How much money should I be saving?

Planning to save “whatever is left” at the end of each month is really no plan at all. It’s amazing how easy it is to spend every dollar that comes in and there never seems to be any left for savings. Savings has to be an integral part of your financial plan or you will always put it off for tomorrow. So just how much should you be saving?
In addition to setting up an emergency savings fund and maxing out your retirement plans such as your 401(k) or IRA, a good goal is to save at least 10% of your income. This should be built into your monthly budget and can increase as your income grows.

How much house can I afford?

It’s important to note that how much house you can afford is oftentimes very different than how much money the bank will loan you. Although lending standards have tightened considerably in recent years, it’s still possible to get home loans for more than you can realistically afford.

If you are looking to buy a house a good rule of thumb is to not spend more than 3x your annual income. So if you earn $50,000 per year, then you should be able to afford a $150,000 house. If you have zero debt outside of your mortgage, then you can generally use 4x your annual income.

Another way to look, that financial advisors often look at this, is that your housing costs (including principle, interest, property taxes, insurance and utilities) should represent 28-36% of your monthly income.

How much should I have saved for retirement?

This is a very smart question to be asking, because the prudent man forseeth the evil and hideth himself (Proverbs 27:12). Yet 54% of Americans have never calculated how much they will need for retirement.

There are several other factors that come into play, but a good rule of thumb is for your retirement portfolio to be worth 25x the amount you anticipate living off each year. So if you plan to live off of $50,000 per year in retirement, your retirement portfolio should be $1,250,000 (or 25 x $50,000).

It’s also important to be realistic about how much you will spend during retirement. For the most part your expenses will remain the same or even higher. So don’t assume that you can live on $25,000 per year in retirement, if you are used to living on $50,000 now.
How much debt should I have?

The ideal answer is probably zero, but the realities of life dictate otherwise. Experts recommend that your total long-term debt payments (e.g. mortgage, car payments, credit cards and loan payments) should not exceed 36% of your gross income. Although many people carry higher debt-to-income ratios than this, once you go above 36% your credit score will be impacted.

How much life insurance should I have?

If you’re married, and particularly if you have children, you definitely need to have life insurance. The question is – how much life insurance do I need? There is no hard-and-fast rule that gives you this answer, but a good rule of thumb is 6x – 10x your family income.

Sticking with our example of a family that earns $50,000 per year, they should purchase a minimum of $300,000 in life insurance coverage and ideally purchase at least $500,000. Of course this number will be impacted by many factors such as how old your children are, how much debt you currently have, etc.

Friday
The opening Worship service and introduction by Bro. Glenn Goodwin of the Des Moines, IA Gospel Assembly.

Bro. M. Gumbo from Manchester, UK

Service Start Times:

• Friday Morning: 11am
• Friday Evening: 6pm
• Saturday Morning: 11am
• Saturday Evening: 6pm
• Sunday Morning: 11am

There will be breakfast served on Friday, Saturday and Sunday mornings. Dinner will be served between services on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

She wrote:

My personal experiences working in the music department: I was not only the band director, but I played the piano and led song services in our local assembly – but also in other assemblies during a convention or a fellowship meeting.

I had a wonderful instructor in music. Her name was Ruth Weatherington. Her words spoken to me were words of wisdom. She said the piano player was not important but the position I held was important. The piano keys were not to be played hard but treated gently as any instrument would. I was taught never to approach a service with a carnal mind. The most important thing was to exalt Christ – not myself.

Be cheerful while sitting at the piano. Have a spirit of humility; not a proud spirit. Be approachable; not arrogant. Be willing to share your knowledge of how to build a song service with others. Be willing to share the piano with others.

Be patient with other piano players. Listen to suggestions. Pray about the suggestions even if they are never used.

While playing the piano never try to display self by adding extra notes. (This goes for those who play instruments in the band too.)

Personally, I tried to display Christ in my playing and singing as I was taught by my teacher – Ruth Weatherington.

Marriages in the body of Christ should be the best, the most godly, the most biblical marriages on earth. In prior articles, we have investigated the fact that God gave marriage to make us holy, and that love is a decision and not an emotion. Then we began addressing various aspects of a Christian marriage one at a time, covering the need for respect, for prayer, and for perseverance. Proceeding, this article will discuss the need for struggles and hardships. Yes, the need for them. They are part of the very fabric of every good marriage.

