With a new year comes cost of living/merit increases for many people. So I thought I would chime in on what has worked for me when it comes to increasing my retirement savings when my pay increases.
We all want to increase how much we are saving for retirement. The problem is that we all don't want to feel the pinch when it comes to our current living situation. So I started increasing my retirement savings when I got a merit/cost of living increase or a raise. Every year I get at least 2%-3% increase in pay as a merit increase. About every 5-7 years I tend to get a nice raise. Could be from a job change or the current job I have increases my pay. I always take a portion of my increase and add it to my 401k or Roth.
If I got a 2% increase, I increased my 401k or Roth withholding by 1%.
If I got a 10% raise, I increased my 401k or Roth withholding by 2%
By doing it this way, I was saving more money for retirement and still getting a small bump in pay. At the beginning, I was saving only up to the max of what my company was matching in my 401k. 6% was my starting point. Today, I am maxing out my 401k and I am adding contribution to my Roth. I am at 20% today. My only wish is that I would have started this process when I got my first real job in 1997.
I hope this works for you!
Submitted February 03, 2017 at 10:41AM by cbdudek http://ift.tt/2kZJWRZ
