V
incent Martin is 56 and on
track to retire right on time at- That’s no small feat, consid-
ering that he has never used a financial
adviser or other investment advice. A
Navy veteran and an IT engineer who
lives in Aurora, Illinois, Vincent is
proud to have gotten here on his own.
“There’s nothing a financial adviser
will tell you that you can’t find writ-
ten online somewhere,” Vincent says.
He has tried to help his daughters start
their own retirement funds too.
Self-driven financial planning isn’t
for everyone. We all face a future of
fluctuating costs—especially the costs
of living and health care—and that
means preparing for retirement can
feel like trying to hit a moving target.
Vincent’s path provides many good, all-
purpose lessons on how to maximize
your nest egg. But we also did what he
wouldn’t: We asked financial advisers
for further insight on his strategy.
Vincent’s retirement goal all along
has been clear: “I don’t want to have
to work,” he says. “I’ve been working
since I was 14, and quite frankly, I’m
tired.” Starting to save was perhaps the
hardest part. After serving in the Navy
for 15 years, Vincent found himself
working full-time as an IT consultant
and “just barely getting by.” On top of
that, he was enrolled in college and
got married to his wife, Pamela Mar-
tin. He wasn’t able to contribute much
to a 401(k) retirement-savings account
until his mid-30s, when he became a
systems administrator at a bank.
In many ways, Vincent’s story is
typical. A March 2018 Bankrate sur-
vey found that one fifth of Americans
aren’t saving any money for things
such as retirement, chiefly, they say,
because they can’t afford to.
“Like a lot of Americans, I was in
survival mode,” he says. “I didn’t have
any money to put away for retirement,
and all of my money was tight. I had no
liquid assets after I paid all of my bills.”
But as Vincent’s career and pay-
checks progressed, he taught himself
the ins and outs of retirement prepa-
ration. He sought out as much educa-
tional material as he could, including
financial magazines and Vanguard’s
online investment tools and calcula-
tor. He contributes 5 percent of his
pretax salary to a 401(k) through his
employer and receives a 5 percent
company match. He invests in a mix
of bonds held in an IRA to ensure sta-
bility in retirement and CDs, and he
has gradually funneled more of his
money to less volatile investments
as he has gotten older. So far, he has
managed to save about $400,000, and
he hopes to double that by the time
he retires.
To maximize his benefits, he also
plans to wait as long as possible—until
age 70—to draw from Social Security.
He expects to receive around $3,500
per month, or $42,000 a year, before
taxes. (Yes, Social Security benefits
may be subject to taxes.)
Will that be enough? Possibly.
Assuming that Vincent’s plannedrd.com 21