Do you regret saving too much?

[easysurfer]

Do I regret saving enough? Not at all. In fact the contrary. Though I'm a LBYM saver and investor, I still fear I haven't saved enough.

 

[easysurfer]

Yep. Two peas in a pod.

About a year ago, SportsCenter did an hour long special, and stealing from the NHL, called the piece, "I went to a fight the other day, and a baseball game broke out."

I forget who the Manager was in Texas, but beings "The Express" hit that guy on the top of his head 4 or 5 times with his pitching hand, I'm sure his blood pressure went off the charts.

"No fool like an old fool".

Ah, I remember watching that fight live on TV. Robin Ventura (now White Sox manger) actually was a pretty good ballplayer. Unfortunately for him, his noggin being shalacked by Ryan's punches is probably what he'll be remembered for.

 

[foxfirev5]

A few close calls with layoffs early in my corporate career solidified my savings habit. Now I have no regrets. The kids always got vacations and education along with a progressively better lifestyle. We hit FI a couple years ago and now don't worry about layoffs or job pressures, even though I still have a full time job. That would not be the case if we didn't save a good portion of our income. I've been broke and had money - I prefer money. Now I'm just getting older and starting to lose a little zip but that's the trade off.

 

[Independent]

When we had kids at home, I would have liked to have bumped up to a bigger house. I regret that, but it wasn't my decision (my wife has roots growing from her feet).

I would have liked to have taken two weeks of unpaid leave every year and traveled with the family. I was concerned that wouldn't "show commitment" to the j*b and I would have lost a lot more than the two weeks pay. I don't know if that was true.

We've had multiple health problems since retiring, meaning that we haven't traveled like I had planned. So I wish we had spent the money and traveled more earlier.

OTOH, we've also had unexpected financial costs since retiring, it's nice to know we had a substantial cushion so we can cover them without worrying about paying the bills.

 

[MasterBlaster]

I'll pile on to this ancient thread...

Perhaps I have saved too much... I don't regret it though.

But think of how great I feel now... No debt pressure like many of our peers

Also as Nords pointed out, you won't know till the end cause there just could be some very expensive final outcomes.

Should the world fall apart it never hurts to have a healthy margin to fall back on.

 

[scrabbler1]

I wrote this in my initial response in the Bogleheads thread:

"No. It is one reason I was able to retire in 2008 at age 45 and get out of the rat race for good."

 

[Bikerdude]

 

[pb4uski]

Not yet - but it is too early to tell.

 

[NW-Bound]

I just read the OP.

Most of us on this board (including me) understand the virtue of LBYM, and the need to save a significant portion of our income during our working years so that we can achieve financial security later in life. However, I fear that some of us (including me) may take this to an extreme, and we might be foresaking some of life's pleasures while we are young enough to enjoy them, only to find that when we are older, we have more than we need or want.

Therefore, my question is, do any of you who are retired regret that you saved too much when you were younger? Do you look back and wish you would have spent a bit more to enjoy your youth, or your kids' youth? Do you now realize that you oversaved and you have more than you need, and you should have spent a bit more when you were younger?

How much savings is too much savings? Heck, I did not even know the percentage of income that we saved, back when we were both working. I did not even track our expenses. I simply knew that being LBYM, we always underspent our income, ever since we got married and I started working full-time after college.

So, could we have spent more when we were younger? Of course! But would that make us happier? Doubt it!

We never crave fancy, fast, or new cars every couple of years. We always had a decent home (we have two now). We always went for 2 or 3 vacation trips a year with the kids. Right after we got married, it was simple road trips, and we stayed at Motel 6. Then, as our income and net worth increased over the years, we slowly upgraded to Hawaiian vacations, Caribbean cruises, and European trips, etc...

People may say that we were lucky to have such high income that we could not spend it all. Hah! Although our income was decent, it was never outrageous. And many of our peer friends are still toiling away. And I would not ask, but suspect our net worth now is higher than theirs.

No doubt, we have had some luck. That is we suffered no long periods of illness that we could not work. No layoffs either, although I suffered a few years of little or no pay, but it was my choice, working for startups for equities that are now worthless.

Only in the last few years that I have learned to calibrate our expenses in terms of % of our portfolio. And I am trying to keep it to 3.5% or less.

No, no regrets! Even if our portfolio grows up to the sky, like the most optimistic line in FIRECalc shows after 30 years, meaning I way underspend, I will regret nothing. When a guy has enough material stuff, he has enough.

And if somehow I end up with less, it would still be OK. In fact, even if I have less, much less, like some people who full-time in an RV in the boondocks and whose blogs I have read, that would not change my happiness level. Heck, some of them seem happier than me, most of the time.

Time for some music. I have posted this before in another thread about regrets, and will do it again here.

