Saving $100,000 by 30 years old is a common goal for many Singaporean Millennials.
For many of us, our 20s is the best time to start building our retirement nest egg due to the power of compound interests. At this point of time, many of us do not have that many obligations such as children to provide for.
This target has been achieved by many young adults in Singapore. There is another senior of mine who also managed to save $100,000 when she was 26 years old. My friend, Rui Ming from The Woke Salaryman has done the same.
For young graduate working adults in Singapore specifically, I feel that to save $100,000 in your first few years of working is not impossible with careful planning and discipline.
Before beginning to explain how I managed to save money, I feel that it might be good to share more about what motivated me and made me take personal finance so seriously.
The biggest motivation for me to improve my finances is my loved ones. Saving enough would ensure that we have enough even if any of these circumstances (above) were to befall us.
As part of my grassroots work, I speak to residents on a weekly basis. There were a few times where I encountered older PMETs bring laid off in their 40s and 50s. This is due to many reasons such as being replaced by technological disruption or being replaced by foreign PMETs.
It is definitely a stressful period for them – to be able to balance between caring for their elderly parents, taking care of young children and saving for their own retirement. At the same time, re-entering the workforce is difficult due to ageism and economic conditions.
To protect my family, I decided to take steps to work towards ensuring my career if futureproof and being disciplined about saving while I am young.
Another factor that motivates me is the desire to contribute positively to my community. My main goal in life is not just to take care of myself and my loved ones but also to improve the lives of the citizens in this country I love.
With more savings, I can better contribute to society. For instance, besides volunteering physically at our monthly food distribution program for lower-income families in Bedok, I can now also donate to fund our operational expenses.
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5 steps to start saving in your 20s
As millennials, we would probably not be as lucky as the older generation who were able to earn so much from investing in property. We also face a higher cost of living which has outpaced that of our income increase. The cost of weddings has risen by 50 percent since 2011 and HDB resale prices have doubled from 2007 to 2017.
However, what we have the internet for us to share and exchange ideas and experiences so that we can improve our present situation.
I hope that my post would benefit other millennials in Singapore. Why am I sharing all these? Well, we are not in competition but in the same boat facing the same life challenges and circumstances.
Here is what has worked for me and I hope that you will be able to achieve the same:
1. Be thrifty and lead a minimalist lifestyle
I am striving to lead a really minimalistic lifestyle where I boil down my possessions to only what is necessary.
Here are some lifestyle habits which have kept my cost of living low. I know that these habits may not be for everyone but I hope that they can give you ideas on some practical steps you can take.
– My utilities bill (electricity, water & rubbish collection) is consistently less than $50 a month. I have no television set and only on my aircon once every few months. I hope that even with the 6.9% increase in electricity tariffs, we can keep our bills low.
– I don’t really buy accessories, new clothes or any branded goods. Yes, even on Chinese New Year, I’ve stopped buying new clothes. To prevent myself from wanting other material things, I install ad blockers. I also unfollowed friends/social media influencers whose lifestyle involves eating at cafes/restaurants often and always posting about their new clothes. The same goes for e-commerce mailing lists. The less exposure I have to advertisements and peer pressure, the less I feel tempted to spend.
– I eat at home most of the time and mostly cook vegetarian meals as I am actively reducing my meat intake for environmental reasons. Not eating at nice restaurants for lunch is quite challenging for me as I work at Tanjong Pagar and there is so much good food around.
To me, keeping one’s expenses low is really one of the most important factors
An older colleague at work once shared with me that it was not wise for the average person to spend money by spending on flashy cars, branded goods, and expensive properties. If one incurred such a debt, they may find it hard to keep up if they were to lose their job one day.
He argued that “sustainability” is much more important. If one had a lifestyle within their means, they could decide to stop work for several months and even go on holidays during this time without feeling much stress or the pressure to find employment asap.
The lower your expenses compared to your income, the more sustainable your lifestyle is
Read: The boring secret to getting rich
2. Invest to beat inflation
Of course, saving alone is not enough. If you’re an average Singaporean like I am, if you just rely on savings alone, it is really hard to achieve this goal.
You need to complement it with investing. Out of the money I save each month, I would put around 70 percent into investments. The idea is to accelerate the growth of your savings.
Every time I talk about the stock market, some of my female peers would dismiss it saying “let my husband or boyfriend handle it”. I feel this is a missed opportunity and would encourage women to take the lead in their financial lives.
Finance may seem like an intimidating topic. However, it isn’t actually that hard to understand or require a solid mathematical foundation.
I studied humanities-based subjects (journalism and public policy) in university, scored a C grade for H2 mathematics. I had zero knowledge about finance until I started working. If I can do it, so can you!
If you would like to learn how to analyze companies and invest, there is a free online webinar by my teachers which you can watch here.
