ideal 401k balance

**disneysteve** · 01-23-2025, 11:52 AM

Did you miss out? Yes. Can you do anything about that now? Nope, so just forget about it.

I think 60/40 at 48 and 43 is overly conservative, but what matters is what you think and if that allocation will get you to your goals.

If you want to increase your stock allocation, ignore whatever the market is doing right now. The absolutely best time to invest is always NOW. You're in your 40s. This is money that will be growing for another 40+ years. With a time line that long, you want to be benefiting from growth.

**EasyMoney00** · 01-23-2025, 11:55 AM

You didn't miss out on much. At 60/40, you were able to snag those big bull gains. Some people are aggressive forever, 95/5. There's no one size fits all.

How much longer do you want to work? I would keep doing what you're doing.

Also, as far as bull run/how high the market can go....most on here have a feeling that we ain't seen nothing yet. To the moon.

**kork13** · 01-23-2025, 12:44 PM

Agree with the others. You can't change history, so don't let it bother you. Going forward, 70/30 or 75/25 might be more traditionally appropriate for your age (120-age in stocks is a common rule of thumb) ... But honestly, whatever you're comfortable with is the true 'right answer'. With a 20-40 year timeline like you have, there's still plenty of room to run & grow in your accounts, so all you've got to do is let it happen.

**LivingAlmostLarge** · 01-23-2025, 01:48 PM

I think the returns for 60/40 and 70/30 and 80/20 is something like 1% per 10%. Something ridiculous. Does it compound? Yes but really does it matter? Not really. I lost out by renting from 2015-2017. I also lost out by not buying in 2015 when I thought we should. Hindsight is 20/20.

I just did a net worth review from 2013 to now. There were 3 years 2016,2017, 2018 our NW grew like less than 5% because I pulled out the house down payment and mortgage. So I put down 20% to buy a home and our portfolio literally stayed the same. We also had income only half the year in 2016 and 2015. So overall if you look at our NW it was flat for 4 years.

**FoolFromAZ** · 01-24-2025, 06:28 AM

Thanks for all the suggestions and comments. Agree i am conservative but I am really worried about correction we might get any time.. dont want to bump it up to 70 or 80 and suddenly see the correction within a few months or a year. at present, i want to wait for the correction, i know its kind of timing the market which I should not do. I am putting all new money in to equities though. when I check the overall networth.. without including real estate equities, my allocation is more like 50/50 technically as most of the 350K outside of 401K in cash.

**Jluke** · 01-24-2025, 06:30 AM

I would stick with your redirection plan with new money to equities.

otherwise good luck timing the market.

**EasyMoney00** · 01-24-2025, 09:15 AM

OP...just keep doing what you're doing. No harm, no foul. You're not an aggressive investor, nothing wrong with that.

**kork13** · 01-24-2025, 04:44 PM

Originally posted by EasyMoney00 View Post

OP...just keep doing what you're doing. No harm, no foul. You're not an aggressive investor, nothing wrong with that.

Exactly -- if you're more comfortable keeping it as is, so be it.

**srblanco7** · 01-27-2025, 02:06 AM

Originally posted by FoolFromAZ View Post

I joined this group around the time I and my wife started contributing to 401k back in 2008. After nearly 17 years, we have around 1.37 million combined in our 401k accounts. 350K in other accounts and cash. My age is 48 and my wife's age is 43. We both have been maxing out our 401k right from 2008. We used to take loans from our accounts for emergencies as we did not maintain any EF. Due to this, initial years we used to be very conservative as we had to take loan and sell equities any time. Now although we dont carry any CC balance and we have enough EF, as we are close to 50 and stocks are all time high, we are still maintaining conservative asset allocation.. like 60/40. What do you guys think about our balance at this age? Should we have gone aggressive ? Did we miss out the great opportunity presented by 15 yrs of bull market?

currently we are making 300K combined.

primary house : 310K Loan Zillow Value : 650K
Inv home: 85K Loan Zillow Value : 620K

Congrats on a great income and well done on becoming millionaires! Let's not lose sight - that's a wonderful accomplishment.

My 2 cents (though the value of my thoughts is likely worth less than that) - I think 60/40 is a fine AA for a 50 year old, especially if you're comfortable with it from a risk tolerance perspective. That being said, remember that a 50 year old still has (potentially) a 30+ year investment horizon.

Could you have been more aggressive/did you miss an opportunity? Most certainly. We all did. Nobody had the optimal AA for each and every year of the past 15. That's why we advise picking an AA you can live with and staying invested. Time in the market beats timing the market.

ideal 401k balance