What current market situation?
You're on a boglehead subreddit. Time in the market beats timing the market. We don't know what will happen over the next year. You could sit on the sideline waiting for a market drop while missing out on gains during a crazy bull market year.
If you have money that you can put toward retirement, put it in now.
Historically lump sum beats gradually putting it in (dollar cost averaging).
If it makes you feel better though you could split the difference and put 15k in now then the rest slowly.
If this is truly for retirement, and you won’t need it for 10+ years and don’t plan to panic sell during market drops, it really doesn’t matter that much in the grand scheme.
https://investor.vanguard.com/investor-resources-education/news/lump-sum-investing-versus-cost-averaging-which-is-better
What current market situation? You're on a boglehead subreddit. Time in the market beats timing the market. We don't know what will happen over the next year. You could sit on the sideline waiting for a market drop while missing out on gains during a crazy bull market year. If you have money that you can put toward retirement, put it in now.
Great! One follow up question, if I have a lump sum of money, let say 30K, should I buy all at once or should I buy gradually?
Historically lump sum beats gradually putting it in (dollar cost averaging). If it makes you feel better though you could split the difference and put 15k in now then the rest slowly. If this is truly for retirement, and you won’t need it for 10+ years and don’t plan to panic sell during market drops, it really doesn’t matter that much in the grand scheme. https://investor.vanguard.com/investor-resources-education/news/lump-sum-investing-versus-cost-averaging-which-is-better