Are you 60 years old and have no retirement savings? Here are 4 tips for stepping up your savings game

Are you 60 years old and have no retirement savings? Here are 4 tips for stepping up your savings game AnnaStills/ Shutterstock Vishesh Raisinghani Wed, June 10, 2026 at 5:15 PM GMT+7 7 min read Moneywise and Yahoo Finance LLC may earn commission or revenue through links in the content below. For those approaching 60 years old with little to no retirement savings, there are two pieces of good news. First, you’re not alone. A 2024 survey by the AARP (1) found that roughly 20% of U.S. adults over 50 had no retirement savings whatsoever. While some of these individuals will accumulate some savings by the time they turn 60, it’s fair to assume millions of people will enter their golden years with no meaningful nest egg. The ultra-rich use these 5 real estate strategies to build wealth while they sleep — you can start with just $100 The IRS usually taxes gold as a collectible — but this little-known strategy lets you hold physical bullion tax-free. Get your free guide from Priority Gold Dave Ramsey warns nearly 50% of Americans are making 1 big Social Security mistake — here’s how to fix it ASAP Second, there’s still time to salvage your retirement, even though it might not seem like it. You may need to take extraordinary steps and modify your retirement plan in creative ways to achieve a comfortable retirement, but it’s still certainly within your reach if you try. Here are four things you can do in 2026 to keep your retirement dream alive. The average retirement age for most Americans is somewhere between 62.6 years old for women and 64.6 for men, according to the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College (2). But if you’re approaching 60 without any retirement savings, this might not be possible for you. Your best bet could be to delay retirement and keep working to accumulate more income, savings and investments. Delaying retirement to age 70 gives you a full decade of extra room to earn. This is the direction many U.S. adults are moving in, according to research from the Economist Enterprise as cited by CBS News (3). On average, workers across the country expect to delay their retirement by roughly four years to account for the rising cost of living and healthcare. So, if you’re pushing back the date you leave work, you’re not alone. Read More: Thanks to Jeff Bezos, you can become a landlord for $100 — without the headache of actually being one Retiring with $0 isn’t ideal, but it still might be better than retiring with negative net worth. Even if it’s a small auto loan or a few credit cards with unpaid balances, having any outstanding debt as you enter retirement without a nest egg is risky. There’s very little margin for error. That’s why it might be a good idea to take care of your debt before you start enjoying your golden years. The two main ways of doing this are mirror images of each other. The first is the avalanche method, which aims to eliminate your biggest debt through an aggressive repayment plan while servicing the others. Once you’ve taken out your largest source of debt, you simply repeat and go down the list in a cascade. Meanwhile, the other option, or the snowball method, starts with your lowest debt, then works up to the biggest one over time — same principle but different direction. However, managing all those payments — and keeping them straight — can be a lot to manage. Consolidating all your debts into a personal loan through Credible can be an effective way to get rid of your debt faster. Instead of juggling multiple monthly payments, you’ll have one predictable payment to manage each month. Through Credible’s online marketplace, finding the right loan becomes much simpler. Credible lets you comparison-shop for the lowest interest rates with just a few clicks. In less than three minutes, you can see all the lenders willing to help pay off your credit cards or other debts with a single personal loan. If you owe a substantial amount, you may also want to see if you qualify for a debt relief program to help clear a significant portion of your debt. With Freedom Debt Relief, you can speak with a certified debt relief consultant for free, who can show you how much you can save by partnering with them. Plus, if you’re eligible, they can even negotiate settlements with your creditors until all of your enrolled debt is resolved. At 60 years old, it’s highly unlikely that you’ll accumulate millions of dollars if you haven’t already — even if you work hard and delay retirement by another decade. The typical lifestyle and magic number is potentially beyond your reach. However, if you set your target lower and accumulate a modest nest egg, you could achieve a fairly comfortable (albeit bare-bones) retirement lifestyle. For instance, a $500,000 nest egg can still yield $20,000 in annual income from withdrawals. Couple that with Social Security benefits, which averaged $2,081.16 per month for retired workers in April 2026 (4), and you could be set for a reasonable re

Are you 60 years old and have no retirement savings? Here are 4 tips for stepping up your savings game

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