Budget = 91k annually:
22 medical expenses (insurance premuim, deductables, medications)
12 income tax
7 LTC (assuming I can get it !)
6 Home Taxes / Insurance
6 Utilities / Cable / Cell Phones
5 Home Maintenance / HOA
6 Food cooked at home
2 Outside dining
7 "fun" money (hobbies, pocket money, etc)
4 Cars (insurance and maintenace, gas = "fun money")
1 LTD
2 Life Insurance
3 Vacation
2 "stuff" (mostly things that need to be replaced)
3 future one time expenses
2 Pets
1 Donations
I've used 79k in firecalc assuming 12k in either earnings or SS. 12k is DH's current salary. SS even if we stopped working today would be 30k, so I've left myself an 18k buffer there.
Current portfolio = 1.9mm (excluding real estate and 200k set aside for one time expenses for new roofs, new A/C, a couple of fantasy vacations, and the like)
I feel like such a dork worrying when I have more than I could have EVER imagined.
Thanks again
Some random thoughts after reading this thread and it was interesting, BTW.
Others already mentioned about the LTC insurance. Depending on the pre-existing conditions you might need it or maybe not. It sounds that you'd like to get it, but might not qualify for it. My suggestion would be to start investigating this portion of your plan, to see whether any finacially stable insurance co. would take you (both) and what premiums you might pay. Don't forget that those premiums are not set in stone either. After hearing many negatives about LTC, we'll try to self-insure, IMO.
I don't know what's the reason to pay for life insurance if nobody depends on you and your income. Are you sure you're not wasting $2k for it?
The same goes for LTD? Another $1k
When your 11 y.o. car dies, can you share one car? I'm pretty sure it's doable, but that's just me thinking
. Less money to spend plus adds to your 'green' side (less pollution, less support to oil, etc.
).
If needed, would you consider moving to another cheaper state? Boy, either your residence is in the flood area or the house is so grand, that you really pay A LOT for the house taxes/insurance/HOA's/maint/utilities,etc. Hopefully we'll never move there. Only hearing about hurricane seasons there scares me
.
More in general... I read 'experts' advising potential retirees to live on the new budget (as if retired) for a while and see how it goes. But since you know LBYM, maybe you should try to live on the bare minimum budget that would be acceptable to you both, so you can test the worst case scenario.
Since we're far away from retirement or even 50
, I don't study the 4% SWR yet, but in case the majority of your investments are in deferred ret. accounts, have you factored in implications of drawing them ealier than 59.5? The same 'experts' recommend to have 4-6 years of your retirement expenses in 'safe' accounts outside the retirement accounts.
Based on our spending, I could easily retire today on your portfolio (care to share
?), but we have to work FT, save, and raise our two little rascals
.
Just one last note. We use our AmEx CC for probably 97% of our monthly expenses. Each Feb. (or maybe Jan., I cannot recall), AmEx generated a yearly report by categorizing our expenses. Not sure how they do it (by store names or whether they analyze my receipts too), but totals seem to reflect where our money goes quite accurately.