to realize I’m on a progression where I wouldn’t have to, but I honestly think without some of the challenges work can bring, I’d probably just decline and be waiting to die. Honestly, I’m kind of convinced if I get to a point where I legitimately can’t work, I’m basically probably there anyway.
I intentionally delayed maxing my 401k until after I could both get the full employer match and then max both my HSA& Roth IRA. Only then did I return to my 401k.
I have just been concentrating on maxing out my Roth IRA and just increased my 401K contribution by 2 percent.
This will be my first year maxing out my 401k! I am 27 making $135,000
It’s even better when you can max out the combined personal and company contributions.
Will max out 401K this year at 52. I was not maxing out before because kids being at home and saving for college. I have also been saving in my employee stock purchase program at 15% of salary. Between ESPP (which I roll into ROTH IRA to max out for my wife and I now that kids are out of house) and 401K, we are saving 32.3% of my salary. That is NOT counting whatever I have set to go into HSA.
In 2024
Erin said 2004 her Bad!!❤😊
Have you seen all those memes that say “it still feels like 1980 was 20 years ago”?? That’s me for sure - no way is that 40 years ago! 😂
I'm close to maxing it out, but I can't afford to fully max it out yet. I do put money into my IRA also.
This will be my first year to max out my roth TSP. I'm 44, single, no kids, and gross $85k. I also max out my roth IRA and contribute the same to a brokerage account.
0:55 *2024
I started to max my Roth IRA and Roth TSP at $50k salary.
I am 25. Just got a raise to 72k and moved into my parents (working remote) chose to max Roth IRA and 401k now.
Things feel about the same due to no rent. 😅
it's not only rent you are saving, but all the household living costs included like utilities, food, commuting if you had not been remote working, etc.
By the time they tax you shit on you you'd be better off putting it in savings lol
Thanks for your videos easy to understand .
Erin, another great video and one to create discussion/debate! My problem is.. we have a 457(b) option, but we cannot change our 401k contribution rate. So between my wife and I, we would have to contribute close to $100k to max 401’s, 457’s, IRA’s, and HSA’s! I’d love to discuss this with you in detail if you are available via email?
PS- congrats on the newborn! 👌👍
I realized theres a household income limit to be able to put into a Roth
I've been maxing mine out since about 30. Make around 100k or so.
Yea unless your jobs system is capped…
Let’s see who can do the real max - defined contribution limit of $69,000
Many people who work for large employers can hit the real limit (69K) through an after tax provision in their 401K. I've had it available for years across 4 large employers. Just about nobody knows about it, ask your HR team to find out if your plan includes "after tax" and "in service withdraw), the 2 features you need to hit the "real max" of 69K. A LOT of them do, people just don't know about it.
subtle michigan accent detected
What about 401k 5 %match and a Roth
I've maxed a Roth ($7500 for 2023) and HSA ($3850 for 2023) since the first year I opened them about 12 years ago. However, at 54 I'm only about 60% of the way to maxing my 403b and I may not get there at all before I retire, which is fine with me. It's difficult to reach this kind of savings rate when you're single, especially since I earn less than $80k, which puts my total savings rate at about 40%. That includes contributing about $5000 into a taxable brokerage account. Having a taxable account to pull from to cover the taxes on Roth conversions, instead of paying taxes out of the conversion, can significantly improve long term growth in your Roth account. I just hope Roth conversions are still a thing by the time I retire, Congress has been hinting at changing things.
Roth max contribution is only $6,500 for 2023
@@ihaveadreamformykids4400 Did you notice my age?
Started maxing it at age 34.
age 50, at about 130k...
Your hair looks great straight. 😁
Looks like everyone is maxing out both their 401k and Roth lol.
not everyone. I think if you are maxing employee limit to roth 401k chances arye you are phased out of roth IRA.
I didn't know the max amounts had become this high. I'm 58 and contribute $2k/mo ($24k) and my wife is 53 and contributes $1500/mo ($18k) to her's so our combined is $42k. Maybe I'll try to reach for $30k in 2024, but that is a stretch.
I had been maxxed out in the past when the limits were lower.
LOL at people not able to max out your 401k with a 200k salary. My wife and I raised a child and soon as our daughter graduated highschool we started maxing out our 401k's. We make 140k combined income and both maxed our 401k's two years running. We still blow money for fun occasionally too, we also paid our house off in under 9 years.
Two income family with a child and two dogs. Ages 33 & 32. Total salary around $235K. Live like we make 1 income of $110k. Just starting to max two Roth 401K's and a family HSA. Ineligible this year to contribute to our Roth IRA's. We have a very simple lifestyle and are ok with that.
42 and making over 250k annual income. I started maxing out my 401k since the age of 32 when I started making over 180k. I only got out school at the age of 28 because of 6.5 years of PhD program 😢
I started maxing mine at around 65k salary, 30 years old. It was very hard. I'm 33 now making about 85k and still maxing. The main reason I was able to do it that low was because of living in Alabama, no debt and no kids. Maxing that and IRAs has allowed me to go from 0 net worth to well over 100k net worth in just 3 years.
Going to max my 457b with a $65k or so salary this year, age 29. Also maxing the Roth IRA and put 6% to pension and 1% to a healthcare saving account. Will now only “add” going forward by converting some 457b contribution to Roth.
Hoping to have $100k invested in retirement accounts by 30. Will be making $75k +5k (for student loans only) by this time next year.
