Less than a year at my first job out of college, what do I save for first?
On paper the whole 6 months living costs sounds (and is) great, but in real life there are a lot of things that you need to consider. For example, my first car was constantly falling apart and was an SUV that got 16MPG. I have to travel for work (about 300 miles per week) so getting a sedan that averages close to 40MPG saves me more in gas and maintenance than the monthly payment for the new car costs. When our apartment lease was up, the new monthly rent would have been $1685 per month, we got a 30 year mortgage with a monthly payment of $1372. So buying a house actually let us put aside more each month. We have just under 3 months of living expenses set aside (1 month in liquid assets, 2 months in a brokerage account) and I worry about it. I wish we had a better buffer, but in our case the house and car made more sense as an early investment compared to just squirreling away all our savings. Also, do you have any debt? Paying off debt (student loans, credit card debt, etc.) should often take top priority. Have some rainy day funds, of course, but pay down debts, and then create a personal financial plan for what works best in your situation. That would be my suggestion. I recommend saving for retirement first to leverage compound interest over a long time horizon. The historical real return on the stock market has been about 7%.  Assuming returns stay at 7% in the future (big assumption, but don't have any better numbers to go off of), then $8,000 saved today will be worth $119,795 in 40 years (1.07^40*8000).  Having a sizable retirement portfolio will give you peace of mind as you progress through life and make other expenditures. If you buy assets that pay you money and appreciate, you will be in a better financial position than if you buy assets that require significant cash outflows (i.e. property taxes, interest you pay to the bank, etc.) or assets that ultimately depreciate to zero (a car).  As a young person, you are well positioned to pay yourself (not the bank or the car dealership) and leverage compound interest over a long time horizon. Too long for a comment -  It's great that you are saving to the match on the 401(k). Does your company offer a Roth 401(k)? If so, you might consider that, instead. From the numbers you offered, you are likely in the 15% bracket now, but will find you move to 25% in years to come. The 2014 tax rates are out and how the 15% bracket ending at $36,900. (Over $47,000 gross income). I'd rather see you pay tax at 15% now, and use pre-tax accounts as your income rises. If the Roth is available. You should plan 1-3 months for an emergency fund.  Saving 6 months of expenses is recommended by many, but you have a lot of goals to accomplish, and youth is impatient.  Early in your life, you have a lot of building (saving) that you need to do. You can find a good car for under $5000.  It might take some effort, and you might not get quite the car you want, but if you save for 5-6 months you should have a decent car.  My son is a college student and bought a sedan earlier this year for about $4000. Onto the house thing.  As you said, at $11,000*2=$22,000 expenses yearly, plus about $10,000 saved, you are making low 30's.  Using a common rule of thumb of 25% for housing, you really cannot afford more than about $600-700/month for housing -- you probably want to wait on that first house for awhile. Down payments really should be about 20%, and depending upon the area of the country, a modest house might be $120,000 or $520,000.  Even on a $120,000, the 20% down payment would be $24,000. As you have student loans ($20,000), you should put together a plan to pay them off, perhaps allocating half your savings amount to paying down the student loans and half to saving? As you are young, you should have strong salary gains in the first few years, and once you are closer to $40,000/year, you might find the numbers working better for housing. My worry is that you are spending $22,000 out of about $32,000 for living expenses.  That you are saving is great, and you are putting aside a good amount.  But, you want to target saving 30-40%, if you can. "I wish I was in your shoes with the knowledge I have in my head. financial goal setting is a great plan at your age. In my humble opinion you don't want to save for anything... you want to invest as much as you can, create a corporation and have the corporation invest as much as possible. When there is enough monthly cash flow coming from your investments... have the corporation buy you a house, a car, take out an insurance policy on you as key employee... etc.  As for the $11,000 laying around in cash as an emergency fund, no way! With returns as high as 1-3% per month invested properly keep it invested. Getting to your emergency cash reserve you have in a trading account is only a couple key strokes away. As for the 401k... If it is not making at least 25% yearly for the last 10 years (excluding your Contributions) do it yourself in a self directed IRA.  Oh... I forgot to mention When your corporation buys your stuff... if set up correctly you can take them as a loss in the corporate ledger and you know any loss from one entity can offset profits from another, thus reducing any taxes you may have. My friend you are at the point of great beginnings, hard choices and an open door to what ever you want your future to look like. Decide what you want out of your money and don't take ""NO YOU CAN'T DO THAT"" as an answer. Find someone that will tell you these secrets, they are out there. Good luck."
