Plan Participants

Your 401(k) benefit is one of the most important benefits, consider challenging yourself to review and tackle these items about your retirement goals and 401(k) plan.

Achieving your retirement dreams will not happen by accident. In order to live the retirement lifestyle you dream about, you will have to start saving.

A 401(k) plan for most is an easy way to save for retirement - if for no other reason than the money is taken from your paycheck before you have a chance to spend it. If your employer offers a 401(k) plan, sign up for it!

You probably know by now that you can build a sizable pool of savings if you take part in your company's 401(k) retirement plan. And guess what? Enrolling in a 401(k) is usually so easy.

One of the many great things about 401(k) plans is that your assets are usually “portable” when you leave a job, meaning you have the ability to take your benefits with you. But what should you do with that pool of retirement assets when the time comes?

When you build a 401(k) portfolio, one of the first decisions you will make is choosing how much of your money you want to invest in stocks vs. bonds. The right answer depends on many things, of course, including your experience as an investor, your age, and the investment philosophy you plan on using.

No one wants to see the retirement savings they worked for take a severe hit when the markets go south. But markets do go down, sometimes pretty dramatically. The truth is that these downward movements are inevitable for long-term investors.