How much should a 30 year old have in savings?

[Sky1992]

I'm quiet curious to read people's responses

How much do you think a 30 year old should have saved by now and how much do you think they should be saving per month?

In general, it's reckoned that people should try to have the equivalent of at least 3 to 6 months worth of normal expenses set aside in savings, in addition to any designated savings (such as the savings for a deposit, for a holiday, for a car etc).

I would guess that many 30-year-olds are probably paying rent while trying to save for a deposit to buy a flat/house. The amount they "should" be saving is entirely dependent on the amount of their earnings and their other financial commitments. Obviously, the more they can save, the better.

Every 30-year-old should be contributing to a pension, again at a rate that is appropriate for them according to their current salary.

My parents always taught me I should have 3 months worth of bills money saved for emergencies and we do have that stashed in a separate account although with the hike in bills and food it's probably nearer 2 months

When I was 24-35, I had no children and regularly worked my arse off for a couple of years to save enough to take off travelling for a year. Then back for a couple of years to do the same thing. So I'd have maybe 10k, then would live off that for a year. Then save 10k then live off that for a year. And so on.

In the current climate? One million pounds.

Yes. It's a trope as old as the sun that poor people are poor because they bought a fancy phone and too many haircuts

Honestly most people can work out that to save more they need to not spend £300 on a haircut. It's pointless patronising advise trotted out on every thread about money to make the poster feel superior.

And to be fair you did say save before haircuts phone and clothes 🤷🏼‍♀️

This is the way

I’m 37 and have only been able to save significantly in the last year. Before then I was earning too little or had a big nursery bill. I have had access to inheritance (which went towards house) and DH is a good saver. But it’s a recent thing for me (and being eroded by cost of living)

At age 30 my kids were younger and we probably had about £1 to 2k max. Kids now grown up and we're early 50s we have about £130k (albeit 60k was from oh pension handshake on leaving raf).
Sadly you seem to only have excess money when you don't need it as much.

I'm not yet 30 but my savings have dramatically reduced now I've bought a house. So savings alone doesn't look great, but the whole picture looks okay

Ridiculous question for badly written “online content” 🙄

I wouldn’t advise my DC to ‘save’. You lose value so quickly.
We are late 30s with 2 DC and only approximately £3k ‘saved’ as ready cash.
We have invested in property, a small stock portfolio and, mainly, our pensions.
A huge savings account balance doesn’t indicate good investment to me.

The right amount of savings - like the right amount of pension pot - is entirely dependent on what lifestyle the 30-year-old has and would like to have.

I'd advocate prioritise saving over discretionary spending, for sure. However, I appreciate not everyone has the funds for discretionary spending in the first place, so there's nothing to cut back and divert to savings.

Personally, I've always kept my own version of the running away fund. Not to leave a partner, but to leave an employer. I always have enough ready cash to resign and tide me over to the next suitable job.

Literally this.

Also unless a 30 year old is saving to get on the housing ladder my answer is they should have as little as possible in savings (beyond an emergency fund) as they should be putting into a mortgage and/or a pension

Ideally a years' salary or income.

With one caveat. You can't access a pension pot until you're 55.

If you looked at my finances, you would question why I didn't put more of my savings into my pension pot, but it's because I'm half-expecting to die young. So I have more ready cash than someone my age would have, plus private medical and critical illness cover.

If you're from a family where it's normal to die young, although you should put into a pension anyway as a backup plan, you shouldn't be funnelling everything into it.

Yes you're absolutely right. Sorry you are in that position.

My personal view is that we have the balance of retirement, work and life all wrong. We should have the means to live well when we need it and can really enjoy it but these are often the (financially) toughest times. Then we have money when we can't enjoy it so much later in life.

Should is a fucking awful judgemental smug word. I would like to ban it.

1223.19 euro. I thought everybody knew that.

Exactly.

Savings interest is really low and mortgage interest is high.

we both pay 10% to our pension and we took our mortgage over as short a term as possible, and make overpayments whenever we can.

It makes more sense to have as little a mortgage as possible and not to have any other debts than it does to have savings.

If there is something we need/want to do, we do save on the short term. Our long term savings are our mortgage (on track to be paid off by 40) and our pensions. We also have no debt except our mortgage.

In order to do this we live well within our means. We could certainly save more, but I don’t want to spend my life miserable to save for a future that we might not even see. It’s all about balance.

Savings interest is really low and mortgage interest is high

Are you sure about that? Lots of people fixed for 5/10 years a year or two ago. They'll be paying around 1% interest on their mortgage.

You can get 3% on instant access, 4-5% on 1-2 year fixed rate accounts, or up to 7% on regular savings products. The last thing people in that position should be doing is paying down their mortgage.

People might also be planning big purchases like home improvements or a new car. These things need to be saved for, although they can probably borrow on a personal loan or homeowner loan at around 4% interest, which is not particularly high depending on the urgency of the works.

For example, we really need new windows and I'm expecting this to cost £5-10k. Also, DP is self employed and needs to save around £10k pa for his tax. It is not appropriate for any of this money to be locked away or subject to investment risk.

So that, plus having some of an emergency fund, means that we currently 'should' have around £20k in cash savings and this is our current priority rather than further overpaying the mortgage or paying extra into pensions.

And the award for the most stupid post goes to .........

What I meant is it isn’t a given that people SHOULD have savings.

Our fixed term just ran out and we recently fixed again, but the rate isn’t great. Plus, by making overpayments we are becoming completely mortgage free fairly quickly; allowing us to potentially buy a second property as another asset (I’ll be 38 when this one is paid off) - our home has also increased in value fairly substantially (70% gain in 10 years) so our relatively modest investment is now a reasonable nest egg.

An emergency fund is less of a concern for us because we can cover all our outgoings on a single salary, and we both have generous sick pay etc.

My point is that it’s really circumstance dependent and savings aren’t the be all and end all.

It's not a nice thing to think about, but we do have to consider how long we're likely to be on this planet, any dependents, and whether we're happy scrimping and having a miserable existence when we stop working, or if we'd like to be more comfortable. Then we have to plan accordingly.

I mean, if everyone in your family lives to 90, you might prefer to be a bit more frugal now, so when you're retired, you don't have to ration your food and shiver all day. If everyone in your family dies at 60, you might want to take that holiday whilst you can enjoy it and make memories.

It's a bit of an educated gamble (well, really educated if you've had gene testing) but ultimately, it's about finding a balance between how you live now and how you live later, and trying to guess at what later might look like and for how long later might last.

You might put up with something less than ideal in your youth because your body is young, fit and health enough to take it, so skip the luxury to free up more wealth for later. Or you might refuse to put up with it, because you're confident you won't enjoy a long retirement.

If you have kids, you might be relaxed about leaving them nothing. If any of them are seriously disabled, providing for them in your old age and after you're gone might look very different.

There are so many variables and we've all said already in one form or another, it's about individual circumstances. People don't plan what to have in savings or pensions because most humans don't like to think about their life expectancy and plan around that accordingly.

Four million pounds.

It's easy to do if you just prioritise holidays and drive around in an old banger.

How long is a piece of string?

what a stupid post, it will be different for everyone depending on circumstances, do they have a job! Is it well paid? What are outgoings, can they save, are they single, with a partner, have kids , do they rent, or have a mortgage, what are outgoings in general, someone in London on £30k would be less well off than someone in say Northumberland on £30k as London is so expensive