When it comes to heading into our golden years and finally retiring, most of us have a handle on what it should cost. We know how much we roughly spend on the electric bill, how much our groceries cost and even what our weekly golf expenses are. After all, those beers at the 19th hole don’t pay for themselves. For the most part, we should be pretty prepared when looking at our costs once we decide to punch our last clock.
The great unknown in all of this comes down to healthcare.
The numbers on what we “should” expect with regards to that healthcare spending keep going higher and higher, and coping with those increased costs is going to take considerably more planning than any of us realized.
Tack on an Extra $100,000
If you’re serious about retiring in the next decade or so, you have most likely read or at least heard about the cost projections for healthcare expenses during our golden years. The numbers cited are often staggering six-figure sums, and in many cases, more than what the average American worker has saved in total. One of the more famous projections that the financial news media and pundits have clung to is a staggering $245,000 for a married couple, estimated by Fidelity a few years ago.
