What's your ER budget

[nun]

I'm fast approaching the mortgage pay off milestone and seriously thinking about ER. After the mortgage is gone and I don't have to save for retirement my budget is $30k per year after tax.

$7k on home insurance and real estate taxes
$5k on health insurance.
$18k is what I currently live off

Just wondering if anyone spends less.

 

[rescueme]

Not in our retirement (I'm retired, but my wife will be shortly).

It all depends on your perceived lifestyle in retirement. For some, it is more - for others, much less.

While I won't mention numbers (in our case), it is multiples (includes taxes) of what you quoted....

Just as an example, our trip to Australia this past June was close to $20k, in total costs.

My wife/me have booked a cruise on the Baltic for next June, along with her going on a trip to Egypt with a friend, along with a trip to Vegas late next year.

For a lot of folks, this would be extreme (yes, trips are our greatest expense at this time), but again, it's just a reflection of our desired lifestyle.

It's hard to say that any "retirement income" is the correct one in life - it all depends on what you want in retirement....

If it works for you, then that's all that counts, IMHO...

 

[W2R]

My total expenditures for this year are projected to amount to $20,600 or so, but I am going to spend more once I settle into retirement, move north, and so on. Right now I can't really buy anything big because I would just have to move it north.

 

[nun]

Not in our retirement (I'm retired, but my wife will be shortly).

It all depends on your perceived lifestyle in retirement. For some, it is more - for others, much less.

While I won't mention numbers (in our case), it is multiples (includes taxes) of what you quoted....

Well yes, lifestyle will influence how much you need. I'm trying to get at what people are doing or planning

 

[scrabbler1]

I'm fast approaching the mortgage pay off milestone and seriously thinking about ER. After the mortgage is gone and I don't have to save for retirement my budget is $30k per year after tax.

$7k on home insurance and real estate taxes
$5k on health insurance.
$18k is what I currently live off

Just wondering if anyone spends less.

My retirement budget is about $20k for 2009. It will rise to about $21k for 2010. I retired in late 2008.

$6k for co-op maintenance (includes prop taxes, co-op's mortgage interest, and other common charges).
$6k for health care.

No debts since I paid off my mortgage in 1998.

My total dividend (mostly bonds but some from stocks) income (not the irregular cap gains income) is about $30k so I am still well ahead.

 

[aaronc879]

I'm fast approaching the mortgage pay off milestone and seriously thinking about ER. After the mortgage is gone and I don't have to save for retirement my budget is $30k per year after tax.

$7k on home insurance and real estate taxes
$5k on health insurance.
$18k is what I currently live off

Just wondering if anyone spends less.

I'm not retired but if I were:

$1K on home insurance($135) and real estate taxes($850)
$5K on health ins.(although I think I can do better)
$12K living expenses(could go several thousand lower if needed)

Total of $18K per year after taxes but i'd like to have $24K. That would be "living large" for me. I may be able to spend winters in Florida with $24K/year.

 

[nun]

Just as an example, our trip to Australia this past June was close to $20k, in total costs.

My wife/me have booked a cruise on the Baltic for next June, along with her going on a trip to Egypt with a friend, along with a trip to Vegas late next year.

For a lot of folks, this would be extreme (yes, trips are our greatest expense at this time), but again, it's just a reflection of our desired lifestyle.

It's hard to say that any "retirement income" is the correct one in life - it all depends on what you want in retirement....

If it works for you, then that's all that counts, IMHO...

I had a 2 week trip to England last May and that was in the $18k living expenses. The cost was about $2k. $800 on plane flight. I stayed with friends in London and rode my bike the 400 miles to Northern England to visit relatives. I stayed in B&Bs during the ride

 

[rescueme]

I had a 2 week trip to England last May and that was in the $18k living expenses. The cost was about $2k. $800 on plane flight. I stayed with friends in London and rode my bike the 400 miles to Northern England to visit relatives. I stayed in B&Bs during the ride

We have no friends/relatives in Australia. For those that have traveled there, you know that to get to any point you need to travel via rail/air. It's not inexpensive, in any manner.

It's a wonderful country, and I would recommend it to anybody who wishes to travel. Regardless of that, depending on the route taken (and the transportation in country) it can be quite expensive.

BTW, we've traveled to England (and the ROI, in addition to Scotland) - hey, I even drove in the "wrong side of the road" in ROI and Scotland, but it was much cheaper.

It's great if you have family/friends while traveling; however in our case, we normally spend $15-20K or more on our annual trips.

A bit expensive as most would say, however we look at an ancient laurate that stated "those that have not traveled are only on the first page of life" (we've turned many pages, and will contiune strive to do so )...

We are fortunate in retirement to travel; of course, it was always considered a "normal expense" during our pre-retirement years, so it's not something we have not done before....

