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So this idea of knocking down our house and building a new one (same waterfront lot) is getting more traction, and we are now fishing for quotes. I'll spare the real estate/reasoning details on that. We have a mortgage of $225k now and it is assumed that if we knock the house down, we will...

DW retired mid 2022 and we are on her COBRA (at over $2k/mo!) for insurance until the end of the year. I will have been retired 7 years in January. We are shopping ACA plans now to get insurance for 2024. We put in our "base" expense budget as our income for 2024 at healthcare.gov, and it...

I have held FZROX since May 2022. It has returned 5.2% since then. FZILX since May 2022. It has returned 2.8% since then. FJRLX since summer 2018. It has returned 0.2% Each fund represents roughly 13% of the total portfolio. Over 5 years expenses is available in cash right now. We...

Maybe I am overthinking this, but... The vast majority of our portfolio is in Fidelity, scattered between DW and I's Rollover IRAs, Roths and a single WROS (brokerage) account that we share. Last year stuffed the proceeds of our primary house sale into the WROS account. Most of it is...

... over 401Ks? Prudential have DW and I's 401Ks, combined they represent around 75% of the portfolio. Fidelity has roughly the other 25%. I intend to move the Prudential segments into Fidelity before May when DW retires. With the recent "dip", it has made me wonder if/when is the best time...

I'm 5 years FIRE'd on Wed and today, DW told her boss on their weekly call of her planned retirement date in May. As such I have been running several models in Fidelity's calculator. About 25% of our portfolio is there now. Had pulled in other balances into it earlier in the year and updated...

Planning on listing the primary home for sale next spring (maybe sooner) and living at the lakehouse full time. Did a little spreadsheet to calculate the proceeds of the sale after cap gain taxes and realtor fees. For what we might list the house for, at the standard 6%, the realtor fee would...

I retired 4 years ago and DW has just announced her retirement date of May 2022. We are refinancing our primary home, even though we plan to sell it in a year, to pull some equity out of it in cash do something with now (and it will still lower our payment by $100/mo with the lower rate) and...

Considering, and very close to committing to, having a 2 car garage (detached) built at our second home. Longer term plan is to sell the primary house and move there full time in '23. I drew up a floor plan for a 24' wide, and 34' deep garage. Two rollup carriage style garage doors, and a...

Maybe 10-15 years or so ago I spotted a couple "albums" of 78 rpm records while perusing antique stores in Vermont. I asked the proprietor what he wanted for them (I worked my was through college in the 80s as a nightclub DJ) and I forget what he said, but they were in the single digits. I...

Have noticed that my middle name/initial with SS is not the one I currently used and has been on every ID I have had since maybe 14 years old. I "took" a new middle name in my teens as part of a religious passage... but am pretty sure it is never documented anywhere. I just started signing my...

I'm retired, DW is retiring mid 2022. We are very happy with our portfolio positions and have recently worked on (with a FIDO rep, see my thread "Playing FIDO") a retirement expense budget that will go into effect mid 2023 after we sell one of our two homes. We have fattened it up nicely to be...

I'm 4 years FIRE'ed, DW is working 1.5 more years. We are now (barely) living off her salary and not touching the portfolio. Today, after a Zoom call with a Fidelity guy, we revisited out budget and took a stab at a "retirement" budget. We made guesses about where we would live (we have...

Right now our primary home is in MA, we bought a second home in NH last year. DW is still working in MA, I am FIRE'd. We draw nothing from our investment portfolio right now. In the spring I plan to buy a new 1-3 year old vehicle; ~$25k. NH has no sales tax on vehicles. NH has no income...

I have the following holdings in my Prudential 401k. They were transferred over from Vanguard when I was working and megacorp switched 401k management from Vanguard to Prudential. Vanguard Institutional 500 Index Trust Large Cap - Blend Vanguard Institutional Total International Stock...

I did something today that I rarely do, I answered my cell phone when I didn't recognize the number (was from our local area code and we have lots going on with contractors, realtors,etc). It was a guy from our local Fidelity Office... We had a nice chat. My assumption is that my account...

I'm retired, DW is working 2 more years, we are not touching anything in our portfolio and (barely) living off her salary. We have been very cash strapped having bought a second home last summer, but are now selling a third property we have had since 1994 in a few weeks. Once all the fees...

We are closing on an investment property (not primary home) this month or next (Dec 21 latest), that will net around $200k on which cap gains are due. I intend to reach out to our tax accountant, but I thought I would ask here as well, should we send a check to the IRS in 2020? Any strategies...

I am thinking of selling my V8 powered Dodge pickup truck/plow truck next spring. Sold the RV trailer that necessitated the V8 engine last year, and we plan on selling the primary property that necessitated plow trucks since 2004, in 2023. I'll just try to make do with a big assed snow blower...

I pull all account balances the first of every month and plug them into a spreadsheet so I can track the growth of the portfolio. Of course after yesterday's DOW hit, I dreaded it, but it wasn't as bad as I thought. We are about a 50/50 AA and my one account with mostly bond funds actually...

Read a fairly recent thread here on reverse mortgages..... enough to convince me it is not a good idea. I'm FIRE'd, DW will work 2-3 more years. We hold 3 real estate properties that have equity totaling probably around 27% of our NW. Living (barely) off wife salary, not touching the...

We use Amex for almost everything, and have taken two trips to Europe (one in Business Class) on reward points alone. The customer service I get from them is second to none. This past year, in Europe when I damaged a rental car, they sure enough took care of it for me. Been a card holder...

An idea I've had for a while, wondering if anyone else does this. While we don't want for much, it is fun to sometimes just spontaneously buy a new toy, indulgence or take a trip. I FIRE'd in 2017, DW is still working 2-3 more years. We are not touching our portfolio now. My though was...

I track our portfolio in a massive spreadsheet (I'm sure ALL have one too) and log into the 8 or so accounts (IRAs, 401Ks Roth's etc) we have and pull balances, and try to about once a month. Been FIRE'd a bit over 2.5 yrs, DW is still working and so far, we have not had to touch the portfolio...

Looking for some creative ideas here. Considering buying a second "overlap" vacation home that we would have for 3 years until DW retires then sell primary residence and live there full time. I FIRE'ed 2+ years ago. DW will work 3 more years, she will turn 60 this summer and is past 59.5...