You openly promote spending everything your can.
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Note: i am only saying don’t max out the 401k now while trying to achieve those other goals. Once you have the loans paid, a down payment saved, and have passed a few more exams then you can increase the retirement savings and still get there.
Just don’t pass up on getting the full company match.
You think people should splurge on a car, and that chicken breast is inedible…
I would take the match and pay off my debt. It is nice to not have debt [and to have savings] and there it’s not crystal clear you are going to miss out on a great return in the market anytime soon with a global recession looming.
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Necessary savings for life
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$1k emergency fund
2.1: Insurance. Home, renter, auto at least for liability. Health. Arguably dental for the premium bones.
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401k match
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$10k emergency fund (adjust based on parental fallback network, must care for children, etc.)
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Pay down high-interest debt (credit cards, payday loans, etc.)
5.1: Insurance - life, term, unless you have nobody to provide for.
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Save for anything significant such as a house down payment.
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Max HSA if available, otherwise 401k or IRA. Don’t neglect slowly adding to emergency fund.
7.1: Under the current environment, consider paying the mortgage earlier. Or don’t, it’s your life.
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The remainder of anything tax-advantaged: 401ks, IRAs, potentially FSAs if you will use the money, 529s, gifts to children.
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Non-tax-advantaged brokerage accounts.
Adjust the above for your personal risk tolerance and desire to save long-term or not.
Nice list.
Under the current environment, consider paying the mortgage earlier.
Are you referring to someone with a 6-7% fixed rate? I think I will hold on to my 3% loan as long as possible.
Precisely. Only said consider for that reason. I’m at 1.875%. A new homeowner may find the differential is worth the guaranteed payoff. To each their own.
Years almost up but all of my major financial decisions are in the rear-view mirror. Very happy with how everything ended up.
- Completed/Met Goal
- Completed/Met Goal
- Completed/Met Goal - had a major malfunction a week before putting the house on the market and a major required replacement due to inspection that cut in to my net proceeds. Still ended up at the bottom of my target range. The end result of owning a fixer upper is great but the process can be a grind.
- Completed/Met Goal - shifted some of the crypto goal towards this
- Completed/Adjusted Goal - shifted some of this to goal #4
- On track - Joey B tried to help!
All student loans will be paid off by Xmas. Will be a VERY nice feeling. - Completed/Met Goal - Now I have the itch to get a new car… 2023 goal?
- Completed/Met Goal - Ireland/Scotland here I come
- Completed/Met Goal - Came in a little higher than my goal
On to 2023!
- Max out one 401k and start bumping the other from around $8k/year to ~$12k/year. Complete
- Add $11,700 to taxable brokerage. Complete
- Add a small amount to HSA (in 2023 I’ll push things around and max that instead of IRA/401k). Complete, maxing for 2023 over 401k max
- Pay $12,000 over minimum on the mortgage (aiming for 11 years or less on the total duration) Complete
- Max out at least 1 Roth IRA Complete
- Major vacation far away for ~2 weeks if COVID numbers improve, otherwise save up more for it and throw remainder into the second 401k. 1 week vacation but complete
Decided to consolidate some charitable contributions in 2022 by setting up a donor advised fund and donating appreciated stock to it
I don’t know how I missed this thread this year, but my goals don’t change much from year to year, and they’re highly automated, so I’ll put what they likely were and whether I met them.
- Max HSA + 1000 for spouse = done
- Don’t pull anything out of HSA = essentially done, except I reimbursed a sub-$20 expense because we switched HSA providers and I wanted to test how reimbursements worked at the new one.
- Retirement savings between $49k and $62k ($13k difference is funding 2 roth IRAs, spouse over 50) = hit $53k, still have time between now and April to finish this out.
- Don’t buy a car = have two more days to go, so counting this as done… but pretty sure we won’t make it to March 2023 since EV tax credits are back in place for a couple of months, and they count towards the plug in hybrid version of our current van, and that’s what my spouse wants.
- Live on remainder, and save what’s left over = I did this backwards and saved another $15k first (for delayed spending, like a new car) by sending money to a separate savings account at a different bank (out of sight out of mind), and then we lived on the remainder that went to the main account.
maxed out the 401k (over 50).
bought a new (to me) car. that has a loan, paid off wife’s van to maintain single pmt
started some projects around he house without needing a loan (yet)
finished college payments for kid 1 (sweet!)
gave some money to people/orgs i liked
so with the maxed 401k, company match and other company contribution, the 401k is…down 10% for the year. i imagine others lost more than that. prior year was up more than 20%, so more of the reason to not watch it too closely at my age.
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Hit most of my goals, I’d have to check on charitable giving but I think I got there.
I got a sizable raise in 2022 that let me max the 401k and put… a little over $30k into brokerage. So I managed to save quite a bit while still trying to whittle away at the mortgage, and do both while spending a lot of money on home updates. We’ve spent well over $40k on the house this year.