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Originally Posted by O.city
Hamas, I’m no expert on this by any means but I was in a similar spot with loans and such.
I would recommend paying as much as you can towards the debt repayment as you can. Don’t forget about retirement obviously, but getting out from under that will help alot
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Quote:
Originally Posted by DaFace
Yeah, do what you need to do to get the company match, but beyond that, debt reduction is your main priority for the near term.
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Congrats Hamas by the way.
And this is basically it. Don't pass up any free money so do the minimum contribution to get all the free money, so 5%.
After that, tackle debt. If you have any credit card debt, I'd start there. After that, work on the student loans and possibly refinancing them to a lower rate if you're able (not sure what you're paying).
I had $60k debt after my schooling so I only contributed 4-6% to my 401k (to get the entire free match) until I paid off my student loans last year. Now I do 12% to my 401k and it's barely noticeable out of my take-home with the loans now gone, even leaving money left over to contribute to a ROTH IRA each month.
Hopefully your employer offers cost effective index funds for your retirement plan. I am invested in only Index funds alone in my 401k (Large, small and foreign). Many companies finally offer low cost index funds, but there are still some hold-overs of employers who offer expensive and less than ideal retirement funds. Let us know your choices when you get that info.