By: Laura Walton AFC®
For our 3rd Decade program, it’s all about the bass, in our case, the bottom line. Now that we’ve had a chance to track ‘before’ and ‘after’ net worth statements for our participants, we’re seeing “all the right junk in all the right places” to take a line from Meghan Trainor’s hit song.
Take a look at these results:
A single 29-year-old with $39,000 in take-home pay increases retirement savings by $5971 and pays off $7245 in debt to improve their net worth by $13,215 in just 9 months.
A 32-year-old with $50,000 in take-home pay increases retirement savings by $13,430 and pays off $5720 in debt to improve their net worth by $19,150 in just 9 months.
A married couple, 27 and 28, with $75,000 in take-home pay increases retirement savings by $13,600 and pays off $31,300 to improve their net worth by $44,900 in just 8 months.
Wow!
I didn’t cherry pick these results. Almost without exception, participants have made dramatic changes to their finances. In fact, some have been so dramatic that I hesitate to site them – like the couple I met with last week, both 29-years-old, high earners with virtually no debt and a laser focus on saving. They increased their net worth by $80,552 in 10 months!
They are the walking examples of the 3rd Decade pitch – keep living expenses low, delay buying a home, even delay having children while you max out saving and investing. One of our challenges is “60×30” – save $60,000 by the time you’re 30 and you’ll have $1 Million at retirement*.
You can only imagine what these net worth statements will look like in 10 years not to mention the choices these individuals will have – what kind of work do I want to do instead of what kind of work will pay my bills, what can I do to support the causes I believe in, how can I help my community? It’s powerful.
Back to a Meghan Trainor lyric, “every inch of you is perfect from the bottom to the top” – the bottom lines of 3rd Decade participants are looking pretty perfect!
*age 67, 8% return