Ask Terry Questions How are we doing for savings and retirement with 2 children

How are we doing for savings and retirement with 2 children

By Terry Savage on October 22, 2014 | Financial Planning / Retirement

Dear Terry

My wife and I both work and have 2 children ages 9 and 6. We make about $165K year
We want to keep both children are in private school till highschool age.
My age 48 wife 43. We save $1,200 a year for each child in 529 accounts and put away into a 401K $7,400 year, IRA account $5,500 yr and save about $15,000 in our bank account a year
We have our primary home and 2 other homes that we lease out each year. The 2 leased homes bring in after all bills total about $725 extra income per month
Our primary home will be paid off at my age 63 the other 2 homes will have about 13 years left on the terms
We realy have no idea how we are doing? Good or not so good. We are looking at retirement age maybe 62-65 for me and 55 maybe for my wife. My wife has her 401K for work and I have the IRA. We have had retirement accounts for some time and keep funding them each year.

Please let me know your thoughts on are we going in the right direction for retirement or ???

Thank You

Terry Says:  Well, I can honestly say that I’m impressed at the amount of your savings/investments — especially with two young children.  But if you want a real calculation about retirement savings, go to www.ChoosetoSave.org –the website of the Employee Benefits Research Institute.  Click on the “ballpark estimate” icon –and fill in the blanks, with your current savings, your retirement goals.  Then the program will tell you exactly how on track you are to reach your retirement goals (including the impact of inflation).  Or it will tell you how much more you should be saving!  Play around with it a bit — and extend your worklife each another two or three years.  That will make a huge difference —  time IS money!

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