Plan early to the reach goals.

I am 33 and work in the private sector. My wife is a home maker. We have a one-year-old daughter. My parents are dependent on me. My extra income goes towards closing the home loan by next year. I have term insurance for ?1 crore. How do I reach my goals?

Nilesh Rathod

You can easily reach your goals since you have started planning 15 years ahead of the target. Your current annual living expenses of ?2.4 lakh will be ?13 lakh when you are 58, if inflated at 7 per cent.

To meet the monthly expenses at retirement you need to have a corpus of ?3 crore and it should be able to earn 1 per cent above inflation. If we assume that your salary increases by 10 per cent every year, the monthly EPF contribution of ?4,500 and the employer’s contribution will also grow by a similar amount. These contributions will help you reach a corpus of ?2.7 crore, provided the EPF continues to declare an interest of 8.75 per cent for its investments.

So, the shortfall will be ?30 lakh. To reach the target you need to invest a sum of ?1,500 per month to fund your retirement kitty till you turn 85.

Education: To meet your daughter’s education expense, you need to invest a sum of ?2,270 and it should earn a return of 12 per cent. For her marriage, your target is too conservative. Invest a sum of ?1,800 for your targeted corpus. But if possible set aside ?3,600 instead.

To meet goals you need to save about ?7,500 which is well within your present savings of ?8,000. Build an emergency fund of ?5 lakh for parents. In mutual funds, allocate 50 per cent to large-cap funds.