Its Never Too Late to Start Investing for Retirement

Michael Kitces, director of wealth management Pinnacle Advisory Group, sees it regularly in his financial planning practice: clients who are close to retirement but haven’t saved. “They fall into two groups — either they don’t focus on it, or they are despondent,” says Mr. Kitces. “They think their retirement is doomed — it’s a real lose-lose scenario.”

His clients are not alone. Among workers age 55 or higher and nearing retirement, almost half have saved less than $100,000, according to the Employee Benefit Research Institute. A third have less than $25,000.

The savings shortfall means many Americans face the prospect of retiring solely on Social Security, which replaces just 39 percent of pre-retirement income for the average worker retiring at 65, according to the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College.

But near-retirees do have some opportunities to improve their financial scenario in retirement. Which is not to give up on saving. Therefore, rule number one is to save more. If you don't live below your means, financial freedom is not within your reach.

If you start saving 25 percent of a $100,000 salary at age 50 could potentially have about $650,000 at 65 or about $1,000,000 at 70 (assuming a 7.5 percent investment rate).

So to start, create a household budget to reallocate spending to retirement saving - it is more challenging until your children are out of the house. But if possible, maximize contributions in your 401(k) account and open an IRA. Over the age of 50, you benefit from higher “catch-up” limits on tax-deferred savings, for 401(k) accounts it's $24,000; for I.R.A.s, it's $6,500.

The contribution limit for 401(k)'s and 403(b)'s increased to $18,500 in 2018. Take advantage of the additional pre-tax savings and future tax-deferred growth. The catch-up contribution limit for employees age 50 and over will remain at $6,000.

If you or your spouse has access to a workplace retirement plan such as a 401(k), you may not be able to additionally make a tax-deductible contribution to an IRA if you earn too much. The IRA tax deduction is phased out for high earners. The IRA contribution limit is $5,500, with an additional $1,000 catch-up contribution allowed for those age 50 and over. That’s potentially a total of $31,000 that can be invested in tax-deductible tax-deferred vehicles.

Also, waiting to file for Social Security offers another opportunity to increase retirement income. Social Security benefits, which are adjusted annually to account for inflation, can be claimed as early as age 62, but monthly benefits rise 8 percent for every year that you wait up to age 70, increasing your benefit by over 60 percent.

When investing be wary of high-cost funds, academics agree, generally the lower the cost of the fund, the more you keep – this translates to a larger balance at retirement.

As always, you should seek out a credentialed professional that is fee transparent and offers holistic, evidence-based advice.

CBlakely, CFP®, CTFA              01-2018

Sources: The New York Times, Center for Retirement Research at Boston College,  Employee Benefit Research Institute

Why Low-Cost Investing Likely Results in Above Average Returns

Several studies found that only the top 2 to 3 percent of active-fund managers have enough skill to cover their costs. It’s hard enough to save for a house or retirement. So why pay big fees for subpar investment returns? Maybe think about low-cost investing, with an eye toward index investing.

To quote Nobel Prize winning economist Eugene Fama on active managers: “You’re charging people for stuff you can’t deliver.”

We are in the early stages of a move toward low-cost investing as huge sums of money have been flowing out of actively managed mutual funds and into index funds. According to Barry Ritholtz, “we are in the middle of the Copernican Revolution about the proper way to invest or at least the rational way to invest.”

It’s easy to think — by seeing the ads and reading newspaper articles — that if you’re just clever enough, you’re going to win. The delusion comes in the form of how the stock markets actually work.  We don’t understand the negative-sum nature of active investing. Whatever you win, I lose. Whatever I win, you lose, and we both pay to play that game. So the negative-sum nature of investing is one problem that’s often overlooked.

And then there is the second problem, which is, most people suffer from overconfidence, particularly in noisy environments where the feedback is weak. That describes the stock market. It’s incredibly noisy and it’s really easy to misinterpret what the return on your portfolio means.

Simple, perhaps, but elusive. In part because the alternative — the gamble of picking stocks — is so seductive. Which may explain why it took so long for index funds to really catch on. The index fund is more predictable, and boring — which, as Jack Bogle sees things, is its virtue. “It diversifies away the risk of individual investments. It diversifies away the risk of picking a hot manager and diversifies away the idea that you can pick market sectors like healthcare, technology, or whatever it might be.”

And then there’s the cost comparison. According to Vanguard founder Jack Bogle, “They charge a lot for this service. We estimate the average expense ratio is almost one percent for an actively managed fund. Then these active funds, all of them have sales loads. The index funds do not. The active funds further turn over their portfolios at a very high rate and that’s costly. You add that all up and the cost of owning a mutual fund on average is two percent. You can buy an index fund of, an S&P 500 Index Fund, let’s say, for as little as four basis points, four one-hundredths of one percent. In a 7 percent market, you’re going to get 6.96 percent.”

