Ensuring you have sufficient funds for your retirement requires calculating your investments, determining all sources of funds and estimating the amount of anticipated interest earnings. The amount of funds you will need depends on your goals and preferred lifestyle during your retirement years. You should routinely calculate your retirement funds to monitor your balance, make adjustments as needed and ensure funds are invested appropriately. Consider consulting a financial adviser to create a retirement plan that provides a mixture of funds for a balanced retirement portfolio.
Step 1
Gather all retirement fund information in a spreadsheet. Place the name of your funds and income sources in the left-hand column and the titles "current value," "projected value," "guaranteed monthly income" and "projected monthly income" along the top row. Include all pensions, investments such as IRAs, stocks, Social Security and annuities. If you anticipate working during retirement, include it in your column list.
Step 2
Determine how to review your account balance for each retirement account. Investment funds may offer an online account portal that provides an account overview, fund estimate and possibly fund projections. Social Security benefits can be assessed through an online retirement estimator or by contacting Social Security by phone and requesting a Social Security Benefit Statement. Pensions and other employment-based retirement accounts may require contacting the human resources department of the employer managing the funds.
Step 3
Look up the current value of your retirement savings. Insert the total on your retirement funds spreadsheet for each account on your list under the "current value" row heading. If the total value is not available, make an estimate based on any information you have on hand. If an account will deliver a set amount per month, place the amount under the "guaranteed monthly income" column.
Step 4
Estimate potential earnings and additional savings. Establish the amount of additional savings you plan to add to each account, how much interest earnings and any anticipated account increases until you plan to retire. Consider estimating your interest earnings by averaging the interest earnings you have currently received over the life of the account. Add your projections to your current account total and place them under the "projected value" column. Add projections for variable monthly payments such as a pension and retirement account disbursements.
Step 5
Total the value of each column. Review the totals for your account value and your estimated values. Compare your values to your financial plan and consider making adjustments to your contributions or investment allocations.
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