You have just started a new job and your employer has enrolled you in KiwiSaver. This is the first time you have been enrolled in KiwiSaver and you decide not to "opt out". You are interested in estimating how much your KiwiSaver fund could be worth when you retire.

You make the following assumptions:

You are 25 years old and will retire in exactly 35 years when you are 60.

Your salary is $45,000 this year and you expect this to increase by 2% every year.

You are trying to decide whether to contribute either 3% or 8% of your salary into your KiwiSaver fund each year.

https://www.ird.govt.nz/kiwisaver/kiwisaver-individuals

Your employer must contribute 3% of your salary into your KiwiSaver fund each year.

https://www.ird.govt.nz/kiwisaver/kiwisaver-employers

For the purposes of this assignment you should ignore ESCT requirements.

You will be entitled to the annual member tax credit of $521.43 which will be credited into your KiwiSaver fund every year.

https://www.ird.govt.nz/kiwisaver/kiwisaver-individuals/kiwisaver-benefits

Your KiwiSaver fund will invest in a diversified portfolio of assets to earn a return on your investment but there is uncertainty around the actual annual rate of return that your fund will earn over the 35 years.

Regardless of the return earned, the manager of your KiwiSaver fund will charge a management fee of 1.0% at the end of each year, based on the opening balance of your fund each year.

You will make no withdrawals or additional contributions (other than those mentioned above) to your fund until you retire in 35 years.

For simplicity, assume that all contributions to your KiwiSaver fund are made once per year, at the end of the year. The first lot of contributions will be made in one year from today.

Question

Fill in the below table with calculation steps. Show how much your KiwiSaver fund would be worth at retirement under 4 different scenarios. The scenarios are determined by the employee contribution rate (3% or 8%) and the annual (after-tax) rate of return on your KiwiSaver investments (you decide that 5% and 10% represent a good range of potential rates of return).