DH puts 10% in and has a 5% match. I put in 5.5% and my employer puts in 8.5% of my salary. DH is 44 and majorly playing catchup because of all the years he didn't contribute/have a 401k. He has about $35,000 now, which is quite good considering he hasn't been at it too long. I'm 34 and have only been contributing for about a year. I need to check to see how much I have accumulated, but I know it's not much.

We have about 165K last time we added it all up. My husband is 37, and he has always put in 10% plus whatever the company matches. He's had different company match senerios with different employers along the way. We've never touched the accounts for any reason, and (hopefully) we won't have to until retirement.

Unfortunatly right now me and my DH cannot contribute becasuse we are in the waiting period with a employer but I do have mine from a previous job. It is very small though because we cashed my 401k out once before for a home purchase. We are in are mid 20's but we know we have to at least contribute up to 6% because that is what our company matches. Keep up the good job, theres a long way to go. I have 15,526 days before I reach retirement age. (My 401k website keeps track for me)

dh contributes 15% plus his employer matches 6% plus i have mine from a previous employer rolled into a fidelity acct and i put in 50.00 a month. so between the two of us we are over 100,000.

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fALL SEVEN TIMES STAND UP EIGHT!

Wow, yeah, I live in So. CAl, and it's crazy expensive. And the enlisted folk don't make that much.

Yeah, we are military and we save quite a bit a month and we are NOWHERE near that AT ALL. some day!

We've always done 15%. I don't have a 401K option, so we have done Roth IRAs for me in the past. Retirement will cost a LOT, and we're not banking on receiving any type of social security. $100,000 wouldn't come close to covering it. The amount you'll need is dependent on SO many different factors. Do you want to maintain the same lifestyle in retirement, or travel more? Are you planning on moving or buying another property? Plus, then there's healthcare too. Oy, it's a lot to consider. Here's a good calculator:

Retirement calculator: Bankrate.com

For example, let's say you and your husband are both 30 years old and hope to retire at age 65. You will need an annual income of $60,000 (in today's dollars) in retirement and hope to live to be 90 years old. The calculator says you'll need to have $718,978.01 saved.

Here's another one. Let's say you and your husband are 40. You hope to have $100,000 annually in retirement and want to retire at age 62. You hope to live until you're 95. You will need to have $1,301,547.76 saved.

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Thanks Kim! It seems so overwhelming to think about, but I guess if we don't that would be even worse. I wish the military offered a 401k option...it would be so much easier to save if they matched!
--Ann

The military has a Thrift Savings Plan (TSP) your husband can contribute and if your banking with any credit union or USAA they have a lot of investments options that you can invest into. Mutual Fund, CD, etc... Good luck.

You know what DH and I learned? it also apply in civilian world too. In the military (yes the pay isn't that much) there are some E1-E4 that has 4 or 5 depedants right? you ask yourself how are those families manage to survive in their income coming in? They manage to live somehow right? if your DH manage to climb up more in the military and gain a promotion,bonuses, deployment money etc.. is that mean you have to spend that "extra" money coming in? Yes I know the saying that the more you make the more you spend but that's not entirely true it really depends upon yourself. Before I got out DH at the time(E5) and I was and E4 we live using my pacheck and we put his in the bank. Yes we have cc cards debts,insurance, vehicle payments but we manage to feed 3 people in the family by using an E3 pay. Now that I became a SAHM and DH is an E6 we still using our concept about living and using an E3 pay with (4 in the family) we manage to live and have food in our fridge, kids got clothes, our little one have formulas(thanks to WIC). We both been reading a lot of financial books neither of us are knowledgable when it comes to finances but we educate ourselves and what we are doing right now is getting rid of our debts and saving at the same time even if its just a little. We never touch our retirement and our savings no matter what. We don't even count that at all. Also, we pay ourselves first. DH alloted money from MYPAY and taken out from his paycheck and whatever we see in the LES is what we use to budget our money for 2 weeks. We paid off 2 cc so far and one more to go. By the end of May we will be debt free except for the vehicles but we are not going to paid those off yet because its good for our credit to keep it going. I'll be honest we were smart back then but also made dumb decisions with CC debts and spending whatever is left over but never pulling out from our retirement account. WE finally agreed that enough is enough with the CC payments its getting old and we are getting rid of them. I know being in the military is not easy but the way I'm looking at it its only temporary. DH is only going to stay for 20 yrs to collect his retirement and look for another job and have another retirement. But he is taking advantage of getting his college done despite heavy schedules, (field, long hours in the office, then there's going to be deployment) I even cried sometimes at night and ask myself if its worth it staying in? but we are almost halfway there little more to go but its really hard not think about the what if's situation