[Inception "pre-kick" song] Non, Je Ne Regrette Rien - Edith Piaf (French & English lyrics) - YouTube

 

[dessert]

Do I regret saving? Not at all. It has allowed me to be retired today. Otherwise I would be heading out to work tomorrow instead of going fishing. It is hard to imagine what you will need later in life but for sure, the more you save, the earlier you retire. The freedom will be worth it.

 

[brett]

No.

The upside is we avoided the chains, the worry, and the userous interest rates of consumer debt.

 

[Walt34]

No.

The upside is we avoided the chains, the worry, and the userous interest rates of consumer debt.

+1

We are sooo glad to have zero debt. While for the moment I am working, it is optional, and still most of the unplanned-for income is going to savings to be spent later. If one thinks about it that is being optimistic since it relies on the assumption that there will be a "later". If there isn't, well, I lost the bet.

 

[brett]

We did not save a great deal at first. What we did do was build equity and greatly reduce our interest expense by eliminating our mortgage as quickly as possible ( interest is not a tax writeoff where we live). So the mortgage went to 20, then to 12 years and so on. Then we moved to a larger house and did the same all over again.

We did not buy new cars every three years like many of our friends/neighbours, nor did we buy expensive furniture, etc. Our children were able to graduate without the burden or student loans. Seeing a few friends and relatives mired in consumer debt and poorly managed finances just encouraged us to stay on the path. We never really did without anything we just did not over consume.


Like others, I worked in an industry for Megacorp that saw continuous downsizing and mergers for the last 20 years of my career. I was concerned about the double whammy of loosing my job and having unmanageable debt. Fortunately it never happened to me-but I saw it happen to others.

When we became mortgage free, saving was very straightforward as we had been living well under our income level. I was on a variable salary program at work. We lived on the base, and saved the rest. I stopped work at 58 with no worries whatsoever. We just sold our house in order to downsize. We are going to store our things and travel overseas for six months.

It never felt like we were giving up anything. We were fortunate-we were both raised with a strong work ethic, conservative approach to personal finance, and a belief that borrowing money to purchase depreciable assets, vacations etc. was the path to financial ruin.

 

[W2R]

do any of you who are retired regret that you saved too much when you were younger? Do you look back and wish you would have spent a bit more to enjoy your youth, or your kids' youth? Do you now realize that you oversaved and you have more than you need, and you should have spent a bit more when you were younger?

I do not regret saving, and, to be honest, I do not regret anything else that I have done. I love life, and have done the best I could with my life given the circumstances. Part of that was making the best and most logical decisions I could and I would make the same decisions again under the same circumstances.

As for money, I am enjoying it now, and have a lot more time to do so in retirement than I did when I was working. The Catch-22 of buying a lot of expensive "good for me" presents when working is that you really don't have much time to enjoy them, because of the work that you have to do to pay for them.

Of course, life is a gamble and if one doesn't spend and dies young, it is tragic for many reasons. Saving is always a risk, in that sense.

 

[rescueme]

What is worse? Saving too much, or saving too little?

I'll just restate the question in this manner of saving/investing too much or saving/investing too little.

There is no scenerio of "saving too much". If you have saved/invested more than you need, the excess will be used by others (personal or charity) to improve their "situation".

As for me? I would rather die with money than live without it (of course, I've always made that statement). There will never be any "loss", if you think of it in that matter.

 

[Danmar]

Given the background of this forum I would be surprised if many felt they saved too much. The LBYM ethos pretty well prevents ever having this thought.

 

[NW-Bound]

Yes, a bunch of LBYM'ers here, and delayed gratification is the rule.

One of my brothers and his wife have a different philosophy: "Carpe diem!". We never share each other's income or net worth, but I know he has a nice salary and a reasonably secure job. I don't think he knows my net worth, or even how much it takes to retire like us.

He should know how much SS he will have, but has he figured out how much 401k and after-tax savings it will take to maintain his lifestyle? I don't think he has, but one time he volunteered that there was no way he could save enough for early retirement, so why bother. I bit my lips, trying not to ask if he thought he could ever retire, period, leave alone early.

So, two persons, raised in the same family, have totally different philosophies. When we buy something, we usually get the run-of-the-mill quality, figuring it would be good enough. My brother and his wife usually get the "good stuff", which costs 2x or 3x what we are willing to spend. The "good stuff" is of course better quality, no doubt, but we were just not willing to pay the price.

We derive more pleasure from looking at our 7-figure portfolio on the Quicken screen, in our big-enough home (2800sqft, too big for empty nesters!).

My brother and his wife get more pleasure from their top-notch kitchen remodel, with all new appliances and pots and pans, in his 3500-sqft home of higher build quality and in a nicer neighborhood, with a much smaller portfolio.

