I have a fixed amount that goes to my retirement plan. I am pretty laid back with my investing but I see from reading here I should probably be more aggressive. I do increase it every year and as I make more money I will invest a greater amount.
When I first joined the military, they came around offering us retirement plans. I knew nothing then about these. They said that 10% of our monthly income was the best way to increase earning for a successful financial future. I have always been laid back. If your income has increased then I say you increase your contribution.
I wish I could be saving for my retirement, but that is something too hard because my income is short and I have a lot of expenses.
I just contribute to it in a random way, whenever,I feel that I have some extra cash I do contribute to it, though I must say that I am laid back , I need to put more into it.
With the exception of 2 or so years, my wife and I have always maxed out on our 401K contributions since we started working (over the last 25 years or so). Some places we maxed out on percentage, others maxed out on dollar amount allowed - not necessarily hitting the max percentage. As a young wannabe investor, I knew starting the snowball early was key and fortunately my wife was easy to convince of that. It has worked out well so far!
Having gone through a messy divorce a few years back and losing so much I have not been able to put away as much as I would like to. I am slowly getting back on my feet and in a better place financially. I do the best I can with what I have.
I started my pension quite early on in life so I only had to contribute around 10-15% of my salary so to be able to retire at the age I want and be able to live comfortably. I'm one of the lucky ones though, and these days it's not easy to save for retirement with a lot of people not knowing how they'll manage when they leave their jobs.
I am contributing the maximum amount to our social security here and our office has a counterpart. As to the percentage of what amount, I cannot say because I have no idea. In fact, I do not know how much pension I would get when I retire 10 years from now. My husband has just applied for pension and he will be getting 4,000 pesos a month, that's around $100 in your money. It is a meager amount because that amount can sustain one person only excluding the rental.
I was always told to try and contribute 20% and while I did start off doing that, I have to admit that over the years the amount as dropped off considerably. Now it's more like around 10% and some months it's not even that depending on what other bills are due.
I, personally, try to get 10%-20% of my monthly income in. At first it was painful, but then I just got used to it. It's been piling up and I plan on it to keep piling up until I retire. It make good sense, you don't have all the time in the world to make money so while you're making it you might as well put some away in a piggy bank for a rainy day!
