> most personal finance wisdom advises keeping no more than 6 months - 1 year of expenses in liquid savings

I was unclear: by "liquid" I didn't mean in cash equivalents like an emergency fund. I just meant "not locked away until retirement, under threat of penalty" the way tax-advantaged retirement accts are.

At the very least, I'd expect that most people with a 401k have a ton of assets tied up in houses that are often to big for them after eg their children move out: downsizing and unlocking those assets is a pretty common sense move in the context of "not having enough saved for retirement".

I think the high level point I'm going for here is that I'm not sure that 401k balance is a good proxy for overall retirement savings, as implied by the comment I originally replied to. I don't have the data on this though

Problem is you can’t fund a 401k and traditional IRA at the same time. Then you can’t fund a Roth IRA if you make too much (and it’s only $3k/year anyway). The government has rigged it so they are getting a cut of your retirement savings, one way or the other.

You can fund a traditional IRA and 401k up to a certain MAGI.[2] If your spouse doesn't work, or their work doesn't offer a 401k, you can fund a traditional IRA for them as well. Roth IRA is $5.5k/year.[0] If your 401k plan allows in-plan conversions you can also do mega backdoor Roth IRA contributions up to something like $37k. [1]

0. https://www.nerdwallet.com/blog/investing/roth-ira-contribut...

1. https://thecollegeinvestor.com/17561/understanding-the-mega-...

2. https://www.quickanddirtytips.com/money-finance/retirement/c...