Who's right? Who's wrong? We live our lives the way we want it, and that's that. I could be diagnosed with some terminal disease tomorrow. I still would not regret not spending more.

I should note here that my wife and I share the same philosophy, while my brother and his wife are also a good match.

Back to the OP pondering, I think if one has to ask himself if he is too stingy, and if he craves something that is affordable, it might be better for his psyche to just get it than feeling deprived and miserable.

I would hasten to add that if my portfolio happens to grow like Jack's bean stalk, I would learn how to cope. Spending more is easy! I am not sure if it would make me happier though.

 

[Moscyn]

No, don't regret our slightly frugal years (I don't think we were ever really frugal) which has certainly opened up paths to moderate splashes of luxury we enjoy now. I do remember those years when my friends/relatives tell us about their overseas holidays and the jewellery they bought and they asked me why I don't have that many similar stories to share. Well, those were the less spendrift years for us but I don't think we missed much. I now hear from some of these folks about their money woes while we enjoy our holidays and lifestyle.

 

[Badger]

The Catch-22 of buying a lot of expensive "good for me" presents when working is that you really don't have much time to enjoy them, because of the work that you have to do to pay for them.

+1 This is what I frequently see. Either that or there is a rush to squeeze the enjoyment into some very short time off.

I am finishing the last 20 years in academia after 10 years in industry. It was a large drop in income but also a pleasant life style change. Neither of us care for jewlery, expensive clothes, or the need to keep up with the Jones but now we can continue to enjoy our time and afford to buy what ever really pleases us and pay cash. If I "buy the farm" first I have the peace of mind knowing that my wife will have no worries about a place to live or her next meal.

No regrets here.

Cheers!

 

[megacorp-firee]

re: the question ... are you kidding me?
FIREd since July 2007 and living the life.
Wouldn't be able to if not for [-]over[/-] sufficient savings.

 

[MasterBlaster]

I would hasten to add that if my portfolio happens to grow like Jack's bean stalk, I would learn how to cope. Spending more is easy! I am not sure if it would make me happier though.

I agree.

For me, as the stash gets bigger though, I keep upping the bar - Sisyphus style. If I was smart I would up the lifestyle now so as to achieve some level of Kotlikoff style consumption smoothing.

Lee Eisenberg in his book "The Number" speaks eloquently about this very topic. About how we never quite get there and how we never quite seem to have enough. It's a great book to read if you haven't already done so.

Somehow, Somewhere though, all that self-deprivation needs to pay off. It already has in many ways per the reduced stress thing and being able to live on your own terms. But really, I should take some of all that money and buy myself some nice stuff. Trouble is that after decades of LBYM It just doesn't seem important. Besides I already have everything I ever wanted.

 

[FIREd]

For me, as the stash gets bigger though, I keep upping the bar - Sisyphus style. If I was smart I would up the lifestyle now so as to achieve some level of Kotlikoff style consumption smoothing.

You could start by upgrading your LBYM adobe:

http://www.early-retirement.org/forums/f46/home-exchanges-anyone-60971.html#post1184296

Running water would be a good start...

 

[MasterBlaster]

You could start by upgrading your LBYM adobe:

http://www.early-retirement.org/forums/f46/home-exchanges-anyone-60971.html#post1184296

Running water would be a good start...

I am glad you liked our house and that it made a lasting impression. We work hard to make it comfortable.

But it is starting to feel cramped and we feel that we should upgrade.

 

[H2ODude]

Trouble is that after decades of LBYM It just doesn't seem important. Besides I already have everything I ever wanted.

Copy that. I have stuff I'd just as soon get rid off, including a Porsche I hardly drive anymore. Not sure why I even bought it; it violated my generally cheap philosophy. Will sell it as I figured what the taxes, insurance, and depreciation were per mile driven. Obscene. We'd put more money into DOING stuff (travel) but are restricted in caring for MIL. Buying stuff because we can just seems to generate buyers remorse and no real pleasure. At this rate our kids will be the beneficiaries!

 

[MBAustin]

No regrets - choices are good.

When I start drawing my pension in 3 years we will have enough income from dividends, pensions and DH's SS (disability) to cover our normal spending (although most is not COLA so we'll have to draw on investments to cover inflation). We do expect to need some of our stash to cover LTC expenses when DH's MS progresses further, hopefully not anytime soon. But our biggest concern is that we don't want to leave our two kids so large an inheritance that it interferes with their own well-being. So we are considering options for what we might do with what we consider our "excess" should that happen (charities, etc.). Nice problem to have.

In the meantime, I still clip coupons for the grocery store, even as we are considering a large purchase of something that is clearly a luxury. LBYM habits are hard to break!