Have you ever wondered just how much you need to save to retire early enough to live comfortably? According to analysts at Blacktower Financial Management Group, the average American needs to save about $3,86,100 to retire at 67. Let’s break that number down. A 24-year-old should already have saved $8,775. A 39-year-old should have $1,40,400 in the bank. Many millennials are neck-deep in student debt, battling a brutal job market and facing down a crumbling economy. These numbers certainly don’t help.
The 2019 Planning and Progress Study by Northwestern Mutual estimates that about 22 percent of Americans have less than $5,000 saved for retirement. 50 percent have planned to work well past the age of retirement. 17 percent of the boomer generation has less than $5,000 in their retirement fund.
Let’s say you are still able to squirrel away $1million in savings for your retirement. How long will that money last? Analysts say it depends on the state you live in.
Financial and investment analysts at the publishing firm GOBanking Rates pulled data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics 2018 Consumer Expenditure Survey to analyze how long $1M would last. The study multiplied annual expenditures by each state’s overall cost-of-living index to calculate the number of years, months, and days that $1 million would last. Then, researchers multiplied annual costs by other annual expenditure figures such as the cost of living, housing costs, utility costs, transportation costs, and healthcare costs. They came up with a list of states ranked from the shortest to the longest time to determine just how long you can stretch that $1 million.
According to this list, Americans living in California or Hawaii, which count as the expensive states, will struggle to stretch their $1M after retirement. Similarly, it might be hard to cover living expenses even for 18 years in the Northeastern states. However, if you live in a Southern State, you might just be able to retire when you planned.