I am hoping for some advice as all this isn't my strong suit. First a little background info. I have always been a saver ever since I was a kid and would get birthday money. My senior year of high school in the early 2000s, my dad had me open up a mutual fund account with Morgan Stanley. Then after I got out of college, I opened up a Roth IRA with Morgan Stanley. As my income grew I kept putting more and more into the Roth IRA up to the max that was allowed per year. Back in 2017 I decided on a career change, so I went back to college and got my nursing degree, which I just graduated this past May. Now that I am in a new job and not working in my family business, I have access to a 401k with employer match after 1 year of employment. I have decided to start out putting 8% of my income into a Roth 401k option because I will get a match for the first 5% but I wanted to invest more since I stopped investing the almost 2 years I was in school. I hope to get up to 15% but my income went down from what I was making in my family business plus I want to buy a house soon. My income will grow as I gain experience in the nursing profession but right now I am making less.
Since I have zero debt, my question is should I just go ahead and start investing the full 15% right off the bat even though I do want to buy a house soon or should I work my way up to that amount? Also, should I be putting anything into the Roth IRA with MS that I have had open for years or just let it grow on its own? I won't be able to contribute much to it since I am looking at buying a home plus contributing to the 401k. Just trying to figure out what is best in this situation to maximize my profits. I get kinda scared thinking about having enough for retirement even though I am in my early 30s and have a long way to go. LOL
I also need some advice about buying a home. I have enough in savings to where I can put between 20-25% down on a home. That will still leave me with a decent amount of savings. I know I need to have at least 6 months of expenses saved but how much should I keep in my savings account after buying a home? I am just not sure what a good balance is or really how much I should keep in my savings account vs. putting some into an investment account after putting a down payment on a house and having my emergency fund set up plus what money I will need to furnish the house. Again this isn't my strong suit, so any help or advice will be appreciated.
Submitted July 07, 2019 at 10:17PM by JJLaw08 https://ift.tt/2XPsEtO