That’s awesome, but this blows my mind! 7% to those accounts, 22,500 max, and max IRA is over $33k. Congrats to saving over 50% of salary! How do you live?!? 😳
@@brandon8531 Haha thanks! First, I am single and have no kids so I can rough it a bit. But luckily, I got a great deal in a downtown apartment with great amenities like a gym, pool, sauna, and also walking distance to work. I own my car but the insurance is low and I pay annually so I get a decent discount. Plus it's a hybrid so I'm only filling the tank once every 2 months or so. I also invested in my cooking skills and cook like 95%+ of my meals and also learned to make cocktails. I'm vegetarian too so in total my food budget is about $225 per month or so and the meals and snacks are great + healthy. And then most of my hobbies are free or low cost. The most expensive thing I do is when I travel to see friends and family.
I will say though, that it is pretty tight and I'll be making $70k in a week or so (raise from 60k and backpay to July) and then 76k next july. And I will for sure be raising my lifestyle with that money rather than investing more. But for the most part I someone who can be satisfied with the basics as long as I can have decent social interactions and creative outlets. I also started investing at a high rate immediately so haven't had to "regress" my lifestyle so I don't know what I'm missing yet haha.
All told, my expenses per month are about $1800-2000
@@CaptainPIanetthat’s awesome. Crazy, but awesome! Our mortgage alone is $1600. Not counting utilities and food!
“23,000 in 2004”
Family wage income $94k but in Vermont that's quite a lot as median here is about $72k. At 56 about 20% of the taxable paycheck is saved these days but we weren't that aggressive until the pandemic. About 10% pay to the 401K. Also there's a sweet employer 401K match on that so effectively 20% into the 401K! The 401K is all low cost funds. We try to max the IRAs and my HSA from the brokerage account. The other 10% saved goes to that account. 2023 will be the first year maxing the IRA's and HSA. No plans on maxing the 401K since I enjoy researching and buying individual business much more than funds. My cap gains rate is about 0% since I usually only sell long and most of my dividends are qualified. Once the proceeds are in the HSA and IRA I often re-buy my same companies.
I was a six figure earner but NOT in the top 10 percentile. I retired 2 years back at the age of 56 assuming zero social security income. I not only maxed out 401 K contributions but also additionally invested in a Vanguard brokerage account. So far despite facing the sequence of returns risk, I am comfortable and am not worried about my retirement.
Currently saving at 9% and I’m 28 years old with an income of $75,000 after bonus. All the sudden I feel very pressured to increase to 15% but I’m also trying to pay off a car loan and student loans.. 😬 Dreaming of being debt free (other than my house) but I think that will take 2 or 3 years. It’s hard to keep my priorities straight and pay that off before really upping my savings rate! I want to get going on building wealth NOW! I just have to remember that interest avoided is the same as a rate of return on my money (once the debt already exists, of course. Not advocating people to take out debt). It’s just hard!
34 and low 6 figures. This was only because I focused on maxing out our 2 Roth IRAs first. We have been maxing the Roths for 3 years while putting in about 15k into 401
I think a good rule of thumb is to just contribute to your 401k to the extent necessary to get the full extent of whatever match your employer is offering and to max out your Roth IRA at least until 35.
I'm getting close-ish. We probably could do it, but have other priorities.
We are maxing out my and my wife's Roth accts, plus our HSA which we treat as a retirement acct with preretirement benefits, and contributing just enough to get the full 401k employer match.
But rather than going forward to max the 401k the rest of the way, we are investing the rest in a non retirement account with a focus on dividends. The goal here is a sort of super emergency fund that acts like a 3rd income. First goal is to have it generate an average of $1k/mo in dividends, and the end goal is $2-3k/mo. Once it hits $2k/mo then I think we would divert into maxing out the 401k (if we get that far).
I realize that this isn't the most efficient from a tax perspective, but $2k/mo isn't going to bump us into the next tax bracket. Plus my wife is self employed and has rather variable and seasonal income, while I work in IT which can be a volitile job market at times (knock on wood, so far no issues though). Plus we have some health concerns to contend with and won't get better with age. So the goal is to have a sort of 3rd income where if the chips are down, and we are out of work, or can't work, (or don't want to work lol) then we would have the flexibility to not work for a while, or work less, with less worry about tapping into savings or derailing retirement plans.
I would love for the numbers to tell me that if we stopped retirement savings then we could join the fire movement... But we would hit FIRE just a couple years before retirement age anyways lol. So it makes sense to max out the post tax retirement options, understanding that we will have a sizeable normal investment acct, plus a 401k generating taxable income in retirement. So we can let the Roth and HSA accts continue to compound at the start of retirement, and slowly drain the 401k and investment acct early on, and then have less tax burden towards the end when we potentially need our dollars to stretch further.
Maxed out our Roth since we were 26/29. Maxed out 401 39/42. Could have done that way earlier, but wanted to use the money for our brokerage account. Ever since we maxed out our 401k, we have been doing maga backdoor Roth with both of our employers. Granted we are not maxing out the mega though lol. Income 280k not including hubby’s RSU. We also invested 529 for our 2 boys and pay double of our mortgage. Really hoping in 8 years job is an option. Fortunately we do enjoy our careers, and both with great companies.
Great video! I’d be able to max out now at 35 if I wasn’t paying off debt. I’m paying off in debt annually the equivalent of the max. I can’t wait until the first time I can contribute the max! It’s one of my financial goals.
I’m 26 and have been maxing out my TSP ever since starting my full-time career (age 22). Of course, it’s much more feasible to live below your means and super save when you’re single and don’t have any dependents. Here’s to discipline and delayed gratification! 🍻