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Old 05-11-2013, 03:16 PM
 
5,730 posts, read 10,094,902 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by NJBest View Post
There's a lot of people from NJ that just sell their expensive homes and downgrade to a low COL living area like Florida. I hear you can live a decent lifestyle on a retirement income of $5000/month.
I live very well as a single guy on 1/2 that! (Doesn't count savings, etc... just what I spend)
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Old 05-11-2013, 03:18 PM
 
1,858 posts, read 3,596,398 times
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Another viewpoint from WaPo.
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Old 05-11-2013, 03:23 PM
 
5,730 posts, read 10,094,902 times
Reputation: 8051
Quote:
Originally Posted by NJBest View Post
There's a lot of people from NJ that just sell their expensive homes and downgrade to a low COL living area like Florida. I hear you can live a decent lifestyle on a retirement income of $5000/month.
I live very well as a single guy on 1/2 that! (Doesn't count savings, etc... just what I spend)
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Old 05-11-2013, 03:34 PM
 
24,488 posts, read 41,016,315 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Themanwithnoname View Post
I live very well as a single guy on 1/2 that! (Doesn't count savings, etc... just what I spend)
Quote:
Originally Posted by Themanwithnoname View Post
I live very well as a single guy on 1/2 that! (Doesn't count savings, etc... just what I spend)
Cool.
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Old 05-11-2013, 04:43 PM
 
5,730 posts, read 10,094,902 times
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.
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Old 05-11-2013, 04:52 PM
 
Location: Whoville....
25,386 posts, read 35,424,366 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by cheapcharly View Post
what do you think about people who don't save any money for their old age.?

I heard in the USA, only 40 percent are saving for their retirement.
60 percent will finish on the streets with nothing.

I can think there will be a huge crisis coming.
I think that most of them can't save for retirement because they are living paycheck to paycheck. My step dad was one of them. All the money he had in the world, when he retired, was the house and $25K from profit sharing in the company he worked for over the years. He lived shared a house with my brother until my brother got married and then lived with another brother until moving into a senior complex that pro rated rent based on income.

I'm also willing to bet that most of the 40% aren't saving enough for retirement. I had planned to but a forced career change has derailed retirement savings. I have kids to get through college. I'm 54 and going on my 6th year of contributing next to nothing to my retirement account (only the 4% required to get the 3% match from my employer). It is my hope to start contributing again once the kids are through school and then to contribute the maximum until I retire. I know it's risky but what can I do? I took a 50% pay cut to go into teaching and my kids still need to go to college. I counted on an engineers salary and have had to adjust to a teacher's salary. I know I shouldn't have counted on it but that is now water under the bridge. Now I have to count on staying healthy enough to work until I'm 67 and maxing out savings the last 7 years I work AND my investments doing very well...or living in my kid's basement.

Whether we have a crisis coming depends on whether kids help their parents out.
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Old 05-11-2013, 05:03 PM
 
2,135 posts, read 4,261,588 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Ivorytickler View Post
I think that most of them can't save for retirement because they are living paycheck to paycheck. My step dad was one of them. All the money he had in the world, when he retired, was the house and $25K from profit sharing in the company he worked for over the years. He lived shared a house with my brother until my brother got married and then lived with another brother until moving into a senior complex that pro rated rent based on income.

I'm also willing to bet that most of the 40% aren't saving enough for retirement. I had planned to but a forced career change has derailed retirement savings. I have kids to get through college. I'm 54 and going on my 6th year of contributing next to nothing to my retirement account (only the 4% required to get the 3% match from my employer). It is my hope to start contributing again once the kids are through school and then to contribute the maximum until I retire. I know it's risky but what can I do? I took a 50% pay cut to go into teaching and my kids still need to go to college. I counted on an engineers salary and have had to adjust to a teacher's salary. I know I shouldn't have counted on it but that is now water under the bridge. Now I have to count on staying healthy enough to work until I'm 67 and maxing out savings the last 7 years I work AND my investments doing very well...or living in my kid's basement.

Whether we have a crisis coming depends on whether kids help their parents out.
I never understood this. Risk your retirement just to fund your kids schooling? What if they flunk out. Not saying you shouldn't fund nothing, but risk my future and hope my kid turns out to be a doctor and can take care of me. Just sounds strange.
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Old 05-11-2013, 06:04 PM
 
Location: IN
48 posts, read 106,506 times
Reputation: 42
My retirement is suicide.
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Old 05-11-2013, 06:05 PM
 
198 posts, read 482,676 times
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Saving money each year gives me a sense of accomplishment and payoff for busting my butt at work each year. I can't imagine working a full year of 50 hour weeks and ending up with the exact same net worth at the end of the year.

My coworkers are more interested in contributing to the office lottery pool than they are their own 401k. They can't believe I don't play the pool meanwhile I'm doing 20% into my 401k and 10% into my ESPP. Ill be a millionaire the old fashioned way while they are waiting to hit the powerball.
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Old 05-11-2013, 06:27 PM
 
Location: San Marcos, TX
2,570 posts, read 7,717,376 times
Reputation: 4059
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ivorytickler View Post
I think that most of them can't save for retirement because they are living paycheck to paycheck. My step dad was one of them. All the money he had in the world, when he retired, was the house and $25K from profit sharing in the company he worked for over the years. He lived shared a house with my brother until my brother got married and then lived with another brother until moving into a senior complex that pro rated rent based on income.
<snip>
That was my mom, pretty much. She has always worked, and saved, but that savings was for emergencies which eventually always happened (house repairs, car repairs, etc). Her last job was working as an HVAC tech at $8 an hour and she worked secretarial jobs the whole time she raised me and my brother as a single mom.

She then took over full time care of my Grandmother, and that turned into 10 years of her life when she could have been working. So now, at age 70, she lives in my Grandmother's (who passed in 2011) house (mobile home actually) and owns 2 rental properties, but one is an older mobile and doesn't rent for much. The other is my childhood home, paid off long ago but then she borrowed against it again to pay taxes she was behind on and make needed repairs so she owes on it now.

Thankfully her Social security amount is based on my father's (also deceased) earnings since they were married a long time even though he married after her. It is tight for her but she's always been pretty frugal, just not as smart as she could have been in other ways (financially).

I am not sure about my own situation either; I've been working low wage jobs my entire adult life, while supporting kids and barely making it, and at 41 I am still trying to get my 1st Bachelor's degree. I should be finished in another 3 semesters, at which point I will be 43, and "starting a career" for the first time in my life. IDK what I'm going to do considering I will be very very late to the party.
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