Let’s assume you want to retire at 65 years old and you live till 85 (Malaysia’s average lifespan is 70.8years old). And for your golden years, you want to have a minimum monthly allowance of $1,500 (in today’s dollars) to spend.
With a long-term 3% core inflation rate, how much money do you need to have in total when you reach 65 in order to achieve that?
The answer as follows based on your current age:
Age 0 : $3.53 million |
Age 10 : $2.62 million |
Age 20 : $1.95 million |
Age 30 : $1.45 million |
Age 40 : $1.08 million |
Age 50 : $840k |
Age 60 : $598k |
These figures are based only on having a $1,500 monthly allowance. If you want more, the sum will be bigger! (I’m assuming you have also paid up your home and car in full by the time you reach 65).
Hence, based on the above table and the law of averages, we can safely conclude that EVERYONE needs to be a cash millionaire by the time they reach 65 years old — just to enjoy the basic $1,500 allowance every month.
Here’s a cruel fact: If you save every single cent of your paycheck every month, how long will it take you to save a million? The answer is likely to be NEVER for most people.
So what are you going to do about it? I asked myself the same question in
2001 when I was an employee and that’s why I decided to walk down a different path (or two): business and value investing.
To keep doing the same thing you do today and hope for a different result tomorrow is simply madness! If you want different results, you need to take different action! I did 11 years ago. What about you?
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