Under the U.S. government’s new “blended” retirement system, which went into effect in 2018, active-duty military personnel automatically make a 3% of salary contribution to the plan, but they can make a 5% contribution, which will be matched dollar-for-dollar by the government.
“Previously, if you left before 20 years of service, you walked away with only what you put in. Now you have the government’s match,” Harrington said.
He also works with active duty military spouses. “We had a new wife of a service member who was deployed come to us a few years back who wanted to know how they could repair their credit to buy a house when he returned,” he said.
“We sat down with her and said, ‘Here’s what you need to do to clean up your credit so you’ll be able to get a VA [Veterans Administration] mortgage when he gets back.’ We got them to the point where they qualified and got a house,” Harrington said.
“It was a very stressful situation and we gave them hope. The great thing is she set a goal for herself, paid off debt, saved for a down payment and deployment went by a lot quicker for her,” added Harrington, who has been in the Army Reserve for nine years and has served in the East African nation of Djibouti and Poland.
“It’s important to our group to give back because service members go through a lot. If we can help them with our financial expertise, we are happy to do that because of the sacrifice they make,” he added.