Savings Table By Age

ColinEdwards

I'm not even sure if one exists, but I've tried searching for a table that gives an average of Cash Savings by Age, I'd like to know roughly were I am compared to others. Thank you

Alexland

I don't think you would really be able to draw any conclusions from such a table as it would mix up people who were asset rich (and only holding enough cash for their rainy day requirements) with people who might be significantly less wealthy but actually hold more cash as they are cautious and adverse to investing. Rather than cash you might prefer to know people's net worth (total assets minus liabilities) by age however even this isn't simple as people with DC pensions might have a lot more assets than those with DB pensions who instead have valuable future guarantees.

colsten

Even if such tables existed, they would be pretty meaningless, as most people don't save enough, and/or not for the right things.

Scottish Widows do interesting research about retirement savings.

 https://adviser.scottishwidows.co.uk/assets/literature/docs/2018-Retirement-Report1.pdf



https://adviser.scottishwidows.co.uk/assets/literature/docs/2018-Retirement-Report1.pdf

ColinEdwards

Alexland said:

I don't think you would really be able to draw any conclusions from such a table as it would mix up people who were asset rich (and only holding enough cash for their rainy day requirements) with people who might be significantly less wealthy but actually hold more cash as they are cautious and adverse to investing. Rather than cash you might prefer to know people's net worth (total assets minus liabilities) by age however even this isn't simple as people with DC pensions might have a lot more assets than those with DB pensions who instead have valuable future guarantees.

Hmm Yes I hadn't thought of that, not quite the straight fwd answer I was looking for, but I do see what you mean. 

DireEmblem

Surely all that matters is that you are happy with where you are at, and what you will likely end up with when you decide to stop working, rather than measuring yourself against others from lots of different backgrounds and targets in life?

I think the best way to look at things, is if you are able to live the lifestyle you want now, while being able to save an appropriate amount to do the same in retirement.

kinger101

Knowing you're doing well compared to others can give a false sense of security.  It's better to come up with a plan for you own circumstances based on your income and life plans.  Home purchase and retirement being the two major events for most. 

Albermarle

The ONS ( Office of National statistics) do a Household Wealth survey  , if you are interested in these type of surveys.
The median household wealth is approx £250,000: Approx 13 % of households are worth over £1 million and 3% over £2 million.
Maybe surprising to some people the biggest component is pension wealth ( DC+ DB estimated values) , followed by property.
Financial wealth , which includes all savings , non pension investments etc minus non mortgage debt, is around 15% of the total . As a wild guess lets say 25% of that is cash , so the average household has a bit less than £10K in cash ,as a very loose estimate.

colsten

Albermarle said:
 As a wild guess lets say 25% of that is cash , so the average household has a bit less than £10K in cash ,as a very loose estimate.

I reckon you are way, way too optimistic

https://www.finder.com/uk/saving-statistics

Albermarle

I reckon you are way, way too optimistic

I wasn't really expressing an opinion ( optimistic or pessimistic) just trying to use some known statistics and make a guess from there.

The average figures published by ONS , include the large % of people with zero, small or negative wealth + a small number of people who are fabulously wealthy. To avoid too much skewing of the figures the £250K household wealth figure is a median rather than a mean figure. I think this figure is pretty valid, although I guess most of households will be at the higher age range.  Trying to work out a cash figure from this was a wild guess , as I said. 

afis1904

colsten said:

Albermarle said:
 As a wild guess lets say 25% of that is cash , so the average household has a bit less than £10K in cash ,as a very loose estimate.

I reckon you are way, way too optimistic

https://www.finder.com/uk/saving-statistics

Most of the wealth inequality in this country is in financial assets (apart from London iirc) so yes, you're definitely correct.

pafpcg

The ONS (as noted above) is probably the first place to look: www.statistics.gov.uk

In the past, I've used a table from ONS based on HMRC data with a breakdown by individual local authority by source of income (employment/self-employment/pensions, but not savings) and the income tax paid.  ["Wealth" is a relative term - I might think I'm wealthy in comparison with my current neighbours, but not if I moved to Kensington & Chelsea!  The 71k taxpayers in K&C pay HMRC an aggregate £3.8billion pa; the 74k  a few miles away in Barking pay barely one twentieth of that amount;  the taxpayers in the City of London with income from self-employment, all 2,000 of them, have a average (mean) income of £183,000 each....]

The annual Family Resources Surveys may give you some clues (but being based on DWP data are analysed by the amount of household income rather than the capital value).

There's almost, but not exactly, what you've asked for in the "Market value of Individual Savings Account (ISA) funds" tables (based on HMRC data) which give a breakdown by age & gender, but obviously it's only ISAs and includes Stocks&Shares ISAs.

Have a ferret around in the lists on the ONS web-site and you probably find something of interest!