Poll: Monthly income streams (please read before voting)

[rodi]

In another thread a member suggested that income streams might be a more interesting metric than net worth. Here are the rules.

Income streams are CURRENT - not future - income streams.
Income streams total should not include WR - rather streams of money from other sources - like pension, SS, annuity pay out, rental income, hobby job income.
This poll is for retired persons - so salaries are not included.

Hobby jobs - my definition: money for something you'd be doing even if there was no money involved... perhaps blogging, photography, fixing up and selling old cars.... If it's *work*, involves a boss and deadlines... it doesn't count.

 

[rodi]

More clarification:

Dividends/interest/cap gain distributions - those are part of your nest egg/withdrawal plan - you can choose to reinvest them, or to withdraw them as income...
In other words - don't count those.

 

[W2R]

1) I have a tiny FERS pension, diet-COLA'd.

2) I get divorced spousal SS. This income stream will increase in 2018 when I plan to claim my own SS instead, but I answered based on what I am getting right now. SS is COLA'd.

3) I get a fixed monthly payment from the TSP (=401K), from the G Fund which is cash-like because it cannot decrease in share price. I regard it as being similar to a high interest savings account. I purposely set up this fixed monthly payment to be essentially the same as a non-COLA pension so I included it. With the same payments each month, it will not run out until I am in my mid 90's.

No hobby jobs, rentals, or annuities. I might get an SPIA when I am in my 80's if they are cheap and available at that time.

These income streams provide just a little less than half of my income. The rest is from dividends (I also take my capital gains in cash, and reinvest them plus any excess dividends when I rebalance).

I like the security of having several income streams.

 

[Meadbh]

Good thread topic.

I have some regular as clockwork rental income, less than $2000. I expect that to rise with inflation, while the offset expenses decrease in a stepwise manner as mortgages are paid off.

 

[jim584672]

Big fat zero income stream right now.

 

[rothlev]

Is it per household or per person?

 

[Souschef]

We have an income stream of $5870 per month. This includes 2 SS and 2 small pensions.
At 5% return, that is the equivalent of having about 1.4 Mil in income producing investments
Life is good!

 

[rodi]

We have SS for DH, and rental income. The gross SS and rental income is 41% of our gross monthly budget.

I have a somewhere between 8 and 16 years till I draw SS - so that's not even on the horizon. I have a small non-cola'd pension that I can start collecting this fall - it would be 6% of our monthly budget if I chose to start it at age 55, or let it grow.

 

[rodi]

Is it per household or per person?

I assumed per household - because most folks budget on a household basis.

 

[FUEGO]

Voted $1-3k. Started a blog about my early retirement in 2013 and it's doing well enough. It also led to a couple of freelance writing and consulting gigs. Very very very part time (maybe 4-8 hrs/wk on the blog; 1-2 hrs/wk freelancing/consulting).

Hmmm... "money for something you'd be doing even if there was no money involved" - yep. I often put more thought into a forum post than I do a freelance writing assignment (and you guys still aren't paying me!). Consulting = talk to people in the same way that I talk to people for free.

 

[Another Reader]

Two relatively small pensions, about to get the first SS check, inherited IRA's with RMD's, and real estate. Pensions are sorta COLA'd at 2 percent max. My IRA's are in reserve. The income adds up to a nice number on paper, but I pay a high amount for pre-Medicare retiree health insurance and I still have a mortgage in Silicon Valley....

 

[Senator]

I am not quite retired yet, I voted $10K+.

After I leave my FT job, I will have rental income/profits in excess of $150K per year. On top of that, I also have a small VA disability payment. These are current income streams that I receive now, on top of my mega-corp salary.

Future income streams...
A small pension ($1,262 mo, no COLA at 65)
SS
Dividends, etc.

Maybe I am more "semi-retired" than retired?

 

[mickeyd]

I voted but used income after deduction for taxes. Probably should have voted for gross (pretax) category and would have bumped me up to the next category.

 

[Cobra9777]

I'm retired; DW still working OMY or so. I have a modest non-COLA pension plus rental income from two houses. These cover about 40% of our spending. When DW retires, her COLA-ed pension will take that figure to 70%. We're both more than a decade from FRA for SS.

 

[calmloki]

Think we got about 98% of our income from sources other than stocks last year. good thing!

 

[MichaelB]

Nada. Bupkis. Diddly-squat. Zilch.

 

[Bir48die]

Currently at $3,800/mth. Will go to $5700/mth if early SS or $6,400 at 66.2 years old

 

[scrabbler1]

big zilch for me, too.

 

[MBAustin]

We have DH's SS and pension which covers about 40% of our spending (not including charitable donations and income taxes).

The answer would have been much higher if I had started my pension last October as I had originally planned, but I was offered a buyout which I took in 2014, so by definition of the poll, any income from that doesn't count. IRL, I would not take anything from it until 2017 at the earliest when I hit 59.5. But don't need it as we got some whopper CG distributions from taxable funds in December that will more than cover our "gap" in spending in 2016 and probably most of 2017, even after I write the huge check to pay the taxes on the distribution.

 

[sengsational]

To compare, you'd need to combine current portfolio balance and current and future expected income streams. As indicated by all of the zero replies, the value of this comparison holds little value for those that are not structured with income streams.

 

[rodi]

I am not quite retired yet, I voted $10K+.

After I leave my FT job, I will have rental income/profits in excess of $150K per year. On top of that, I also have a small VA disability payment. These are current income streams that I receive now, on top of my mega-corp salary.

Future income streams...
A small pension ($1,262 mo, no COLA at 65)
SS
Dividends, etc.

Maybe I am more "semi-retired" than retired?

Why are you still working?

Do you plan on handing the management/maintenance of your rentals over to someone else? We manage our one rental ourselves - but it's directly behind our house, newer construction, and we have great tenants... so the work is probably less than 10 hours per year - including cashing the checks and doing the little bit of extra tax entry.

 

[FIREd]

Nada. Bupkis. Diddly-squat. Zilch.

+1. I did not realize there were so few of us in this situation.

 

[Walt34]

We have pension income and a (very) small amount of dividend income. Later this year I will apply for SS and that will help a lot. At the moment we are living slightly beyond our means but SS will more than cover that. All planned out years ago.

 

[Corporateburnout]

Zilch. Nada. Rien. Zero

 

[Bestwifeever]

The most important thing to remember in adding this up is

Don't cross the streams