What's your retirement number?
Retiring in comfort
Whether it's some way off, or nearly here, working out how long your retirement money needs to last is an important step to being prepared.
How many paydays until you retire?
If you’re working, an important number to work out is how many paydays until you retire.
Take the age you plan to retire, subtract your age, multiply it by the number of pays you get per year (12 if monthly and 26 if fortnightly) and that will tell you how many paydays until you plan to retire. This can be a particularly powerful number, whether it’s more or less than what you thought. It can give you an indication of whether you need to consider other options for saving for your retirement.
How long does your money need to last?
We are living longer – 80% of 65-year-old men can plan to live until they’re 90, and 65-year-old women until they’re 94.
This means you’ll need to plan to have enough funds to last you through your retirement.
What next?
Once you have an idea of how long you have until retirement and how long your retirement savings need to last, the next step is to estimate how much money you’ll need – which means considering questions like:
- How much do you need per week to survive?
- How much do you need to have a comfortable life?
- What are the main ways you can increase your retirement?
Sorted have a helpful retirement planning tool to estimate how much you might want in your nest egg as well as much you could have in your KiwiSaver by the time you retire.