Education Goals

When to Retire?

When can you retire?

Technically you can retire when you want to. Whether you have enough money saved to replace the income you receive from working is another issue.

What is retirement planing?

Retirement planning is the process you put in place to maintain your finances after you leave the workforce.

When should you start retirement planning?

As early as possible. The earlier you start planning, the more time your money has to grow. Every dollar you can save now will be much appreciated later.

How Much do You Need to Retire?

One common rule of thumb is that you need 70% to 80% of pre-retirement income  through savings and Social Security.

For example if you make $70,000 per year before retirement should expect to need $49,000 to $63,000 per year in retirement.

In retirement, your savings will cover many of the same expenses that you had prior to retirement. These include, to name a few: 

Developing a detailed budget for your future expenses can help you determine your retirement income needs, investment and withdrawals strategies and tax planning to reduce taxable expenses and figure out how to reduce taxable income.

Great thing you have a budget, look at it and subtract some of the costs you won’t incur as a retiree.

Things such as: retirement contributions you’re currently making, some transportation costs, and hopefully debt and mortgage. If you plan to downsize and sell your home, you can also subtract some of your housing costs.

Retirement Plans

Social Security
How much you can get in your Social Security retirement benefit depends on your average indexed monthly earnings (AIME) during your 35 highest-earning years so amounts will differ significantly among retirees. The average monthly benefit in 2023 is $1,825 or $21,900 annually.

AIME works by taking into consideration the 35 years that represent an individual’s top earnings. Those top-earning years are then indexed to factor in wage growth and averaged to produce a monthly figure.

What is FRS?
FRS stands for the Florida Retirement System. It is a system that provides a pension benefit to anyone employed in the State of Florida on a full time basis.

The FRS Pension Plan uses your income, years of service, and a 1.6% multiplayer to determine a monthly benefit in retirement.

For example, Let’s say you were to earn an average highest five years of compensation of $50,000, and work for the FRS for 30 years. Your retirement benefit could be calculated like this:

30 Years x 1.6% – 48% of $50,000 average income = $24,000 annual retirement benefit.

For members hired after July 1st 2011, your average final compensation will be based on your highest 8 years of compensation.

Free FRS Workbook
This workbook is to help you start putting together a plan for your retirement.

457(b)

A 457(b) is offered to state and local government employees.

• 457(b) participants can double their contributions if they are within three years of normal retirement age.

• Catch-up contributions are allowed after age 50.

• Your 457(b) benefits become available when you no longer work for the employer providing the 457(b) plan.

College/Trade School

Help your child decide if college is right for them. As stated in this Business Insider article; a recent survey shows that 84% of millennials are saddled with some sort of regret over their student loan debt, many of them wishing they could hit the rewind button and do things differently.

According to Ramsey Solutions your child should ask themselves these 8 questions:

1. Do you know what career you want to pursue?

2. Do you want to learn how to learn?

3. Does the career you want require a four-year degree?

4. Is it what you really want, independently of your parents’ and family’s wishes?

5. Is there a lot of job opportunity in the field you want to study?

6. Do you have money saved up to go to college?

7. Are you getting decent grades?

8. What will you do to make your college plan cost less (i.e., community college, trade school, living at home instead of on campus, etc.)?

College costs vary widely depending on where your child goes to school and whether they qualify for financial aid.

A NerdWallet survey found that 1 in 5 parents of children under 18 (20%) haven’t started saving for their children’s college education, but want to.

Consider putting money into a college savings plan.

529 Plans

They are tax-advantaged accounts that can be used to pay educational expenses from kindergarten through graduate school.

Keep Track Of It

If you are not tracking your actions and monitoring how those actions affect your goals then you can’t adjust accordingly. By the time you notice things are not working you may have missed the opportunity to adjust to meet your timeline.

Don’t hesitate to use our helpful trackers below.