There are many challenges facing people trying to save for their retirement, and how much you are able to save may not match your vision for retirement.
Recent studies have found few people start saving for their retirement before the age of 34, and increasingly jobs don't come with workplace pension plans.
But that doesn't seem to have changed people's ambitions for their retirement, including travelling, golfing or a home on the beach.
The popular wisdom is that saving a million dollars will put you in a good place when it comes to your retirement, but that may depend on your ambitions.
An informal survey of Waterloo residents found many think it is a reasonable goal, but actually saving, or even thinking about saving, is becoming increasingly rare.
Lee Anne Davies, head of retirement strategies for the Royal Bank of Canada, says "We saw this year a real dip in those investing in RRSPs. In fact, in over a ten year period it went down to the lowest number, 39 per cent."
According to Davies, people are putting off contributing to a retirement fund because they're eager to purchase their first home or retire their student loans first.
What's worse, she says, is they're already starting off behind compared to years past.
"This group is starting out with a couple of disadvantages for the most part. They're carrying more debt than what their parents carried. They're also having a harder time finding that permanent employment that will have a pension plan associated with it."
In fact, only 39 per cent of Canadian workers currently have a workplace pension, and more than half of those that do are government employees.
That makes investing in your own retirement even more important, and may be why the average age of retirement is steadily rising.
Nonetheless, the sooner you start investing the more interest your savings will earn and the more your money will grow.
Coming up in part two: When do you need to start saving and how much do you really need to put away to achieve that million dollar saving?