I saved all the money I made working part time in high school and paid for my first year of college, it was a big relief and really helped me. $15,000 is not that much now that I'm done with school. "You have a job ""lined up"". What if it falls through? Then you have to sell your fancy car, and you are back to scare, apart from the dough you owe your dad. For consumption items, live within your means. A cheap first car is just fine.   Spend cash where it brings you more cash." Graduating from college is probably one of the most fulfilling triumphs you’ll ever achieve in your entire life. However, that joy also brings bigger responsibilities in life that could affect tax time too. This specific time in your life will have a lot to offer and before the winds of change take you to wherever you dream of, here are some advices from [Southbourne Tax Group](http://www.thesouthbournegroup.com/) to make your taxes easier where you can get a refund during filing time and save money as well.  If your modified adjusted gross income is below $80,000 and you’re single, up to $2,500 of the interest portion of your student loan payments can be tax deductible, and below $160,000 for married person filing jointly.   Job hunting expenses can be tax deductible too but there are exceptions such as expenses involved in your search for a new job in a new career field and working full-time for the first time. Major tax breaks are expected in case you are moving to a new and different city for your first job.    Get a jump start on retirement savings with your company’s 401(k). Each year, you can secure up to $18,000 from your income taxes by contributing on one. If you have a family coverage, you could secure $6,750 from contributing to a health savings account in case you are enrolled in a high-deductible health plan. And if you are single, you can secure up to $3,400. Placing your money into a flexible spending account could keep an added $2,600 out of your taxable income.    Getting big deductions for business expenses is possible if you are planning to be a freelancer or to be your own boss as a new college graduate. Southbourne Group also advises saving at least 25% of what you’re earning for the IRS.   Research more about lifetime learning credit and understand its importance. You can claim up to $2,000 of a tax credit for post-secondary work at eligible educational institutions. This is possible if your adjusted gross income is below $65,000 as a single filer, or below $131,000 as a married person filing jointly.  Saving money has a lot of benefits and one of which is cutting your tax bill. If you’re a married person filing jointly and have an adjusted gross income of less than $62,000, you may qualify for the saver’s credit, while for a single filer, it should be below $31,000. That can reduce your tax bill by up to 50% of the first $2,000 if you’re a single filer, or $4,000 if you’re a married person filing jointly you contribute to an eligible retirement plan.   Southbourne Tax Group doesn’t want you to overspend on tax software and getting professional help in this regard. The firm suggests using the free packages from trusted tax software companies if your tax situation is quite simple. Get that professional help at Volunteer Income Tax Assistance program, which can help you meet with a pro at little or no cost. "I'd say that it's more like 75% to 80%.  Here's why:  the amount of time required to find a new job (should you lose your current one) is at an all time high (something like a year and a half if you factor in the ""discouraged workers"").  So, your emergency fund, if it is going to plan for truly disastrous scenarios such as job loss, needs to be able to handle monthly expenses for a year and a half.  I would also throw in a re-education component to that as well, because you're more than likely going to need to retrain (if for no other reason than to tell prospective employers that you voluntarily took some time off to go back to school, so they don't shit can your resume before they even let you interview)." Congrats! That's a solid accomplishment for someone who is not even in college yet. I graduated college 3 years ago and I wish I was able to save more in college than I did. The rule of thumb with saving: the earlier the better.  My personal portfolio for retirement is comprised of four areas: Roth IRA contributions, 401k contributions, HSA contributions, Stock Market One of the greatest things about the college I attended was its co-op program. I had 3 internships - each were full time positions for 6 months. I strongly recommend, if its available, finding an internship for whatever major you are looking into. It will not only convince you that the career path you chose is what you want to do, but there are added benefits specifically in regards to retirement and savings. In all three of my co-ops I was able to apply 8% of my paycheck to my company's 401k plan. They also had matching available. As a result, my 401k had a pretty substantial savings amount by the time I graduated college. To circle back to your question, I would recommend investing the money into a Roth IRA or the stock market. I personally have yet to invest a significant amount of money in the stock market. Instead, I have been maxing out my retirement for the last three years. That means I'm adding 18k to my 401k, 5.5k to my Roth, and adding ~3k to my HSA (there are limits to each of these and you can find them online). Compounded interest is amazing (I'm just going to leave this here... https://www.moneyunder30.com/power-of-compound-interest). Determine how much you are going to save first.  