So now all I need to do is save up 300K--is this for real?

[Coffeetree]

An article from This Is Money showed up on my feed this morning. Basically someone with £290K in pension pots at 50 years old, asking whether they're on the right track for retirement. The rest of the article was various investment advice. Generally the advice was "You're nearly there."

I read these articles and I feel like someone is playing a joke on me. I usually feel very very privileged in that, at 52, I have a mortgage that I'll hopefully be able to pay off in 4 years, plus about £50K in pensions. No inheritances on the horizon. I've worked in charities my whole life, then became single about five years ago, hence not much saved.

So, after paying off my mortgage, I then need to buckle down and save up 300K? That's not going to happen. My plan is to keep working and then go part-time or contract when I reach retirement age.

Am I the only one who thinks these "retirement advice" articles are really out-of-touch?

I find it all incredibly disheartening. I would like to see a realistic plan alongside the figures with examples of what to do and when.

We're pretty much the same OP. Except with longer to go on the mortgage. I read these articles too and am 😳.

Sign of the inequality of our times and who the country is run for (clue: not for anyone who works for a living).

Yes! Thank you. Every damn time I hunt around for retirement planning advice, I get this foolishness. I mean, fair dues to people with big pension pots, great, enjoy! But I'd like to see retirement advice for the rest of us too.

Okay but no hate to the ppl with big pension pots. Lots of them got there by working in boring jobs and saving all their lives, so yay for them. It's just that the rest of us need advice too.

Unfortunately if you want to have a comfortable retirement you will need this sort of pension pot and realistically very few people have.

I feel strongly that it is something that should be taught at a young age when you have the, chance to start a pension and have enough running time to save into it.

My father was very much into pensions and I was encouraged to open one and save from the age of 18 but even so, after mortgages, children and part time work the pot I would like to have is not anywhere near £300k and I’m in my 50s !

The figures they put out about how much you need to have a 'comfortable' retirement are pie in the sky.

I think the figures are around £50K pa for a couple and 25K for a singleton.
If these are today's figures they are unrealistic. If they are future projections there may be an argument for thinking those figures will apply.
I am well below those figures for a single pensioner and I manage because you can live quite frugally so long as you don't expect the same standard of living as when you were young.
No need to take a cruise or have expensive cars.

The articles may seem disheartening, but they're not that unrealistic. If you were to retire at 67, how much do you realistically think £50k is going to give you? You'd be lucky to get a couple of hundred pound a month.

I realise £300k is a pipe dream for a lot of people, and I don't know what the solution is - going to be a lot of poor and struggling people in retirement for sure.

Yes I agree, and I have worked out the figures. I don't take cruises or have fancy cars etc now so I won't suddenly start doing that when I'm 67. So as long I can keep working part time I'll be fine.

I agree that £300k or more is a good amount to have for retirement, but my issue is that when faced with an article like that I just go, "Right, I will never have that much, so what's the advice for me?"

Well hopefully after paying off mortgage I'll be able to bung more in my pension pot. But not £300K!

The super-rich do not get there by working, don’t be ridiculous. Nor do the moderately rich who live by landlording and getting other people to buy houses for them. In a country where it is now known that you can’t get into ‘hard and boring’ jobs without family connections, can’t buy a house in most of the country without family connections, and have to pay through the nose in training to get even a median level job (therefore largely inaccessible without family support), wealth is not earned nor earn-able when you start off in life with nothing. Jane Austen needs to be put back on school curricula as a textbook for life studies, especially for girls.

This.

Retiring at 67 you could feasibly live another 30 years. Assuming investment growth just keeps up with inflation from that point on, £300k would only give you £10k per year. You get about another £10k from your state pension, bringing you to just over the National Living Wage (although I understand there is a debate that this isn’t in fact enough to be a living wage).

That wouldn’t be a comfortable for me, but I accept that it depends on how much you’ve had to spend in your lifetime as to whether that’s achievable.

I think the big divide is going to be between people with index-linked DB pensions (basically public sector) who will be fine and people with completely inadequate DC pensions. Things will get better in time as the effects of auto-enrolment work through but there will be a generation for whom it’s a real issue- too young for private sector DB pensions, too old for the benefits of auto-enrolment.

Well yes, I know that. I've read the articles and crunched the numbers too. That doesn't change the fact that it will not be humanly possible for me to save £300k in the next 15 years.

52 is a bit late to be looking for pension advice. This is the thing - it is something that should start much earlier in life but I do realise the inability of or the lack of prioritising of many to do this too. @Coffeetree having your own property is a big asset.

The thing is that if you start contributing to a pension as soon as you begin work you don't need to contribute much to end up with a large sum. That is the message we need to get out there. If you start at 18 or 21 pretty small contributions will get you to £300k.

Auto enrollment will help ensure more people start contributing early but it is far to common for people to opt out for really ill thought out reasons.

I think the figures given in these articles are often unrealistic but they are designed to encourage us to save harder.

I wake at night worrying about this.

Also because we have to somehow help DC through university and with house deposits.

It's impossible.

My sister and her husband both have public sector pensions, and a healthy inheritance.

We are screwed.

I went to see a financial advisor for some help and she said I needed £800k! She scared me off.

I read somewhere at the weekend that you need £2million!

I think the problem is that 52 is far to late to start thinking about these things. I'm the same age as you and pension/retirement planning is something which has been discussed for decades, I remember getting a lecture from payroll in my first job after Uni when I was 22 about the importance of making payments into a pension, even a small amount. Compound interest and all that. And companies (including charities) have been legally obliged to offer pensions since 2012.

Of course saving £300k when you're not earning loads in 15 years is unachievable. But this is talking about starting to save when you're 20-25, putting a small amount away and letting it grow.

Bear in mind the effects of compound interest…the £50k will be worth £90k or so in 15 years assuming a growth of 4% a year. When I looked recently, I read that I need £600k in my pension pot. I’m currently 30 and have around £50k (started paying in at 21) but it does seem so very daunting! Doesn’t help that I could desperately do with that £50k now with a young family and sky high mortgage…

I think depends on age. A 30yo has more time to invest in their pension pot than a 50yo. So out of touch with the older generation but not so much with the younger.

Definitely good to have saved into pension since 18. At the same time, saying "You should have done xyz" isn't really advice is it?

Also the best thing we did in terms of savings for our kids was to start pensions for them when they were born. We pay in something like a tenner a month, they can't touch it until they are 60 and should grow significantly.

Just do what you can in terms of pension saving. On the positive side if you own a property you can do equity release later.

I agree it is very difficult to make a massive difference if you are not in well paid work. Even then if you are not in a defined benefit scheme it is still very easy to lose all those savings. I wouldn't get disheartened. There are far more people in your situation than who have got pension pots that they are confident will see them through without a major drop in lifestyle.

If you don't have family or asset wealth the best pensions advice is to look out employers with good pension offers and make extra contributions if you can afford it.

I have a decent DB pension from 10 years in the civil service that will pay about £12k per year when I retire. I have been in a couple of DC pensions since leaving the civil service in 2015 and have built up a pot of £100k already. I am not a massively high earner but I have chosen employers that make good employee pension contributions and I make as high additional contributions as as I can afford. In addition, a small part of our salary is made up of "flexible benefits" meaing you get a small percentage before tax to use to buy things like childcare, extra leave, private medical care etc.. I always put all of mine in to my pension.

We lost our pension pot as the fund collapsed so we have no pension anymore!

I currently have 500 quid in a private one and hubby has about the same