Just because saving for retirement is difficult, it doesn’t mean you should give up; and the current reliefs and allowances on pension contributions should give cause for optimism.
If you expect to retire on a final-salary pension and with no mortgage, your perspective on retirement may well be rosy; if you are grappling with debt and worried about having insufficient pension savings, it may be a different picture.
For some, the question is not how to retire successfully, but how to retire at all, given that there may be precious little in the way of a state safety net to fall back on.
Of particular concern is the group of pre-retirees aged 55–64, only half of whom have given thought to how they will manage in retirement; and only a quarter know how much they have in their pension pot.1 These people may only have a few working years left to build their nest egg.
Those able to put some aside really should: people massively underestimate the amount of money they need to save. People also underestimate longevity and therefore how long retirement could last.
Many experts are warning that the end of final-salary pension schemes, chronic underfunding of defined contribution pensions, and increasing life expectancy are creating a perfect storm that threatens to destabilise the financial wellbeing of the coming generation of retirees.
The solution is to plan
You have to ask yourself: how much will I need, and how much can I afford to put away? Then you need to factor in any other sources of retirement income and you can see the size of the gap you are trying to fill.
It’s vital savers know and understand all their options for using their pension; but also that they make the most of the current tax breaks while building one.
To receive a complimentary guide covering wealth management, retirement planning or inheritance tax planning, contact Peter Harding Wealth Management on 01202 830730 or email peterhardingwm@sjpp.co.uk. Peter Harding Wealth Management is a trading name of Peter Harding Practice Ltd.
1Financial Conduct Authority, Financial Lives Survey 2017
This article is featured in the June edition of the Dorset Business Focus magazine. Read on the online version here.