How much money will you need to live life your way? Whether retirement is just around the corner or half a lifetime away, it’s worth thinking about what you’ll want your life to look like when you’re older – and if you’ll have enough money to make it happen.
The Retirement Living Standards have been developed by the Pensions and Lifetime Savings Association (PLSA) to help you picture what kind of lifestyle you want to have when you wind down from working, and give you an idea of how much income you’ll need to support this lifestyle. They’re based on three different standards of living:
covers your basic needs, with a little left over for fun
provides more financial security and flexibility
allows for more financial freedom and some luxuries
To help you think about your lifestyle in retirement and how much money you'll need to achieve it, try our quick video quiz by clicking the play button below.
Click the 'play' button and take a few minutes to tell us how you want to spend your time in later life and we’ll tell you how much might need. You can change your answers to the quiz as many times as you like, so have a play around with the different lifestyles to see what the future might hold for you!
Thinking about the Retirement Living Standards and other financial commitments such as your mortgage/rent or social care, how much will you need to save to pay for the future life you want?
Your Annual Benefit Statement predicts what your TPT pension savings might be worth at your chosen retirement age. You can use the ‘Model My Retirement’ tool in your online Retirement Savings Account to see what impact changing your target retirement age or contribution levels might have on your pension savings.
Don’t forget to add any other pension savings and sources of income you’re expecting to receive. You can find any pensions you’ve lost track of by using the government’s pension tracing service and see how much state pension you’re likely to receive by checking HMRC’s state pension forecast.
Not on track and need to save more? Read on!
In addition to her State Pension, Alex needs her TPT pension savings to cover her expenses. She's thinking of taking her TPT savings from her State Pension age of 68 and will need these savings to last around 20 years. She's looked at her TPT pension statement and is on track to get £3,000 each year from TPT.
Alex runs through the TPT video quiz and sees she's somewhere between a minimum and moderate lifestyle.
She decides to log in to her Retirement Savings Account and use the modelling tool to experiment with the different options available to her, and check if her savings are on track.
With her State Pension she may have enough, but by using the calculator realises she'll need to save more because she'd like to be closer to the moderate lifestyle standard.
Now you know how much income you’re likely to need to achieve the lifestyle you want, let’s look at how you can increase your savings. Even small changes can make a big difference.
you can do this by logging into your Retirement Savings Account. You might find a different fund is better suited to your life stage or circumstances right now
for example, a bonus or gift from a family member
if your salary increases or if you finish paying off your student loan or a big purchase, for example, could you put the money into your pension instead?
some employers increase the amount they pay in when you increase your contributions, up to a certain limit. Check the maximum amount your employer will contribute into your pension by logging into your Retirement Savings Account, clicking on ‘Your TPT DC Pension’ and then the 'Change Contributions' button at the bottom of the next page
Explore the categories below to picture what later life could look like for each of the Retirement Living Standards. Don’t forget to switch the ’single/couple’ toggle to the option that’s appropriate for you.
*These amounts would fund this lifestyle for people living outside London. If you live in London you'll need a slightly higher income.
*These amounts would fund this lifestyle for people living outside London. If you live in London you'll need a slightly higher income.
If you haven't registered for your Retirement Savings Account yet, click here to find out how you can do it