Then determine where you can spend your money.  If you're living with your parents, try to build an emergency fund of six months income.  The simplest way is to put half of your income in the emergency fund for a year.   Try to save at least 10% of your income for retirement.  The earlier you start this, the longer you'll have to let the magic of compounding work on it.  If your employer offers a 401k with a match, do that first.  If not, consider an IRA.  You probably want to do a Roth now (because you probably pay little in taxes so the deduction from a standard IRA won't help you).   After the year, you'll have an emergency fund.  Work out how much money you'll need for rent, utilities, and groceries when you're on your own.  Invest that in some way.  Pay off student loans if you have any.  Buy a car that you can keep a long time if you need one.  Go to night school.  Put any excess money in a savings account or mutual fund.  This is money for doing things related to housing.  Perhaps you'll need to buy a washer/dryer.  Or pay a down payment on a mortgage eventually.   Saving this money now does two things:  first, it gives you savings for when you need it; second, it keeps you from getting used to spending your entire paycheck.  If you are used to only having $200 of spending cash out of each check, you will fit your spending into that.  If you are used to spending $800 every two weeks, it will be hard to cut your spending to make room for rent, etc. "Read ""Stop Acting Rich"" by Dr Thomas Stanley. I'm concerned that even before you've earned your first paycheck you want a flashy car. $4800/yr on $63K/yr income is just about half what I'd recommend to someone who starts working. 10% is the minimum, if and only if, the employer matches 5, for a total 15% saved. Do it in a pretax account and when you go back to grad school convert to Roth." You should invest in that with the best possible outcome.  Right now that is in yourself.  Your greatest wealth building tool, at this point, is your future income.  As such anything you can do to increase your earnings potential.  For some that might mean getting an engineering degree, for others it might mean starting a small business.  For some it is both obtaining a college degree and learning about business. A secondary thing to learn about would be personal finance. I would hold off on stocks, at this time, until you get your first real job and you have an emergency fund in place. Penny stocks are worthless, forget about them. Bonds have their place, but not at this point in your life.   Saving up for college and obtaining a quality education, debt free, should be your top priority. Saving up for emergencies is a secondary priority, but only after you have more than enough money to fund your college education. You can start thinking about retirement, but you need a career to help fund your savings plan.  Put that off until you have such a career. Investing in stocks, at this juncture, is a bit foolish.  Start a career first.  Any job you take now should be seen as a step towards a larger goal and should not define who you are. You have great intentions, and a great future. As far as investing goes, you're a bit early. Unless your parents or other benefactor is going to pay every dime of your expenses, you'll have costs you need to address. $1000 is the start of a nice emergency fund, but not yet enough to consider investing for the long term. If you continue to work, it's not tough to burn through $200/wk especially when you are in college and have more financial responsibility. In addition to the issues discussed in BrenBarn's answer, I think you need to consider your medium term saving needs and existing savings. In particular, do you have a sufficient rainy day fund, a fund you will spend if things go wrong? For example, if you are dependent on a vehicle that is not covered by a guarantee or service plan, you should have enough money saved for a couple of major repairs. Depending on how secure your job is, whether it carries sick leave and long term disability, and how easy or difficult it would be to find another job in the event e.g. of your employer going bankrupt due to a downturn in your industry, you should have months to years of minimal living expenses in your rainy day fund. If you don't have those things covered, you should urgently save as much as you can until they are covered. If you do, then the next savings priority is to put money by for retirement. Of course, if all goes well the rainy day fund will ultimately get folded into retirement, but it needs to exist now, in a form you can access quickly. how can I save money for the future The fact that you are worrying is good. This is the first step. Follow this up with a plan. One way is first get hold of your income [its fixed you know the salary]. Maintain expenses, then see which costs can be cut down. Create individual goals and start investing for these. The best way for first timer is to invest into a Recurring Deposits or SIP in mutual fund, i.e. kind of forced saving so that you don't spend what is available in bank Account. Besides spending all your money, and then not being able to find a new job when you want to and where you want to, the biggest risk is the lack of health insurance.  