
Millennials What is more important? Saving for short-term or long-term? - theodenanyoh
I&#x27;m trying to understand if millennials value short-term savings to long-term and why?
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kody
Asking this question on HN is probably not the most effective way to
understand what "millennials" value, but I'll offer my anecdote.

My #1 priority is to have $10k in emergency savings. I guess that's my version
of short-term savings.

Once I've hit $10k in liquid savings, I try to max out 401k and Roth IRA
contributions. I am working towards having enough for a good down payment on a
house by the time I am 30-32 (~10 years from now).

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trcollinson
Out of curiosity, why would you max out your retirement contributions if you
are trying to save for a good down payment on a house?

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sethammons
some of those let you pull out tax advantaged for your first house.

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megaman22
As far as I'm aware, you can pull your _contributions_ out of a Roth IRA
without penalty - they are post-tax dollars when they go in, until a regular
IRA or 401k. Earnings and returns are different.

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megaman22
Most do not. Financial illiteracy is rampant; most do not understand how to
use credit intelligently, or to figure out how much interest rates cost them
if they do use credit. Consequently far too many people either avoid using
credit entirely, or treat it like monopoly money and content themselves with
paying minimum payments.

Besides, an alarming percentage are still working shit jobs for no money, and
paying everything extra towards college loan bills for degrees in useless
things that do not make them employable, or worse, that they did not complete.

The idea of socking away enough money for a down payment on a house is,
depending on where you are, a daunting to Herculean task. When the dating pool
is filled with other people in a similarly fucked and precarious position as
yourself, incentives are not great to pair up and expose yourself to a
partner's poor financial decisions, further depressing the drivers to home
ownership.

So a lot of people just float around hedonistically, and maybe start to wake
up and become an adult around when they hit thirty. Or not.

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rc-1140
Definitely short-term right now. If I made a SDE's salary instead of a SDET's
salary and didn't live in a high COL area and didn't have to support a parent,
I'd be more inclined to value long-term savings. Objectively, planning for the
long term is better than planning for the short term, and I'd like to actually
make enough money to plan for it, but I gotta make do with what I got for now.
I do have a 401k via my job, and my credit is good, but nothing else.

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estilos
I prefer long term; I've my pension and house sorted at 30, and will be able
to retire early.

But I live pretty cheaply, and earn a decent income. When I'm saving for
something short term (a holiday, new tech, etc) I usually just pick up a
couple hours extra work, or don't over-pay into my savings/mortgage that
month. I think if that wasn't the case saving for the shorter term, more
experience-based things would be the priority in actually enjoying life.

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a-saleh
Currently short-term-ish?

I have achieved more than half-a-year of income in my short-term savings, but
I feel unsure if I should start long-term i.e. pension-fund-style savings. As
I will be 30 next year, I probably should. I probably should start saving for
my daughter's college.

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kennxfl
If you have to save, I'd probably advise against doing it through long-only
pensions. In 2008 when everything was wiped out, a lot of retirees had to
settle for next to nothing.

I'd strongly recommend watching this video:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBVx0Fw1VXo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBVx0Fw1VXo)

It totally flipped my savings approach.

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cwt
I saved a lump of money for the short-term and took a very long vacation. I
have a bit saved for the long-term from before, but now the focus is long-term
saving.

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mchannon
Millennials don't have enough money saved to apportion what they're saving. As
of 2017, 46% had 0 money saved. Another 36% had <$5k saved.

I don't think there's anything long-term about a 4-figure bank balance.

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jryan49
I think it doesn't have much to do with the generation. You'll find rich
people saving long-term and poor people saving for the short-term(or not at
all).

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sp332
What does saving for short-term mean? Spending quickly?

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theodenanyoh
Saving for short-term goals like a deposit on a home, purchasing a car or
other big ticket items, starting a family, taking a vacation.

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sp332
I'm lucky enough to have thought about my retirement planning first, before I
had most other expenses. So I set up a standard boring Roth 401(k) and have
been contributing to it with only one break, when I had some expensive car
trouble. My wife and I managed to pay off my school loans and our car loans,
but we still have a lot of credit card debt and it's going to be tough for us
to get a house, which we both really want to do.

I'd say I'm extremely lucky to have a job where I _can_ fund my retirement
account and also pay rent and pay off loans etc. But if you're asking about
priorities, long-term saving has always appealed to me more.

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theodenanyoh
Thank you. I really appreciate your input.

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1996
Living, not saving.

I do like the governement do worldwide: spend money today, not caring about
saving or repaying

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lern_too_spel
If that were true, government bonds would be worthless.

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1996
Compared to crypto, recently they have been.

