Q: What should I be saving for first, my retirement or my child’s education?
A: Anything you can do for your retirement needs to be first. If you have the ability to save pre-tax through a 401k or 403b, do it. Pre-tax saving puts whole dollars to work for you and will have a smaller impact on your spendable dollars vs. after-tax savings. With potentially more spendable dollars, you can then start an education savings account for your child.
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It may be tempting to buy or keep a large percentage of company stock in your 401k. After all, you company is successful, right? We believe in diversification, so I do not feel comfortable if more than 10% of any holding is in your portfolio, maybe less for your company stock. Let’s look at a couple of things;
Your income is dependent on that company.
Your benefits are dependent on that company.
You can control how much of your retirement savings is dependent on that company.
Some planners might say that due to the points I have just made, you should not put any of your 401k savings into your company stock