Net Worth Comparison by Age and Income
When I read that Jane Dough got her moniker back and is now blogging over at WomenWallStreetClub, I wanted to pop on over to see what a professional personal finance blogger looked like and saw a post about a net worth comparator tool from CNN Money based on income and age that piqued my interest.
Well, it turns out that if you’re 26 like me, the average net worth of our demographic is a whopping $400. I think there’s a little hiccup in the tool because if you put an age between 25 and 34, it still gives you the value for < 25 even though there are separate bars in the graph and separate colors. Anyway, forgetting that, here's how the graph ends up looking:
| Age Range | Median Net Worth |
|---|---|
| < 25 | $400 |
| 25 - 34 | $??? |
| 35 - 44 | $44,875 |
| 45 - 54 | $109,300 |
| 55 - 64 | $203,250 |
| 65 + | $174,400 |
The second part of the calculator gives you the average net worth as a function of your income.
| Income Range | Median Net Worth |
|---|---|
| < $25k | $1,100 |
| $25k - $50k | $20,000 |
| $50k - $75k | $109,975 |
| $75k - $100k | $244,100 |
| $100k - $125k | $363,125 |
| $125k - $150k | $494,100 |
| $150k + | $817,050 |
I wouldn’t read too much into the relationship between those two graphs but it does give you an indication of how well you’re doing in terms of saving and spending compared to both your age group and your income group. If you are 30 and have less than $400 to your name, I’d be a little wary of your overall financial picture.
I originally was going to compare these numbers, taken from a 2005 Market Audit Survey by Claritas, with those from NetWorthIQ but when I put them to a graph, the NetWorthIQ values spiked tremendously near the higher ages and incomes whereas the Claritas values didn’t. I attribute that to the self-selecting nature of folks willing to divulge their net worth values online, but I also recognize that we’re talking about a minuscule data set on NetWorthIQ compared to the entire US population.
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There are 7 comments, add your thoughts now!
NetWorthIQ doesn’t eliminate out-of-place statistics that skew the result, while a true statistical survey might.
You have to wonder how much the
These net worth figures are rather bogus. I see all types of numbers given, and its not a surprise considering its very difficult to figure out everyone’s net worth. And these figures above are probably a little on the low side, with all the housing and stock market appreciation and robust job market since the 80s, its pretty easy to accumulate wealth these days. So many people i know in there 20s have 6 figure net worths and they don’t even care much about personal finance.
I am 50 and I have less than $400 to my name. My annual income of $15,000 might have something to do with that.
Nick - is it pretty easy to accumulate wealth when you earn $15K and have student loan debt?
I do eliminate some of the outliers, though I’m not disputing there are still bogus entries on NetworthIQ. For the categories with a good sample size (i.e ages under 40 with sample size greater than 500), I think our medians are a pretty good indicator. The overall median has barely budged over the last year at around $78k. But again, it all comes down to sample size.
I wouldn’t be surprised if the Claritas number didn’t include primary homes, because that $400 net worth for sub 30 year olds can’t be right.
I’m not at all surprised by the low numbers for
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