SF94111
Confused about dryer sheets
DW and I are both 40 and like many on this board desire a life free of work stress and ability to travel more... and if we work, it's doing something we want to do vs. have to do. After lurking here for a few years, what I've gathered is that the FI part is most important then RE can come when the timing is right.
We're both in jobs doing well and feel like we still have more to accomplish for at least a few years before pulling the plug... which may be in 3, 4, 5 or 10 years. However, we don't see ourselves working past 50 in the corporate world - family members have died young, and we have seen people in their 60s work to make ends meet which we really don't want to be us.
That being said, we've seen two major recessions since we got out of college in the late 90s and the financial crisis and understand that times change quickly... and other TBD crises can and do come up.
Our situation:
No kids, no school/car debt... credit cards paid off monthly, etc. etc.
1mm+ in house equity with still a sizable mortgage (500K) as we're in a pricey West Coast area.
1.62mm in post tax investment accounts
990K in retirement accounts
The plan the next few years will be to continue to build the nest egg by deferring our max amounts yearly to 401k and attaining matches, HSAs, etc.,
and push what we can to brokerage and add a bit each month to pay down the house.
We also plan on getting a handle on spending the next couple years but the challenge is with work/ the house is to truly determine what will not be needed in the future - i.e. work clothes and commute spending, house upgrades/fixes, commute/entertaining costs vs. what we would reasonably project along with what healthcare costs are going to be since that is a moving target.
I think after pulling the plug on work we would downsize the house to a cheaper area (though not the boonies) and stash the equity.
The goal will be to get to a <3% WR but still have a lifestyle that we want without major sacrifices - travel, events, dining, etc. Fortunately, both my wife and I come from blue collar family backgrounds and were brought up with a mindset of not living beyond our means, buying used cars, not going into debt... not staying in five star hotels or buying first class plane tix, etc.
Any thoughts or advice from those in similar positions?
We're both in jobs doing well and feel like we still have more to accomplish for at least a few years before pulling the plug... which may be in 3, 4, 5 or 10 years. However, we don't see ourselves working past 50 in the corporate world - family members have died young, and we have seen people in their 60s work to make ends meet which we really don't want to be us.
That being said, we've seen two major recessions since we got out of college in the late 90s and the financial crisis and understand that times change quickly... and other TBD crises can and do come up.
Our situation:
No kids, no school/car debt... credit cards paid off monthly, etc. etc.
1mm+ in house equity with still a sizable mortgage (500K) as we're in a pricey West Coast area.
1.62mm in post tax investment accounts
990K in retirement accounts
The plan the next few years will be to continue to build the nest egg by deferring our max amounts yearly to 401k and attaining matches, HSAs, etc.,
and push what we can to brokerage and add a bit each month to pay down the house.
We also plan on getting a handle on spending the next couple years but the challenge is with work/ the house is to truly determine what will not be needed in the future - i.e. work clothes and commute spending, house upgrades/fixes, commute/entertaining costs vs. what we would reasonably project along with what healthcare costs are going to be since that is a moving target.
I think after pulling the plug on work we would downsize the house to a cheaper area (though not the boonies) and stash the equity.
The goal will be to get to a <3% WR but still have a lifestyle that we want without major sacrifices - travel, events, dining, etc. Fortunately, both my wife and I come from blue collar family backgrounds and were brought up with a mindset of not living beyond our means, buying used cars, not going into debt... not staying in five star hotels or buying first class plane tix, etc.
Any thoughts or advice from those in similar positions?