To ask how much is in your pension pot and your contribution %

[Vistada]

Just that really?

I'm starting to put a lot of thought into my pension (something that in my 20s I thought just ticked over) but its difficult to get a good gauge of what one should have saved.

WIBU to ask (if you're happy to share) your age, salary, pot size and what you contribute per month in %?

Me: 33, £23k pot, £55k PA (only recently) and joint 13%

I have 113k -am 44 earn 65k mine and employers contribute is 10% all together .

Before that pretty much did minimum contributions from 18 except a 7 year period with no pension with my employer.

Have a mortgage of 153k which I m overpaying slightly

My somewhat pointless short term aim is to get my pension equal to mortgage which should happen in the next 4/5 years if the markets don't collapse

In 2021 I was told that if I retired then at 49 I would get £42k a year. How do you work out what you will get aged 67? I have a mental block re all things financial and however it’s explained to me, I feel rather stupid.

It sounds as if you could be very fortunate @WillYouContribute and have done well without understanding why. Someone will explain it to you. B+Not sure you will be able to take your NHS pension at 49 though as the floor age on most is 55, and soon to go to 57.

No I was just curious. I was just given the projection then at 49. I plan to keep working if I can as we need the income. I have always worked full time in the NHS and find the payslips and financial lingo difficult to understand. I am always impressed at how much others seem to know about this stuff. I am on two different schemes too which always throws me.

I know the NHS scheme is a good one. I can’t imagine it will stay that way for the next generations.

Best thing I did was working at 21 for an insurance company that encouraged us to sign up for a pension at the start. I've had some good years but still worried it’s not enough

The statements went online and never looked again! 😆

I'm 38, earn 39.5k and my pot is only 23k. Between me and my employer the total contribution is now 11% - I have upped mine recently due to a pay rise - only 8% was going in until recently.

i am due another pay rise in June and our HR are going to try and negotiate it as an increased employer contribution - I would value this.

I used to teach and do have a smallish teacher pension that will give me around £300 per month in today's money. I won't be going back to teaching so need to do better with my other one - it's not enough.

I had several years of low pay, 2 maternity leaves, and some time overseas where I earnt well but didn't pay into a pension so got some work to do if im going to live well in retirement!

Some really useful advice here. I would like another thread on ‘how much will I need’ as it’s so hard to work out.

Currently have a mortgage and commuting costs and three adult DC at home so it’s hard to separate out what I need to live on. Internet says 2/3 of current salary so £34k ish but why do I need that much without my £950 mortgage? (which will be gone)

I know nobody can say what someone else might spend. Am thinking I will have £25k pa plus about £50k in the bank and that feels ok. Modern house so no massive bills there.

Anyone else single and retired and living on about that? How does it feel?

What pension companies tell you your need at retirement is not right. At the moment I have a mortgage, pay NI, support children at Uni. My costs are about 3.5k a month. I calculate I wil need £1200 a month in retirement.

You have a teacher's pension - how are you not aware of that?

Where I work I pay 5% in and my employer also pays in 5%. I've only been in that job for about 4 years so I am not sure what the pension pot is, but I consolidated all my other pension pots a few years ago and have about £300K in that one (I am 52 and have been paying in since I was 25).

@Papyrophile I get £3600pa from a £16000 pot. Because the deal was done on the expectation of 8% growth (then typical).

That's an amazing outcome, you're laughing all the way to the bank, unreal returns - well done to your insolvency negotiators! Future generations won't see the likes of anything like it. Enjoy!

I'm 38. I've got a pension pot which is about 1.5 times my annual salary (high income) but its really depressing seeing the annuity projections which seem like peanuts.

Ive recently managed to up what i put in and am putting 15% of my salary in but it just doesn't seem to increase in value the way its supposed to.

Ive been putting in continuously since i was 24.

Waitingforgeorge

You only have the teachers pension if you sign up and contribute to it.

Those of you saying it isn't enough ( a lot of those seem to have hundreds of thousands in the pot) what is it not enough for?

Maintaining a standard of living into retirement when used to earning more. We want our pensions to comfortably cover :

A couple of holidays a year
Travel around the uk to visit friends/family
Gifts at christmas for kids/grandkids
Easily affording higher heating bills etc as we age
Helping the DC out financially - property in our area is extremely expensive
Care when we eventually come to need it

Are teachers not automatically enrolled?

No pot as such as it is a defined benefits / final salary pension. About 25% combined I think

Age 46. Have £175k in DC pension and a DB pension which will give me a £9.5k salary from age 60 (which means it's worth around £225k)
I started really upping the payments a year ago while I can (£30k a year) but I am planning to repay the mortgage age 57 with the tax free lump sum.
DH (also 46) has about £140k in DC pensions and is putting in a lot less than me (£10k a year) as his scheme isn't great.

If we can keep going at this rate we could retire comfortably at 62. But about to start paying school fees so it's all a juggle.

She must have started paying NI at 5yo 😁

Don't look at annuities - income draw down is the way forward! E.g. you can actually use your pot of money by taking chunks out as opposed to buying an annuity.

Teachers are automatically enrolled onto the Teacher's pension scheme when starting work. The only reason you wouldn’t get it is if you decide to opt out, which would be complete madness. The Teacher’s Pension scheme is excellent.

@Singlespies why would you use drawdown Vs annuity?

Cos you can get a lot more money! But you have to make some sensible decisions because you have to make the money last.

So, if I retire early, I will take bigger chunks of money before my state pension kicks in, and when I am active and want to travel.

https://www.aviva.co.uk/retirement/pension-annuity/annuity-vs-drawdown/#:~:text=Choosing%20between%20a%20pension%20annuity,and%20access%20to%20lump%20sums.

Thanks @Singlespies, I'll take a look.