No need to feel guilty if you can’t save 50% of your income

Have you read about those super savers who claim to save 50% of their income, who retire early in their fifties and then continue to live on 50% of what they earned during employment?

Pretty impressive stuff. I certainly couldn’t do it and never did.

Dig a little deeper into their story and you will likely find a couple of reasons for their ability to be frugal and super savers.

• Dual incomes
• One spouse still working while other enjoys retirement
• No children and hence no grandchildren
• Declining to pay for children’s college
• Financially emancipating children at age 18
• Or a combination of the above

Raising a child can be an emotionally rewarding experience. But it can also be very costly. Statistics from the Brookings Institution, an economic think tank, show that the average middle-income family with two children will spend $310,605 to raise a child born in 2015 up to age 17 in 2032. Excludes college costs.

Investopedia

The cost of children doesn’t end when they become adults – think weddings perhaps and the spending can surely increase with grandchildren.

Grandparents spend an average of $2,562 annually on their grandchildren according to a AARP survey. 1 in 5, say they spend money on their grandchild’s school or college tuition, an average of $4,075 a year.

So…

don’t feel guilty if you are an average saver and your spouse is not employed, or you have children or grandchildren.