Prepare for a worry-free future

Every retirement article I read assumes you’ll retire at 62 or 65. Between my investments and pension, I plan on being retired by the time I’m 50. However, I can’t find any articles or any advice that address the kind of situation I hope to have: Good pension, TSP (401k) account, civilian employment for 4-5 years following retirement from the military (from ages 46-50). Any ideas?

Provision allowing the transfer of as much as $100,000 directly from an IRA to a charity, tax-free, expires at year end.

View full post on WSJ.com: Retirement Planning

I’m 19 and my husband is 20 and we just got married 2 months ago. He’s in the military so I just relocated and haven’t found a job yet, but I am halfway done with my Bachelors degree. Anyways, we’re very cheap and love to save money. Both our new cars are paid off, and the army pays for rent and utilities for the most part, so we have a good handle on our bills.
Anyways, so far, after paying off our cars and buying all new furniture for our house, we have about $33,000 in savings, and until I get a job, we’re putting $400 into savings each month. Whenever I get a job, pretty much all of my income will go into savings, since we don’t like to have more than $2,000 in our checking account at any given time. Well I’ve been talking to my dad and he’s saying we should start a retirement plan, but he gets so confusing so after that I had no idea what he was talking about.
I was wondering if someone could explain what a 401K is or an IRA or any other kind of plans there are out there? More specifically, one that would be the most beneficial in our situation? Thanks alot!
No we don’t own a house yet cause of the military and moving around and stuff. He will be out within 2-5 years (depends if he reenlists or not) and we’re going to move back to Ft. Worth, Texas where we’re from. We’ll be buying a house there. Until then, just renting though.

What do you do when your retirement-plan choices stink? We lay out the best strategies.

View full post on WSJ.com: Retirement Planning