That difference — two percent versus four one-hundredths of one percent — may not sound like a lot. But over time, those numbers are compounded by what Bogle calls the “relentless rules of humble arithmetic.”

Again according to Jack Bogle, “if the market return is 7 percent and the active manager gives you 5 after that two percent cost, and the index fund gives you 6.96 after that four basis point cost — you don’t appreciate it much in a year — but over 50 years, believe it or not, a dollar invested at 7 percent grows to around $32 and a dollar invested at five percent grows to about $10. Think what an investor thinks about when he looks at that number. He says, “Wait a minute! I put up 100 percent of the capital. I took 100 percent of the risk and I got 33 percent of the return.” Well, anybody that thinks that’s a good deal, I’ve got a bridge I want to sell them.”

To paraphrase Bogle, here’s the reality of the actively-managed mutual fund business, you get precisely what you don’t pay for. So, if you pay nothingⁱ, you get everything!

Now there are those who can and some people have and have for long periods of time. Look no further than Warren Buffett. The challenge is being able to identify in advance who will outperform the market, for them to beat the market consistently year over year, and then to do it in excess of costs, fees, taxes, commissions. How can an investor tell when it is luck or skill? 

The bottom line is most people are better off with low-cost indexing for most of their invested money. Active investment management may have a role in asset allocation and portfolio construction, but only when it’s low cost, adds diversification and is not used to exacerbate behaviors detrimental to accumulating wealth.

C. Blakely CFP®, CTFA                        10/2017

ⁱ - by nothing, I mean almost nothing.

Sources: Bloomberg View - Ritholtz, Freakonomics – Bogle interview, Fama Interview 

How to Add a Half a Million to Your Retirement Account by Cutting not Adding

I’ve been trying to come up with a scenario that fairly represents the difference one percent makes over our investing lifespan using as an example, two employees who systematically put the same amount of money away for retirement and then spend down those assets during about two decades of retirement.

The Scenario

It starts with two 30 year old employees who work until their full retirement age of 67. The first 20 years they invest in an 80/20 portfolio of stocks to bonds, starting with nothing and adding $750 a month (1/2 of the current contribution limit). At 50 years old, the mix is changed to 50/50 and again using 1/2 of the current contribution limit plus the catchup provision, which totals $1,000 a month. Finally, our representatives live another 18 years in retirement, so at 67 the portfolio allocation is again changed, this time to 20/80 stocks to bonds. It is also assumed during retirement they each receive monthly cash distributions from the portfolio. The return figures used are historical averages (see notes for detail) and inflation was taken into account using a 2 percent annual increase.

There is one key difference in the two portfolios, one was charged 27 basis points (0.27%) in fees using a passive funds strategy and the other was charged 1.27 percent for an actively managed funds portfolio. Effectively a one percent difference over the 55 years our investors were invested.

The Results

Over the first twenty years, from ages 30 to 50 the portfolios grew to $374,506 for the passive portfolio and $332,515 for the active portfolio, remember the only difference affecting return is the fee. Over the next 17 years leading to retirement, the passive portfolio ends up with an inflation adjusted $1.27 million while the active portfolio maxes out at $1.01 million. Again the difference is only due to fees. At 67 our retirees begin taking monthly withdrawals, the passive investor takes $6,500 a month for life and dies at 85 with about $430,000 left for heirs, charity or her dog. The active investor cannot take as much or the portfolio would be depleted prior to age 85 and instead takes $5,788 a month so that the portfolio is worth zero at death.

The one percent cost difference to an investor under this scenario over a 55 year period is well over $500,000. Over the 37 years of employment that little one percent fee difference accounts for a 30 percent difference in the amount of capital growth in the portfolios. During retirement the difference in fees is the difference between taking $78,000 out each year and having some capital assets left – comfy with some breathing room - or taking $69,450 out each year with nothing left at the end – live past 85 and its Social Security.

These results are only one of near infinite scenarios depending on when you start investing, how long you work, how much you put away, etc. The important takeaway is that lower fees mean better return probabilities for investors, irrespective of your age or dollar amount of your assets. In other words the less you pay the more you keep. This post does not even take into account that active fund managers have underperformed passive funds across most fund categories over longer-term time periods (10-15 years), making the case for low-cost passive investing even more compelling.* Although in theory the case for active management seems intuitive, the actual track record of most actively managed funds is underwhelming.

As always, seek the help of an accredited professional when it comes to your financial future.

CBlakely CFP®, CTFA          04/2015   

Notes: Inflation assumption - 2 percent per year. Historical returns: 80/20 portfolio 8.92% annually, 50/50 portfolio 7.71% annually and 20/80 portfolio 5.72% annually. Time value calculations used monthly compounding, and retirement calculations used sequential cash flows all with the same value (annuity).

Although the author (me) believes in the veracity of the formulas and results, these numbers have not been subjected to review and may contain errors.

Source: *The Case for Index Investing – Vanguard White Paper March 2015