I am 54 yrs. is it to late to try an put something away for my retirement.?

Answer 1

no its not too late. you probably will have to invest a little more but i can see it working and aren't they trying to up the age for retirement anyway. i wish you a long healthy life with everything your heart desires. peace.

Answer 2

No it isn't too late, but you don't want to get into anything long term. I would avoid stocks and bonds, but I would stick to shorter term more conservative forms of investment, such as your employers 401k, which obviously will pay more if you leave it long term, but it can be taken out when you retire regardless of how much is there. I would also suggest something along the lines of personal IRA's and though, again, short term are not going to pay much, it is a way to put away money. Best bet will be CD's. Try and find one in your area that is paying the highest percentage... They probably will be in the ballpark of 5-7%. You'll be lucky to get higher than about 5-6%, and most have minimum requirements of what you have to put in, such as $1000-$5000 dollars...

Answer 3

You will probably retire at age 67...13 years from now. If you start today, I would suggest investing 20% of your pretax salary. To do that you will have to make a significant change in your current living standards...because you have been spending that 20%. Pretend you have lost your job and had to take a job paying 20% less. If your company offers a 401k plan, investing 20% will be easier (tax deferred) but the plan may limit your contributions to 15% or less. Invest the maximum amount than you can in a Roth IRA...the investments will grow tax free.

If you save 20% of you gross pay for 3 years and you invested it conservatively such that your after gain each year just equaled the inflation rate, after 13 years you would have 2.6x your current salary (adjusted for inflation). You could withdraw from that amount to supplement your social security.

If you invested a little more aggresively such that your after tax gain was equal to the inflation rate plus 2%, after 13 years you would have 3.2x your current salary (adjusted for inflation).

Answer 4

No. It's pretty late, though.

DO NOT use a 'financial advisor'. They charge high fees and that ruins your returns:

"the BCT study found that the raw returns of equally weighted mutual funds (net of all expenses) for 1996 to 2002 were 6.626% for the investors working on their own and were 2.924% for funds provided by advisors.

In other words, the public working on its own did more than 100% better than financial advisors when it came to selecting equity mutual funds. After factoring in inflation and taxes, clients of financial advisors lost money and lost purchasing power. "

http://advisor.morningstar.com/articles/doc.asp?s=1&docId=4482&pgNo=0

http://www.bankrate.com/brm/news/boomerbucks/20061206_investment_advice_a1.asp

Get a good book on investing. I suggest this one:

http://www.amazon.com/Bogleheads-Guide-Investing-Taylor-Larimore/dp/0470067365/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/103-4350381-0371842?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1190343696&sr=8-1

Probably the best thing you can do is

1. Max out your 401k with a proper asset allocation (learn your risk tolerance). Do not trade, leave it alone.

2. buy a target retirement date fund (start an IRA) from Vanguard and leave it alone no matter what happens in the market for as long as you can. Don't even think about it, except to put as much money as you can into it.

3. Don't retire until your house is paid off.

Answer 5

I feel that it is to late for you as unless you can afford to put very very large sums of money in to a pension fund . You would be better putting what you can under the mattress so to speak.
I know of many builders that are in the same boat in the 70's ,what with coming out of national service in there twenty's and finding a job ,starting family's ,they never found the money or time to put anything away. SORRY.

Answer 6

Well you won't be able to put enough away to live the high life, but it would definitely help out. You won't be able to sign up for social security till you're 67. That's 13 years in a decent mutual fund.

Answer 7

its never really to late to start saving! most people retire are 65ish so that gives you a little over 10 years, i would suggest investing some money so you can get a larger return!

Answer 8

It's never too late. Get a good financial planner and an aggressive investment plan and you can be on your way.

Answer 9

It's NEVER too late for this..However I can show you how to invest and reap awesome benefits in the long term.
I accept private messages.

Answer 10

It is never too late.

Keep in mind, that you get Social Security (if there is still SS in a decade).