₹0 saving at 40-45? Here's how you can still retire by 60

Summary: Sounds impossible to build a sufficient retirement corpus if you have zero savings at age 40 or 45? It’s not. We’ve crunched the numbers and found a prescription for you. Now, it’s your turn to build the plan. A 42-year-old reader recently asked us: “I’ve just started investing. I earn decently, but is it too late to aim for retirement at 60?” It’s a question many mid-career professionals grapple with. The good news? It’s still possible. The tough part? You’ll need to be far more aggressive and disciplined with your savings. Let’s break it down using actual projections, assuming you start investing at 40 or 45, and want to stop working by 60. We’ll look at three retirement lifestyles: Same lifestyle as today Moderately better lifestyle (10 per cent more expenses) Significantly better lifestyle (20 per cent more expenses) Starting at 40: How much to save to retire by 60 With 20 years to invest, you have some room to manoeuvre. If you want to maintain your current lifestyle You’ll need to save 40 per cent of your income every year to retire at 60. A 30 per cent saving rate will delay retirement to age 65. A 50 per cent rate gets you there faster — at age 56. This is assuming your investments grow at annualised 12 per cent

This article was originally published on July 17, 2025.