Doubts rise about nest-egg realities

New Zealanders are less confident of reaching their retirement savings goals than they were three months ago, according to an ANZ survey.

The Retirement Savings Confidence Barometer found that of those who are saving for retirement, 56 per cent were not very confident or not at all confident of reaching their goal.

That was a 5 percentage point increase on ANZ's April survey.

ANZ's John Body said the confidence drop was a surprise.

"The deepening debt crisis in Europe and prolonged patchy growth in the New Zealand economy have probably contributed to the drop in confidence."

Confidence was lowest among those close to retirement with 66 per cent of 45- to 64-year-olds saying they were not very confident or not at all confident.

Younger people were much more confident about reaching their savings goals, with 53 per cent of 15- to 29-year-olds either very confident or confident.

The survey found 39 per cent would like to have $500 a week on top of what they would get from New Zealand Superannuation.

A person who is retired for 20 years would need around $415,000 saved by the time they retire to be able to have that level of income.

Body said that was a high level of savings to achieve when many people were contributing just 2 per cent of their earnings to their KiwiSaver accounts.

The survey questioned around 1000 people and found 61 per cent were saving for their retirement.