These blunders can be extremely costly, so learn about and avoid them.
“Regrets, I’ve had a few, but then again, too few to mention.”
— “My Way,” Frank Sinatra, from the 1969 album My Way
You may be familiar with these lyrics to “My Way,” written by Paul Anka and performed memorably by Frank Sinatra. I suspect that most of us will end up with more than a few regrets in our lives — and the financial ones may have cost us a lot.
Here’s a look at five retirement moves you’ll likely regret making.
1. Retiring too early
Retiring early is definitely tempting to many people. Those adhering to a “Financial Independence, Retire Early (FIRE)” plan explicitly aim for very early retirements. That can work out well — but it might not, too, which is why some are skittish about it. It also demands a lot of sacrifices.
Remember, after all, that if you retire at, say, 45, and then live to age 95, you’ve got a 50-year retirement. You’ll need to be quite sure that despite inflation, geopolitical events, and more, you won’t run out of money.
2. Not having a solid retirement plan
Each of us needs a solid retirement plan. We need to think about how much income we’ll need (or want) in retirement, and how we’ll get it. It’s a good idea to aim to have multiple income streams in retirement. Mine, for example, might end up looking like this:
Fail to plan well for your retirement, and it might end up torpedoed by one of several big risks facing retirees.
Image source: Getty Images.
3. Not doing any estate planning
You need to plan not only for your retirement, but beyond it, too — via estate planning. Fail to do so, and your heirs may end up paying more in taxes than necessary, and there may be extra hassles and heartbreaks, too.
4. Not saving and investing aggressively enough — and not starting earlier
Your earliest invested dollars are your most powerful ones, so start saving and investing as soon as you can. The table below shows how your money could grow over time at an 8% growth rate — and you can see that your nest egg could be growing by leaps and bounds after a few decades.
|
Growing at 8% for |
$6,000 invested annually |
$12,000 invested annually |
|---|---|---|
|
5 years |
$35,192 |
$70,399 |
|
10 years |
$86,919 |
$173,839 |
|
15 years |
$162,913 |
$325,825 |
|
20 years |
$274,572 |
$549,144 |
|
25 years |
$438,636 |
$877,271 |
|
30 years |
$679,699 |
$1,359,399 |
|
35 years |
$1,033,901 |
$2,067,802 |
|
40 years |
$1,554,339 |
$3,108,678 |
Calculations by author via Investor.gov.
5. Investing in too risky a fashion — or too cautiously
You’ll be shooting yourself in the foot if you save money aggressively but then park it under your mattress or load up a portfolio with penny stocks. Try to strike a reasonable balance between risk and reward, such as with index funds.
These are just some of many retirement blunders to avoid. A little digging online will turn up more.