If you cut open a cocoon, the butterfly that emerges will never fly. If you help open the eggshell, the chick that emerges will be weak, and will die. The butterfly must struggle to get out of the cocoon. The chick must struggle to break out of the eggshell. Those animals need that struggle to grow strong and viable. It is God’s plan.

Is struggling also a part of God’s plan for His people so they can grow spiritually strong? Should our life be easy? What spiritual opportunities are hidden in our difficulties? Does a life of comfort produce Christian maturity?

What about married life? Should that part of life always be easy? Is there any spiritual benefit to be gained from the tough times, the uncomfortable seasons, and the marital struggles that everyone eventually encounters? In II Corinthians 4:17, Paul calls his sufferings just a light affliction – but an affliction nonetheless. And remember, this man was beaten with rods and with whips, he was stoned and left for dead, he suffered innumerable hardships, but he considered them a light affliction, and knew they were necessary to produce something very valuable.

It seems that marriage is much the same way. Fairy-tale lives are not true. Hollywood movie endings present a false concept. Nobody lives happily ever after. There are tough days and difficult times in every marriage; every single one. But they are part of the refining process; turning raw material into fine gold. Illnesses, financial struggles, family problems, and such are necessary to build the kind of relationship between a husband and a wife that can display the glory of God to the world.

A real, Christian marriage can show the world the redemptive love, the godly patience and the abiding love of God in a very real way. Learning to love and appreciate your spouse, once you realize he or she is not the person you thought they were when dating, is a difficult endeavor. Everyone who is dating has an image in their mind of who the other person is. But reality never matches perception. Marriage is learning who your partner is, and then learning to accept, respect and even love that person. That is sometimes a struggle.

Financial difficulty is a typical part of the struggle. So is child-rearing. Sometimes one marital partner has health issues; sometimes both do. Some of life’s dreams vaporize in the dazzling light of reality. Bickering, arguments, jealousy, different goals, different beliefs, different hobbies and recreation, and different circles of friends can all create hardships. But good marriages are the ones that endure hardships.

A good marriage is not something you find; it is something you build. It is something you must work for. It takes effort – struggle. It is hard work. But so is running in a marathon; yet the reward motivates some people to work hard in order to be prepared to run in that race. For them, it pays off. The struggle makes the man or the woman. So does the struggle make the marriage.

David could not have been as great a king if he had not been hated, mistreated, and persecuted by King Saul. Rejection by man drove Jeremiah closer to God. Paul’s constant rebuffing by his own countrymen made him the apostle to the Gentiles. Every hero of the faith was made and shaped by their struggles. Our faith not only is seen through our struggles, it is formed and refined by them.

Do not run from the struggles of marital life. Gain from them. Let them mature you in Christ and drive you closer to the Lord. When you just cannot communicate with your spouse, talk to the Lord. When keeping your promise is difficult, bear your cross. Let the periodic discord in the marriage be the exercise program that strengthens your spiritual muscles. Endure hardness as a good soldier of the cross. II Timothy 2:3.

This attribute relates closely with the previous one about endurance. Actually, all of the attributes of a Christian marriage are interrelated. To endure implies that there are hardships to be endured. But my focus in this point is not the endurance, but the struggle. Marriages become strong because of the struggles to overcome challenges. Marital difficulties are, by definition, difficult. Married life is not easy; it isn’t supposed to be easy.

Hard times are hard. The death of a child, for instance, can either wreck, or it can strengthen, a marriage. But it will be a difficult time either way. Marriages are either strengthened or weakened by severe financial distress, debilitating sickness, or some foolish and immature act. It is how you respond that matters.

Struggles are good for you. Financial trouble can and should draw a couple closer together. Young people should not expect to start out with just as nice a house, just as nice a car, just as nice furniture, as their parents have. It took those parents 20-30 years to achieve that financial status, and they had to scrimp and save at times. Young married couples sometimes think they should start there, and go too far in debt, and get frustrated in their attempt to have it all. But there is something good and valuable in having to do without, to have to count the cost before going to the grocery store, to saving a dollar here, and having to wish you could afford that vacation.

The race for a happy marriage is a marathon and not a sprint. You have to keep running over the long haul. It is that way with the entire Christian experience; marriage is a part of that for most people. Paul said in I Corinthians 9:24 that you must run, that you may win the prize. And Hebrews 12:1 admonishes us to run with patience, but run.

