I recently found out that I'm pregnant (yay!). This is coming at a good time for us, and I'm looking forward to the next 8 months of planning, and hoping that all goes well.
My question is about what we should do about my pension while on parental leave. I work for the Canadian federal government, and I am fortunate to have a generous parental leave- I am topped up to 93% of my pay, for a full year. Certain deductions will also cease, so I will essentially get full pay for a year. Amazing!
I have worked with this department since I was in university, on and off for about 12 years. I have about 8 years of pensionable time accumulated. While I love my job, I don't necessarily love the direction our government, and in turn our department, is headed. I am working on an exit plan. After discovering MMM earlier this year, I decided I wanted to retire in 10 years, by the time I'm 40. My husband will be 45, and is pretty much on board.
For background purposes, we are mostly invested in real estate. We own 3 rental houses in Canada, and 1 in Australia. Most of our savings is tied up in superannuation, which we are unlikely to be able to touch until between 55 and 65. We have a small amount of non-taxable investments. My short-term goal is to increase these investments so that we are more diversified.
After my parental leave, I will have the option of paying into my pension to qualify it for another year of pensionable time. The fed pension is generous, and I anticipate that when I leave the public service I will leave it intact and access it somewhere between 55-65. However, given my short-term goal of increasing our own non-taxable investments (we have lots of room), I am thinking that it would be better to invest it on our own, especially given that we will have to fund the gap between ER and the pension kicking in.
To summarize the question: When considering parental leave, should I pay into my pension while off to increase it later on, or should I do my own investing for use between 40-55?
Input from other Canadian feds is also appreciated in case I totally have the facts wrong re. parental leave!