Financial Goals For Your 20s and Financial Goals For Your 40s
Financial goals are just as important as life goals or career goals, we have always maintained that. However, just as life and career goals change as you grow, financial goals also need to develop and evolve over time. For example, when you are fresh out of college and starting a career, your first thoughts may be to invest to buy your first car or save for your marriage. Similarly, when you reach your 30s and start a family, your children’s education becomes an important goal.
These examples illustrate the importance of goal setting and goal development as you progress. While it is recommended that you start investing early and stay invested until you retire, it is also important that you have diversified your investments to meet both short-term and long-term financial goals.
Therefore, we have brought you a list of goals that may be important for you in your 20s and another list of goals that you may want to focus on when you have turned 40. Let’s look at them now.
Financial Goals For Your 20s
- Start a retirement fund: small amounts invested early on can help you build a huge corpus of wealth when you retire. For example, if you invest INR 2,000 every month when you are 25, you can reach up to INR 1.4 crores by the time you turn 55, based on a CAGR of 18%. You can read more about how this works in our blog here.
- Start an emergency fund: This fund must be untouched unless there is an emergency, such as funding the hospital bills for a family member after a serious health issue or for shielding you from a job loss due to unforeseen circumstances. This can be funded with small amounts every month and left untouched unless there is an emergency.
- Invest for short-term goals such as a new car or wedding: While equities are great for long-term goals, bonds and debt funds can help you achieve short-term goals. You can allocate a part of your investment amount for such securities if you want to fulfil short-term goals such as buying a car or saving for marriage. These securities are also low risk, so you can invest knowing that you will get steady returns without losing too much over the short term.
Let’s take the example of Ananya. She is now 21 and earns about INR 25,000 each month. Out of this amount, she has about INR 5,000 to invest with. She decides that she will invest INR 2,000 in her long-term fund with the goal of retirement and INR 3,000 in her short-term fun with a goal of buying a car by the time she is 30.
We have already explained how much Ananya can potentially make in her long-term goal. Now let us look at her potential earnings for her short-term target of buying a car.
Ananya has 9 years to buy a car and we assume that her investment can grow at 8% CAGR. If she invests INR 3,000 every month towards this goal, Ananya will have about INR 4.4 lakhs with her to buy a small car. This is good enough, considering this was done through small investments and by taking on no EMIs or loans.
Now let us look at some goals for later in your life.
Financial Goals For Your 40s
Focus On Retirement Planning: Though you have started your retirement fund in your 20s itself, you may want o to increase the funding amount for this fund when you are in your 40s and focus on ensuring you have enough when you retire. As your career progresses, you may have more money to spare for investments. You could allocate a large portion of this for your retirement
- Continue Investing For Your Children: Your children will soon start college or it may be the time for their marriage. You may have to bear the responsibility for these expenses in your 40s, and you certainly would want your children to be set up for a comfortable life in the future. This means you will have to continue investing for your children well into your 40s.
Ensure You Have Enough In Your Emergency Fund: This can come in handy when you fall ill and need emergency medical care. The small amounts you began investing early on should already be paying dividends for you, but it is better to continue building an emergency fund because one can never tell how handy such an investment could be. After you retire, this fund will continue to make gains for you, and you can withdraw it at any time.
For example, Prakash wants to have an emergency fund worth INR 10 lakhs by the time he retires, in addition to his other expenses. He decides he needs to save INR 3,500 towards this goal. Assuming a CAGR of the same 8%, Prakash can easily achieve this goal by the time he retires. Such tiny amounts can grow immensely over time.
Some goals may be common for both the 20s and 40s. The difference is, however, that you must begin investing as early as you can. If, for example, you have only started investing in your 40s, then you may have to be a little more aggressive with your investments and financial planning so you have enough to retire in peace.
Whatever be the age, start investing and stay invested.
Savart can help you plan your finances and investments no matter what your age or financial goals may be. Our proprietary system, Vantage, will bring you the best investment portfolio that suits your lifestyle and financial goals. To get such customized investment advice delivered to you, reach out to Savart today! You can also download our app from the Google Play Store or the Apple App Store. For a detailed explanation of how to use our app, watch the walkthrough video here.
Disclaimer: This article is for illustrative and educational purposes only. Returns are influenced by market forces, are not guaranteed. Investors are advised to conduct thorough research before making any investments.