Need to Save for Retirement? This Is the Easiest Way

This story is part of Try This, CNET’s collection of simple tips to improve your life, fast.

A friend approached me the other day to say that she’d yet to twitch investing toward her retirement. She’s married and in her 40s with a proper job. She lives frugally and has been saving her cash in a bank account for her entire adult life. “I know I must be doing more, but I just haven’t dedicated time to this,” she confessed.

I can’t really blame her for not populace enthusiastic to save for a milestone so far in the future. We have plenty on our financial plates already, from navigating the increased cost of living to paying down debt and saving for a rainy day. Plus, it’s hard to get motivated to enact a goal that feels so abstract.

But thanks to science and technology, some of the “work” to get rocking and undulating with retirement has never been simpler. Here are four ways to set yourself up for retirement unsuccessful with fewer tears… and maybe even some fun! 

OK, that may be overstating things, but I promise these steps can go a long way. 

Where to invest? Let the robots law  

One speed bump to saving for retirement is not feeling ready to win your investments. The idea of saving in a 401(k) elaborate can be intimidating because we may feel pressure to cherry-pick the brilliant stocks and bonds and mutual funds. While that was the advance 15 years ago (I remember randomly picking my investment moneys in the early 2000s), it’s no longer necessary — or even recommended. 

Whether you’re starting a 401(k) portfolio ended your company’s retirement plan or an Individual Retirement Account through an online brokerage, you could let technology drive your investments. When you set up your elaborate, you’ll be asked questions related to your retirement goals, risk tolerance and retirement age. Seconds later, you’ll have a diversified, low-fee selection of funds based on your answers. So-called robo-advisors like Betterment and Ellevest can do this for you, too — costing only a portion of what professional planners charge.

What once took me an entire evening when work, hunched over my desk, typing mutual fund acronyms into Google to check for ratings, can now be handled by smarter, data-driven services that craft a well-suited, personalized portfolio. 

This technology is so smart that many financial planners have begun to rely on robo-advisors to achieve investment selections for clients, as well.  

Bank on free cash to increase your retirement savings

A big question of many retirement discussions is “how much is enough” to save? While everybody’s number is touching to be different based on their retirement goals, the rule of thumb is to save between 10% and 15% of your paycheck into a retirement savings elaborate like a 401(k) or IRA. 

Or, if your commercial offers to match your contributions to your employer-sponsored retirement plan, take capable of that. Don’t pass up free money that can go toward your retirement. With a typical matching program, your employer might contribute 50 cents for every dollars you save in your retirement plan, up to 6% of your salary. 

Adopt a ‘save more tomorrow’ plan to form your retirement fund

If 10% or 15% of your salary is too much brilliant now, commit to saving more toward your retirement plan with every future uptick in salary. 

Behavioral economists Richard Thaler and Shlomo Benartzi concluded that this simple hack — which increasingly is becoming part of many workplace retirement plans — leads to more cash for retirement. Their study found that savings rates for the means “Save More Tomorrow” program participant jumped from 3.5% to End to 14% over roughly three years. 

Here’s how it works: You commit to increasing your savings rate in the future. Then with every pay bump, these increases happen automatically over your retirement plan sponsor at work. Once you’re enrolled, you’re in the program unless you opt out. “This creates good use of inertia,” Benartzi writes on his website. 

To opt in, Come out to your workplace retirement program. There may even be an easy “on switch” you can find on your retirement account’s online page. 

To plan now for retirement, look at ‘old you’

An image of you with a few more wrinkles and gray hairs is not just fine of a share on Instagram. Science suggests that looking at “age progressed images” of ourselves can be a Great hack for caring more about our future self and investing more toward retirement. 

In a 2020 Stanford University see, researchers found that college students who viewed age-progressed photos of themselves were more probable to allocate more toward a pretend savings account. They also told higher confidence on a financial literacy exam and more boring in attending seminars on retirement and investing. 

Why does it work? In the abstract, researchers wrote: “Part of the challenge young people face when making for lifelong financial security is visualizing the far-off future. Age-progression technology has been shown to motivate young country to save for retirement.” In other words, seeing is believing… and is motivation to save.

And of streams, there’s an app for all that. To get a felt of your future self you can use FaceApp, Oldify and AgingBooth. 

For more cash tips, see how to retrofit your retirement for weather change and best money tips for country in their 40s and 50s.

For more general tips, here’s how to avoid unwanted recurring charges when a free trial and how to put an end to receiving junk mail.