Do you agree with Bengen's "Layer Cake" withdrawal rate

[bosco]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nords No, but have you read Hebeler's book? It makes 4% seem wildly hedonistic and he'd probably have a h0cus conniption fit with the SWRs quoted here. It seems ironic that the former president of an aerospace corporation doesn't do online sales, let alone PayPal...

Yes, I've read it. He does seem fairly conservative with his withdrawals, but not for the same reasons as H0suc. He seems to worry a lot about reverse dollar cost averaging, and his estimates of expenses ratios and underperformance seem quite high as well. These seem like a problems that can be lessened or eliminated with intelligent fund selection and method of making withdrawals. His program (at least the demo), however, allows you to adjust expense ratios and equity percentages, but I suppose the reverse dollar cost averaging would still occur. But it would occur with any program that modeled automatic withdrawals and rebalancing, would it not?

[Rich_by_the_Bay]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ron'Da To answer your question in a pragmatic manner, you can say that my plan could be off by 50%, and we would still meet 100% of our goal (yes, the well is deep ).

That makes your plan sound perfect IMHO. Lots of cushion, heirs accounted for, plenty for a rainy day. Well done.

[Nords]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ron'Da (Where does Ho*us fit into this? Other than his plan for 2% withdrawls)

***** can't do math but he doesn't hesitate to lecture those who can. He's not in the stock market but he rants wildly about overvalued equities. Of course Bud Hebeler takes a much more balanced approach but I think that he also tends to be too conservative in his withdrawal estimates. However Bud spends a lot of his time with Social Security widows and provides a valuable cautionary approach to withdrawals.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ron'Da As Conan says "do you want to live forever? )

So far the answer is "Yes!"

However I'm absolutely positive that I don't want to live longer than my portfolio. Planning to live to 140 may be over-nuking the analysis, but expecting a portfolio to run out before its owner hits triple digits seems to be putting a lot of faith in Social Security.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ron'Da PS: Cute what you do with the "H-word!"

Thanks, but the board software has a table of word substitutions that can be used to close the loopholes as fast as we can find them... unfortunately I've forgotten the ASCII code for the umlaut-accented letter "O"!

[48Fire]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ron'Da I'll assume you are directing the question to me, so I'll attempt to answer it (in my own words). To start with, I use several "retirement calculators" in an effort to not get the "best one", but rather to ensure that they all show a similar conclusion to the facts that I am able to provide (each of them have their own input criteria). Hope that gives you the info you need - if not, just ask again.... - Ron

Thanks, I will look into your recommendations, and get back with you if I have more questions.