The average Australian expects to spend more than 20 years in retirement and will require almost $1 million to finance their desired lifestyle, findings from a huge study of Australian consumers’ financial understanding and attitudes towards super and retirement reveals.

The study, carried out by CoreData-brandmanagement, canvassed the views of several thousand consumers and found that, on average, Australians think they will live until they are 83.1.

On top of this, they expect to retire at age 62 and a half – a conservative estimate given the Government recently undertook to increase the qualifying age for Age Pension to 67 by 2023.

That’s 20.5 years in retirement, which could be considered unrealistically short if longer life expectancy is taken into account.

These days it’s not unusual to live until 100. Based on the retirement estimates provided in the study, this equates to 37.5 years in retirement – almost double what’s being provisioned for by the average person.

What’s more, the study found Australians anticipate needing an average weekly income (in today’s dollars) of $909.90. If, indeed, they do retire at age 62 and a half and live until 83, that’s a total cost of retirement of $972,932.

To put this into context, the average super balance, according to a recent paper by Rice Warner Actuaries, is $34,203 – and that’s if the burgeoning self-managed super sector is taken into account.

Rice Warner says the average super fund balance is expected to grow to $101,064 by 2023, while the average SMSF is expected to top $740,635.

While this would propel Australians slightly closer to their desired lifestyle in retirement, at 10 per cent of the expected cost of retirement the near-$1 million target is beginning to look like a pipe dream for most.

And it is hard to aim for something if you have no idea how you’re tracking.

According to the study, almost two thirds of Australians (65.3%) could not say with much accuracy what their superannuation balance is.

While one quarter (26.8%) claim to know their super balance to the nearest $1,000, a further 35.2% know the approximate balance and 10.3% have only a vague idea of their balance.

Some 6.3% have no idea what their super balance is.

*Data sourced from the CoreData Money IQ study. The full report will be published early next year.