Try to look at your hardships in a different light. View them as blessed experiences. They were carefully handcrafted for you by God, and filtered through His heart of love, before they reached you. You must need them, or He wouldn’t have given them to you. Look back on your life, especially your life as a follower of the Lord. Have there been any benefits to prior difficulties? Did God bring you through them? Then He will bring you through your marital struggles and hard times as well.

Solomon’s wise words have been repeated millions of times, but sadly few actually take them to heart. Last year, the Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI) released their 20th annual Retirement Confidence Survey and the results were shocking.

An astounding 31% of currently employed workers have not even started to save for their retirement. That means that nearly 1 in 3 workers in this country have not saved a single dollar for their retirement. Yet a significant percentage of these people still feel confident that they will have enough money to retire on.

Almost everyone hopes to be able to enjoy retirement some day. Sure it may seem like a long way off for some of us, but it is still a real expectation. However, few people understand how much money they actually need to save in order to fund their retirement. In fact, 54% of Americans have never even calculated how much money they will need in retirement.

Recognizing the cost of retirement can be an eye opening experience. It’s never too early to start saving for retirement, but it is possible to wait too late before starting. To help you in achieving your retirement goals here are some savings strategies for you to use regardless of your age.

Teenage Years

Few teenagers are actually thinking about retirement savings or saving for anything for that matter. However, if you were to save $100 each month beginning at age 18, you would have accumulated over $1.3 million at a 10% annual return by the time you reach 65. If you had waited until you were 40 to start saving $100 per month, you would only have $135,000 saved up by the time you reached 65. Instead of saving $100 each month, you would need to save $1,000 to reach the same goal of $1.3 million by age 65.

The longer you put off saving, the more money you will need to contribute to make up the difference.

Roaring 20’s

By the time most people reach their 20’s, they are already saddled with student loans, car loans, credit card debt, etc. On top of all that, they are looking to get married and buy a house, furniture, a second car, etc. There hardly seems to be enough money to cover the monthly bills, much less set aside money for retirement.

This is also the time that most people get their first real job. Implementing a regular savings plan by setting aside a portion of each paycheck is an important pattern to start early on. Ideally, you will begin to set aside 10-12% of your income towards retirement savings. Oftentimes your employer will help you with this by providing matching contributions into a 401(k) plan.

Terrible 30’s

Upon reaching their 30’s, many people are focused on spending money to upgrade their lifestyle. A bigger house, nicer car and the latest electronic gadgets suddenly become must-have items. That’s on top of the surprisingly high cost of raising children! It’s no surprise then that so many individuals forget about saving for retirement.

Hopefully, you have already established a pattern of saving 10-12% of your income by this time. With 30-40 years of compounding interest ahead, it’s important not to be tempted into cutting back now.

Fabulous 40’s

Unfortunately, most people don’t start getting serious about retirement savings until they enter their 40’s. By this time they have already missed out on 20 years worth of savings. They can still catch up, but it’s going to require a strict financial commitment (and much larger contributions to their savings account).

If you have been saving regularly for the past 20 years, then you are able to enjoy the benefits of your earlier savings strategy. You should already be able to see a nice nest egg taking shape.

Fantastic 50’s

Many people begin to panic when they reach their 50’s, because they realize just how little they have saved for retirement. A recent Wells Fargo report found that the median retirement savings was only $29,000 for people in the 50-59 age brackets. Sure these people are making more money that ever before, but it’s hard to begin an aggressive savings strategy at this point in your life.

Hopefully, by the time you reach your 50’s you are contributing the max amount to your 401(k) or IRA each year. Now that your retirement years are on the horizon, it’s time to shift your portfolio to safer investment options. You’ll want to protect that nest egg that you’ve worked so hard to accumulate. You should also be working diligently towards having all your debts paid off by the time you retire (house, car, credit cards, etc.).

Swinging 60’s

By the time you reach your 60’s, you have probably commenced your retirement countdown. If you have been particularly good at saving, you may even be contemplating early retirement. By this stage in your life the vast majority of your investments should be in conservative holdings as you can’t afford to have your 401(k) cut in half by a market crash.

The most effective retirement savings strategies are those that start when you are young. Consistently saving 10-12% of your income will enable you to face your golden years without having to worry about your finances. Remember it never is too early to start saving, but if you delay it can eventually become too late.