One mistake I made in investing is not starting earlier to enjoy the power of compound interests.
I had several male friends who started when they were in army or university. I was late to the game only started when I started working.
The younger you start doing this, the better. To illustrate why this is the case, here is how much you would need to invest each month to retire as a millionaire. Say, you invest in a fund that would give you at a 6% annual rate of returns.
If you’re 20, and you want to retire a millionaire, you should be setting aside $361 per month. If you’re starting at 25, that jumps to $499. You can see how as you get older, you need to be setting aside more.
3. Don’t forget to diversify your investments
Several of my male friends share with me that their investment portfolio are made almost entirely out of stocks and cryptocurrencies. These tend to be more volatile and considered “high risk”. Though they also have the potential to give higher returns. I personally don’t invest in things which I don’t really understand such as cryptocurrencies.
Thus, if you’re like me and have a lower risk appetite, you may wish to diversify and complement your stocks with other types of investments such as ETFs, Fixed Deposits or the Singapore Saving Bonds.
While I may not be able to make as much as my peers who have a more aggressive portfolio, my more conservative strategy can better protect me from risks.
Currently, I am using a roboadviser to purchase ETFs and transfer money every month. I am looking at a more long-term investment i.e. 10 years. Hence, I don’t really check it on a daily basis.
Besides Robo-advisers, one can also purchase ETFs via POSB invest-saver account. You can read about the pros and cons here: As a new investor, should I purchase ETFs using POSB invest-saver or using Robo-advisors?
4. Optimize your forced savings – CPF
Love it or hate it, CPF is here to stay. So why not focus on how you can optimize your CPF?
While I do not use my CPF currently for investments, I add money to my Special Account annually. What are the benefits of doing so?
- The CPF special account has a minimum return of 4.0% per annum (p.a.). In contrast, the CPF savings in the Ordinary Account earn guaranteed interest rates of 2.5 per cent a year.
- Once your OA and SA hit $60,000 of which up to $20,000 must come from your Ordinary Account, you can enjoy an additional 1% p.a. interest. That is like having a free $600 per year. The sooner you hit this the earlier you can start earning 3.5% interest in your OA.
- You can claim tax reliefs on cash top ups.
- No one can take money from your CPF. Even if you go bankrupt, your CPF savings will remain safe.
Despite its’ benefits, CPF is not a perfect system and could do with some improvements. The shortcomings of CPF has been very frequently raised by residents during our house visits.
For example, CPF members could be allowed to start drawing down their CPF from age 60, if they choose to. Instead of having to wait until they are 63 or 65 years old. This will provide more flexibility for people who have retired early and need to start using their retirement savings if they are physically unable to cope with normal employment demands.
5. Your day job is the biggest investment of all
I know that some millennials feel that the purpose of a job is to fulfill your passion. It should be aligned entirely with your passion. They proclaim that “we should work for passion alone and not for money“. Some even consider thinking about money and how the worker benefits to be selfish, entitled and too practical.
This appears to be a new phenomenon in the past few years. If you think about it, for the longest time before our generation, a job is simply an exchange of labour and achievement of KPIs for money. I don’t feel that many of our parents were thinking about “passion”. They just did what they had to do. They provided for their families. They came home from the job, and then they pursued their passions. Are our parents any less hardworking, productive and successful? I don’t feel that way.
It is not wrong to follow your passion. However, it is also equally legitimate to work for the sake of having an income.
However, my perspective about my day job is a different one. I personally see my day job as my biggest investment. I am spending an extremely important asset that can never be recovered back – time – to achieve a steady monthly inflow of income and to secure more in the future.
Thus, I try to optimize my day job but finding the one which I find the work somewhat interesting, don’t mind doing, would likely be relevant in the next decade, gives me autonomy and can provide me the best possible rewards (material and non-material) for my time and effort.
Say you’re doing human resource, in most companies you’d probably do similar things – talent acquisition, talent management, employee engagement, payroll etc. However, if you work in F&B family owned business instead of pharmaceutical MNC in Singapore. The pay, benefits, prospects and work-life balance may vary greatly.
Besides looking at the benefits now, it is also important to think about the future returns on your current investment into your day job.
Think about your own day job which you wake up early to go to each day. Are you in a rising or declining company or industry? Can your current role open doors to better roles within or externally? Does your role offer you the best plan? Do you know what others in similar roles are earning? Are you getting the best possible deal in the market for your effort and time? If not, perhaps it is time for a switch.
Most of us have been taught that money is the root of all evil and one of the things you do not talk about.
However, I am glad to see that there is an increasing trend of young people being more open about talking about money, exchanging ideas and even sharing salary information to help each other.
This open sharing and exchange of information only benefits all of us.
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