Baby boomers have diverse opinions about what makes the “perfect retirement”. In fact, most of us aren’t planning on retiring at all, at least in a traditional sense. Instead, the majority of baby boomers say that they want to continue to work past retirement age, either in their existing job or by starting a new career. The rest are looking forward to taking a well-deserved break after decades in the workforce.

How Far Will Your Retirement Savings Take You?

When I asked the people in our Boomerly community where they wanted to live in retirement, they were evenly split between wanting to stay where they are and moving somewhere exotic. 55% of our readers said that they wanted fun in the sun, while 45% said that they are happy where they are.

Regardless of how you want to live after retirement age, one thing is for sure – your lifestyle will be determined by how much money you have been able to save. Even if you plan on working, there is no guarantee that you will be able to stay active forever.

According to a recent report by the Insured Retirement Institute, many baby boomers have “rose colored glasses with regard to the lifestyle they can realistically sustain during retirement.” They point out that, using reasonable assumptions, $100,000 in retirement savings would provide a lifetime income of about $450 per month.

This number is especially concerning when you consider the fact that, according to Charles Schwab, only 40% of baby boomers have saved even this much.

I’d love to hear what you think about this. Regardless of whether you plan on working after age 65, are you comfortable with the amount of money that you are saving for retirement? Or, do you still feel like you have a long way to go to meet your retirement savings goals?

Are you comfortable with how much you have saved for retirement? Do you plan on continuing to work past retirement age? Please join the conversation.

Here’s a short video that I recorded on this topic.