Easy Rider here, 50 and already 18 months in ER

[Easy Rider]

Helloooooooooo all. What a great place this is! I finally registered after wanting to posts so many times to threads I so relate to.

18 months in and everyday is like paradise. So so true when everybody here says they don't know how they had time to live when working a full time job! For me too, I wake up at 7:30 Am and by the time I have breakfast, water the garden, pick my oranges off the tree and read the morning news, the day seems like it's half gone. Even now it's 8:00 Pm and I haven't done 10% of everything I wanted to do today, so I gleefully leave it to tomorrow after a nice bike ride through Manhattan, Hermosa, and Redondo Beach. At least I finally took the time to join you guys today.

I made it to 75 points (age plus years work) as a satellite designer and volunteered for early retirement so I’ll have a nice uncol’ed pension when I’m 55. I actually volunteered about 5 years ago during the previous slowdown and they rejected me – so nice to be wanted. Glad they didn’t let me go then because the last 5 years really added to my portfolio – especially the pension.

House near the beach paid off and living expenses under $12K, so have plenty of cushion for fun stuff. Divorced many years ago and childfree and still loving the bachelors’ taste of freedom. My portfolio is greater than a mil, and allocations are currently about 30/70 (equities/short term bonds) with about 10 years living expenses in money market. I just rolled over my 401K to VG IRA and plan to go to 75/25 allocations around November time frame.

Things keeping me busy lately…
Since I left work 18 months ago I ride my bike so much that I have to charge up my ‘vettes battery every now and then. Classical guitarists for many years and now can get serious, learning the piano focused on ragtimes, picking up the banjo but guitar has precedence, rebuilt my corvettes engine since the head gaskets went a few months into ER, remodeled my den including subfloor and wallboard installation, finishing the gardening this late summer… to name a few things. So many things on the list. However It was nice when work asked me if I was ready to come back as a consultant (after a year blackout period for volunteers), I told them maybe later, I’m busy right now

 

[jon-nyc]

Very nice life you have there!

Welcome to the forum.

 

[BigE]

Welcome Easy Rider. Nice introduction. Looks like you have a very simplified life...kudos brother!

 

[scrabbler1]

Hi Easy Rider, good to see someone on here with whom I have some unusual things in common. I am 50 and childfree and have been retired for nearly 5 years. I marvel at your expenses being so low, I thought mine were low at around $20k. I have a frozen pension I can't begin taking until I am 65 so that's a nice addition to be able to take yours at 55.

I see you have different asset allocations for your IRA versus the rest of your portfolio, something I did as part of my ER plan. Like you, I have more stock in the longer-range IRA than in the shorter-range taxable portion. We think alike.

While I don't play my piano much any more, my favorites to play included ragtime so I hope you can find some you like to play. When I first began playing ragtime 30 years ago, I simplified the songs a bit (mostly with the bass) before putting the removed notes back in a few years later.

Welcome to the forum.

 

[haha]

House near the beach paid off and living expenses under $12K, so have plenty of cushion for fun stuff. Divorced many years ago and childfree and still loving the bachelors’ taste of freedom. My portfolio is greater than a mil, and allocations are currently about 30/70 (equities/short term bonds) with about 10 years living expenses in money market. I just rolled over my 401K to VG IRA and plan to go to 75/25 allocations around November time frame.

This is what I think may be a unique benefit of being a long time California homeowner. Very low property taxes. No place that I know of more attractive than LA South Bay, esp Manhattan Beach and Redondo. And you are living there on less than $12000! Many of your neighbors likely spend $12000/month.

Congrats.

Ha

 

[Easy Rider]

Thanks guys, glad to have another ragtime player in the house. I leave the classical to the guitar which has so much more control - where the instrument truly becomes an extension of the body.

Ha - exactly right about the property tax, I pay $3800/year with the 2% max cap increase per year which is a big part of my retirement security. My neighbors pay under 1k per year with 3 generations living in their inherited house, and my new neighbors are paying 9k per year. So I'm right in the middle after owning for about 15 years. My parents on the east coast (NJ) are paying around 8K (that's over 2% the value of their home) with almost unlimited increases - and they lived there their entire lives - over 50 years.

Looking forward to contributing to these forums

 

[Ready]

Welcome to the forum Easy Rider!

So, I have to ask...with almost $4K in property taxes, that only leaves you $8K per year for everything else. How do you do that in Southern California? Or anywhere for that matter.