I definitely envisioned retiring in my late 40's when in high school dreaming of becoming a pharmacist. Got into a state school in 2009 and should have had <40k in loans had the state not changed the HOPE scholarship last second and a grocery store I was working for stop offering their 5k a year scholarship the year I got in. Instead I ended up with 80k, and married another pharmacist with almost double the debt load, fortunately we should be able to do PSLF for her and end up only paying about 80k for her loans as well over 10 years.
We max out our 401ks right now, with the match that is 46k a year. We don't have much savings as we have just started our working career and had to pay for a modest wedding, nice honeymoon, etc. We like to vacation so probably spend 6-8k a year minimum on that, more some years especially when we plan on going to Europe. Now that we work at a place with a pension I plan on retiring at 57. Maybe earlier if the market does better then my 5-6 % estimated return. We should have >4million in 401k at 57 if the market returns 5-6% and would each pull in 40-50k a year in a pension.
Of course no one knows future returns, inflation, etc.
We are also planning on starting a family in the next few years so I'm sure that will eat into our savings outside of 401k.
I have less then 4 years on my student loans (at 3.5%), and both our vehicles (1.69%) so no hurry to pay them off ahead of time (except the student loans if I get extra money saved up), I'm focusing on liquidity. With those 3 things paid off it'll free up an extra 2k to 2100 a month in cash flow.
We make a relatively low salary at just at 100k (each) give or take a few k. So we don't have a huge sum left over, about 1000-1500 a month, are in a modest house at 250k+ purchase price.