Now that we're retired, it isn't an additional expense - rather than just "more of the same"...

 

[FIREd]

Except for rescue, are you all single?

For the 2 of us, I am shooting for $60K/year or $30K/person.

 

[aaronc879]

Except for rescue, are you all single?

For the 2 of us, I am shooting for $60K/year or $30K/person.

Yes, i'm single. However, if I had a spouse, my expenses wouldn't double. They'd go up maybe $300/mo. not counting health ins.

 

[Bikerchick]

I'm single, budgeting $34-38K before taxes post-retirement. Live on $24K plus rent now, after state and federal taxes. The budget assumes no mortgage on the future residence.

 

[happy2bretired]

I'm single and my budget for this year was about $37K. I should be able to bring that down a tad though.

 

[Bikerdude]

Retirement year #11 budget will be 54K. Single with small mortgage. Year #1 was 36K.

 

[teejayevans]

My total dividend (mostly bonds but some from stocks) income (not the irregular cap gains income) is about $30k so I am still well ahead.

Since you have about 10K of room in the 15% tax bracket, you might want to do some Roth conversions.
TJ

 

[plex]

Yea, everyone is quoting per person I believe.

If I adjusted my current expenses so that health insurance was 5k/year, and assumed I had managed to mostly pay off my mortgage/didn't rent, I would only need about 9k/year for base costs. I would want some cushion though for unexpected costs/wants, so I would budget 13k/year (after tax). This would be just for my needs alone though.

This is enough to cover all of my hobbies (reading/gaming/movies/learning), which while inexpensive, require immense amounts of free time to fully explore. Everyone has different hobbies however, and it is definitely in their best interests to be honest about what they really enjoy doing, the sort of things you dream about doing while you are/were working. There is not point in ER if you can't really enjoy yourself.

Edit: Forgot to add bi-annual trips to see family, so my budget would increase by 2k/year, to 15k/year. Trips cost me much less than that now, but the distance is much shorter than it will potentially be in the future.

 

[unclemick]

1993-2009, 12k to 89k(2006) to ballpark 48k in 2009 - although the year isn't over.

No mortgage, car payments or health insurance in the 90's with much less travel - lived on Lake Ponchartrain. Ran cheap early on.

All praise to Bogle's balanced index, Mr Market in the 90's, small pension 1998, and SS 2005 - have cranked up expenditures as my 84.6 + or - 0.1 life expectancy gets closer.

Katrina and the passing of the SO unexpectedly cured any live to 100 thoughts.

heh heh heh - Still tap dance around the infamous 4% SWR aka SEC yield(ballpark 3%) in hard times and 5% variable when it's bon temps rolliere. .

 

[scrabbler1]

Since you have about 10K of room in the 15% tax bracket, you might want to do some Roth conversions.
TJ

I have a regular IRA worth nearly $300k, too. According to my worksheet, my expenses will rise more quickly than my dividends (especially if my health insurance always rises at 20% a year like it will in 2010) so my current surplus will disappear in at most 15 years. My surplus is earning about 6.5%-7% and gets taxed very lightly.

To answer FIREdreamer's question, I am single.

 

[FANOFJESUS]

I could get it done on 15k.

 

[Midpack]

My planned spending is quite a bit higher, but no one probably cares how much...

 

[WanderALot]

Except for rescue, are you all single?

For the 2 of us, I am shooting for $60K/year or $30K/person.

We're shooting for the same, 60K/couple. While I understand adding another person doesn't double the expense for things like housing and food, it does double when you include a healthy dose of travel and other fun.

 

[SecondCor521]

$15,801.17 annually for one person starting February 9, 2016.

Approximately.

2Cor521

 

[Rambler]

My parents live on $22k, and are happy and quite satisfied, at ages 73-74. They don't travel much and what travel they do is by high mpg car. We will pull the plug at 51, want to have an RV, travel more, visit the kids, our hobbies are a tad on the expensive side, McMansion and couple acres and a pool require more expensive maintenance, etc, so there is little chance we could get by on the kind of budget they have. Don't want to say what my target budget is...

R

 

[smjsl]

Do you include amortization costs; e.g. $2k per year per car if you buy $20k car every 10 years, or spending like roof / hvac / windows / other rare & expensive housing-related replacements?

 

[plex]

I would include amortization costs, but, as the tax tables do, I would also assign a salvage value, if there really is a realistic one. E.g. A car has a definite salvage value, and some people use a single car for much longer, or shorter, than 10 years, resulting in very personal amortization rates.

 

[FIREd]

Do you include amortization costs; e.g. $2k per year per car if you buy $20k car every 10 years, or spending like roof / hvac / windows / other rare & expensive housing-related replacements?

Yes I do. Currently, I budget about $3,800/yr for large home repairs and $3,600/yr for car replacement.