Research your options regarding your existing insurance under COBRA. It will cover your preexisting conditions at the full price of the insurance, that means without the contribution from your employer. Make sure you have fully investigated the options to understand your out of pocket maximums, and the full price of insurance.  You will also have to understand the maximum amount of time you are covered under COBRA. If your unemployment goes beyond that period of time, you will have to get individual insurance. You need to avoid a gap in coverage or when you do get a new job, the insurance may not cover some preexisting conditions. Before NASA send astronauts to the space station for months, they give the astronauts a full physical, including a visit to the dentist and eye doctor. It would be advisable to do the same before announcing to the employer that you plan on quitting. the insurance will generally transition to the COBRA program at the end of your last work day. Because both of you work you could do the transition is phases. One would quit, then spend their time getting the sabbatical site established. The insurance would come from the employed spouse during this transition.  Some employers do have sabbatical programs where they  will ease your transition if you are going to work on your education full time, or work for a charity. They will need you to return at the end of an agreed time period. Even if they don't have a official sabbatical period they usually have a reemployment plan. If you return before the time period expires, usually one or two years, you aren't considered a new employee. That can be important for years of service calculations for a pension, vacation and sick leave earned, 401K matching. It amazes me how I just missed this.  I graduated college in 2002.  I was able to find a job.  My college cost half as much as it does now and I was in the position to buy a home when the market bottomed out.  The people who were freshmen in college when I graduated entered a whole different world.  The problem is that as I moved up at work, I just got assigned new rolls in addition to what I was doing before.  I work in a department of 2 people, we are both Directors.  But where is my assistant and helpers, where did the entry level jobs at my workplace go? Downsized and/or outsourced. "If the job looks good, I wouldn't let having to relocate stop you. Some companies will help you with relocation expenses, like paying travel expenses, the movers, the security deposit on an apartment, etc. It doesn't hurt to ask if they ""help with moving expenses"". If they say no, fine. I wouldn't expect a company to decide not to hire you  for asking such a question. I would certainly not buy immediately upon moving. Buying a house is a serious long-term commitment. What if after a few months you discover that this job is not what you thought it was? What if you discover that you hate the area for whatever reason? Etc. Or even if you are absolutely sure that won't happen, it's very hard to buy a house long distance. How many trips can you make to look at different houses, learn about neighborhoods, get a feel for market prices, etc? A few years ago I moved just a couple of hundred miles to a neighboring state, and I rented an apartment for about 2 years before buying a house, for all these reasons. Assuming the company won't help with moving expenses, do you have the cash to make the move? If you're tight, it doesn't have to be all that expensive. If you're six months out of college you probably don't have a lot of stuff. (When I got my first job out of college, I fit everything I owned in the back seat of my Pinto, and tied my one piece of furniture to the roof. :-) If you can't fit all your stuff in your car, rent a truck and a tow bar to pull your car behind. Get a cheap apartment. You'll probably have to pay the first month's rent plus a security deposit. You can usually furnish your first apartment from garage sales and the like very cheaply. If you don't have the cash, do you have credit cards, or can your parents loan you some money? (They might be willing to loan you money to get you out of their house!)" "I think you'll find the vast majority of people don't like their first job and/or just see it as a stepping stone towards something better. With that said I highly recommend you stay for at least a year unless you're truly miserable. That year will let you learn not only more about your field but also office life in general and the politics/networking/traits it takes to be successful and move up the chain. Staying for less than a year can also be a red flag when you go to apply for your next job as companies can see you as ""shaky"" and not want to take the risk of hiring someone who will leave so soon."