32 and not knowing what to do

[clifp]

Well you guys have worked hard, or at the very least lived well below your means to have saved that much. So I by all means I encourage you two to take some time off and find out what you what to do and where you want to live. Better to retire in your 50s working at satisfying job/location than in your 40s being miserable. Plus with Illinois's pension troubles you seem like a prime candidate to help bail out the states fiscal irresponsibility .

I go to Vegas several times a year, and being retired typically spend almost a week there. The last couple years buying rental properties, and while I've stopped buying properties temporarily is still one of the most affordable places in the country.

I've also being playing poker almost all my life. I'm good enough to have a cashed at WSOP event, and from Aug 2008 to Dec 2011 never went to an ATM, because poker provided me with more than enough cash. I still put plenty of stuff on credit cards so it wasn't enough to live on in Hawaii and 2012 was a losing year.

I've also watched around 8 guys who I played with move to Vegas to become professional poker players. The couple of guys who were better than me did very well indeed, a bracelet and final table for one, and cashed in 5 out of 8 events for the second guy (a great tourney player). The guys worse than me didn't last the summer. The rest of the guys who were about my level did manage to grind out a living for respectable periods of time. But in talking to them both when the come back to Hawaii as well as running into them on the tables in Vegas, the one common theme is this. Playing the game professionally is much less fun than playing it a few times a week, with a couple of trips to Vegas a year. It becomes a job, a pretty good job, but job never the less.

Could you make 5 big blinds a hour playing, probably, but that is only $15-$25 at the 1-3, 2-5 game taking money from the tourist, certainly possible to make a 2K/month doing that. Could you make that at $5-10, I couldn't, but I guess you could find out. I find after playing poker a lot for a week or two I get bored and play worse.

Still plenty of guys who are good at trading are also very good at playing poker. Plus unlike all of my poker acquaintances, you have a hefty bankroll, and you don't have to worry about making the rent. Which is a big psychological advantage. But you'd have to be great I think to make enough money playing poker to build up your nest egg to 2.5 million.

One of the main concerns that would be nice to have answered is how much a multi-year sabbatical would hurt my employment prospects at future jobs. If I took 3 years off to travel the world and then looked for a job again, how much does that 3 years hurt me? Would limiting it to 1 year make a significant difference?

I think that is exactly the right question to ask. I don't believe there is a definitive answer, but my gut level tells me a year is cool, three years I'd be worried about your skills being too rusty. Or at least I would have been when I ran Intel's website.

 

[Symbiotic]

As a side note, it's interesting how many poker players are on this message board. Correlation? Causal?

 

[clifp]

As a side note, it's interesting how many poker players are on this message board. Correlation? Causal?

Correlation I think. Investing is all about understanding risk and reward and so is playing poker. Math skills are real important when understanding withdrawal rates and pot odds.

I've enjoyed watching young poker players evolve into investors. They typically start off buying high tech stocks, (often with a side trip into options), then individual stocks or high beta ETFs. Finally when they mature they buy index funds. Of course as somebody who buys individual stocks, I haven't matured yet.

 

[Rothman]

Cliff, have you considered market timing? It's like poker just watch your opponent, the fed, and guess when they will stop buying. Seriously I think you should go for any new area, life's too short to not enjoy where you live, and try some other jobs and build to your target.

 

[Throwdownmyaceinthehole]

Move to Texas! Honestly I lived 20 years in a town I disliked, but made the best of it and saved like crazy so we could be FI. Then I moved and took a job I loved. Looking back on my life, we should have moved a lot sooner.. Life is short and you don't get a do over. Don't spend any of it in a town or job that you will later regret.

 

[ShortInSeattle]

I wanted at least $2.5mm plus a paid off house, which would provide anywhere between 75k and 100k in income which would be plenty for the two of us. I find myself kind of mentally justifying lowering that number now

That is about what our goals are, and we're 34/36.

We've been tempted to cut out early, like you are considering, but have decided to hang in there. We have the advantage of liking our city and our jobs, although we'd still rather be free to not work. We anticipate a long retirement, and we'd like it to be a secure one so we can fully enjoy it.

If you think you'll be comfy living off 2.5-3% of your current nest egg, including healthcare, perhaps you can make the jump now.

If you are unhappy in your lives in general (your home, your city) perhaps job hunting in a new city will provide some adventure without unhinging your plans too much.

If you are just feeling impatient, but your income needs are likely to be higher than what your portfolio will provide, I'd stick it out.

Whatever you decide... Good luck.

 

[clifp]

Cliff, have you considered market timing? It's like poker just watch your opponent, the fed, and guess when they will stop buying. Seriously I think you should go for any new area, life's too short to not enjoy where you live, and try some other jobs and build to your target.

Well having sold 1/3 of my Intel and all of my other tech stocks in Jan 2000, I am definitely a dirty market timer. Of course I screwed up in 2008, by not selling anything, but I bought like stocks like mad in Dec 2008 and Jan 2009.

I also sold 2/3 of Vanguard GNMA a few weeks ago, yes to get ahead of the Fed. We will see how that works out for me.

 

[someguy]

To the OP: My DW and I are a few years older and have similar thoughts and issues. Where we live now isn't bad, but we'd love to live some place more temperate and sunny where we can do our athletic activities year-round. California is high on our list. San Francisco itself does not have what most people would call good weather. Get into south bay area (Los Altos, Santa Clara, Palo Alto, etc.) and you get a lot more sun.

Both DW and I have been wrestling with a certain restlessness and dissatisfaction and are trying to figure out if that's some little voice saying to have kids. She leans a little toward yes and I lean slightly to moderately toward no, it's to do everything possible to reach full FI. I am reading a lot between the lines and may be applying my situation to yours, but I wonder if your wife's lack of fulfillment in the workplace is or will become a burning desire to become a mother? On the topic of family, do you or your wife have family? Closeness to family is a factor for many, especially women it seems. Obviously if you add in kid(s), then that factor can increase. You might also consider the same question for your own situation.

Is there any way you can remotely work for the existing company and/or hand off some duties to someone good who you pay? I agree with some other posters who have said that having some kind of income stream separate from your investments would make any of the options less risky. This is something we're considering with my small business. DW is highly credentialed but has found it difficult to get a good job offer in California while we're still here.