If you have a pension, do you max out retirement savings too?

[Anonymous]

Question is in the subject line. I see lots of advice on this board to max out retirement savings, which to me means $17,500 for both working adults, as well as $5000 to an IRA each year. DH and I will both have FERS pensions coming to us, and while we put a good chunk of change in our retirement savings, we still don't max out. I've played with various calculators online to try and estimate whether we are saving enough, but I was just curious if others with pensions felt the need to fully max out other retirement vehicles as well. Thanks for indulging my curiousity.

[Anonymous]

Can't be answered w/o numbers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Question is in the subject line. I see lots of advice on this board to max out retirement savings, which to me means $17,500 for both working adults, as well as $5000 to an IRA each year. DH and I will both have FERS pensions coming to us, and while we put a good chunk of change in our retirement savings, we still don't max out. I've played with various calculators online to try and estimate whether we are saving enough, but I was just curious if others with pensions felt the need to fully max out other retirement vehicles as well. Thanks for indulging my curiousity.

FERS is calculated with the expectation that you will contribute to TSP. My husband and I are both FERS employees and we both max out TSP and put $5500 into IRAs each year. When we were still paying off student loans, we didn't quite max out our TSP, but we at least did enough to get the 5% match.

[Anonymous]

I don't save anything for retirement, but I have a pension that pays 2 percent of my high 3 per year worked.

If I only had Fers, I would try to put aside 17.5K/year as well.

One percent of your salary is not very much. I think you want something like two-thirds or three-quarters of your working income during retirement. If you only do fers for 35 years you will be living on a third of your salary.

[Anonymous]

NP here, I've wondered the same thing. I don't know how to factor my pension in to my retirement planning.

I'm not sure why exact numbers make this easier to answer, but here is a hypothetical:

Current Income = $100K
Current Age = 35
Current Retirement Savings: $150K in TSP
Current Retirement Contributions: 10%

Retiring at 60 with 35 years of service

Is 10% contributions to TSP enough? What other information do I need to consider when trying to plan?

[Anonymous]

You need to determine how much income you need in retirement and then determine how much your pension will pay you. If it won't cover your retirement needs you will need to save more in your TSP to make up the difference.

DH has a pension, which we expect to be about $75k/year. We also max his 401k. I will not have a pension and I put 5% into my TSP to get the match. We also save money elsewhere.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Question is in the subject line. I see lots of advice on this board to max out retirement savings, which to me means $17,500 for both working adults, as well as $5000 to an IRA each year. DH and I will both have FERS pensions coming to us, and while we put a good chunk of change in our retirement savings, we still don't max out. I've played with various calculators online to try and estimate whether we are saving enough, but I was just curious if others with pensions felt the need to fully max out other retirement vehicles as well. Thanks for indulging my curiousity.

Yes, we never know when the pension will go away.

[Anonymous]

Yes. I watched my dad's promised pension be un-promised to him. If I get it, awesome. I cannot assume I will though. DH and I both max out IRAs and contribute as much as we possibly can to our 401ks--not quite $17500 for both, but we do our best.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Question is in the subject line. I see lots of advice on this board to max out retirement savings, which to me means $17,500 for both working adults, as well as $5000 to an IRA each year. DH and I will both have FERS pensions coming to us, and while we put a good chunk of change in our retirement savings, we still don't max out. I've played with various calculators online to try and estimate whether we are saving enough, but I was just curious if others with pensions felt the need to fully max out other retirement vehicles as well. Thanks for indulging my curiousity.

Yes, we never know when the pension will go away.

I think it is ridiculous to think that the federal government will renege on its legal commitment to provide the agreed pension - which is fully funded, by the way.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Question is in the subject line. I see lots of advice on this board to max out retirement savings, which to me means $17,500 for both working adults, as well as $5000 to an IRA each year. DH and I will both have FERS pensions coming to us, and while we put a good chunk of change in our retirement savings, we still don't max out. I've played with various calculators online to try and estimate whether we are saving enough, but I was just curious if others with pensions felt the need to fully max out other retirement vehicles as well. Thanks for indulging my curiousity.

Yes, we never know when the pension will go away.

I think it is ridiculous to think that the federal government will renege on its legal commitment to provide the agreed pension - which is fully funded, by the way.

I did not realize this thread pertained exclusively to federal pensions. Our pensions are with companies and not the federal government.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Question is in the subject line. I see lots of advice on this board to max out retirement savings, which to me means $17,500 for both working adults, as well as $5000 to an IRA each year. DH and I will both have FERS pensions coming to us, and while we put a good chunk of change in our retirement savings, we still don't max out. I've played with various calculators online to try and estimate whether we are saving enough, but I was just curious if others with pensions felt the need to fully max out other retirement vehicles as well. Thanks for indulging my curiousity.

Yes, we never know when the pension will go away.

I think it is ridiculous to think that the federal government will renege on its legal commitment to provide the agreed pension - which is fully funded, by the way.

Didn't the government recently renege on military pensions?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Question is in the subject line. I see lots of advice on this board to max out retirement savings, which to me means $17,500 for both working adults, as well as $5000 to an IRA each year. DH and I will both have FERS pensions coming to us, and while we put a good chunk of change in our retirement savings, we still don't max out. I've played with various calculators online to try and estimate whether we are saving enough, but I was just curious if others with pensions felt the need to fully max out other retirement vehicles as well. Thanks for indulging my curiousity.

Yes, we never know when the pension will go away.

I think it is ridiculous to think that the federal government will renege on its legal commitment to provide the agreed pension - which is fully funded, by the way.

Didn't the government recently renege on military pensions?

The law would have reduced cost of living increases to military pensions. The calculation of the initial pension amount would have stayed the same. However, repeal looks likely.

[Anonymous]

We max out our 401K and I will also have a pension approximately 90K a year. I can pretty much count on the pension, but my DH is a saver and we save practically every dime we make. Sometimes it sucks to be married to him

[Anonymous]

Yes. FERS pension & also max out TSP & IRA. Spouse does not have a pension but maxes IRA & 401(k).

[Anonymous]

We max two TSPs. We don't fund IRAs. Can't quite come up with that to tie down in non-liquid form since we are saving for a downpayment. We'll look into it for the future though.