ICanSeeTheBeginning
Dryer sheet wannabe
Hello everyone. I got serious about saving only about 10 years ago, but I am hopefully retiring in about 5 years. Here is my financial situation in a nutshell.
Income:
Primary employment=100k +10K into retirement fund /yr
Oil royalties = 3-20k /yr
Consulting = 3-20k /yr
wife = no income, but she saves me lots of money and is very frugal
Savings:
Currently saving a minimum of 40k/yr (including 10K from employer) plus any oil and consulting money that comes in.
Total of 975k saved. 400k in taxable accounts, the rest in retirement accounts. Approximately 150k in either Roth or initial basis taxable accounts.
Home Life
Have a wife and 2 kids (11 and 13). We own our house (value=300k). My only debt is 65K on a sailboat (4.25% interest rate).
Spending
I currently spend about 52k per year including the 7k/yr for the mortgage on my boat. BTW, I love my boat! Retirement = more time on the water...among other things. Sailing to Cuba is on the list!
Plan
I can formally retire from work in 4.5 years, which gives me health benefits from 55-65 (I would be 53 upon retirement), and also half tuition for my children at college. My primary employment is as a professor. I am currently limited in the amount I can consult as I have a 12 month appointment (work year round). I'm hoping I can do more consulting after retirement to replace some of the lost income.
I am assuming an additional cost (above my 52k/yr) of 50K for each child's college (100k total extra cost for two kids college). This seems a little light, but I teach at a good public school and with the half tuition (from 12k to 6k per yr) and including what I'm already spending on them, the offset seems OK?? Plus at least one of them will almost surely receive lots of scholarship money.
Modeling
I started modeling my savings and forecasting growth about 6 years ago, and only recently went out and searched the other programs online like firecalc. It gave me more confidence that these other programs were more optimistic (97% success) than my own modeling (93%)....assumes no oil or consulting income, so reality is probably a bit better.
I am now thinking of trying to move to a 9 month appointment at work (from a 12 month). This would cost me 20-25k/yr, but I'd have my summers off. My thinking is that the time now (with kids at home) is more valuable than time later (after they are gone). Basically if I have to work an extra yr or so to make up the lost income it would be worth it to have summers with them now..... And in the end, it still the same total number of months to work. My problem is, I am having a very hard time pulling the trigger. I've lived most of my life in delayed gratification mode (with the exception of buying my boat a few years ago).
Can anybody see any reason why I should not move to a 9-month appointment, or any other glaring problems with what I've described?
Income:
Primary employment=100k +10K into retirement fund /yr
Oil royalties = 3-20k /yr
Consulting = 3-20k /yr
wife = no income, but she saves me lots of money and is very frugal
Savings:
Currently saving a minimum of 40k/yr (including 10K from employer) plus any oil and consulting money that comes in.
Total of 975k saved. 400k in taxable accounts, the rest in retirement accounts. Approximately 150k in either Roth or initial basis taxable accounts.
Home Life
Have a wife and 2 kids (11 and 13). We own our house (value=300k). My only debt is 65K on a sailboat (4.25% interest rate).
Spending
I currently spend about 52k per year including the 7k/yr for the mortgage on my boat. BTW, I love my boat! Retirement = more time on the water...among other things. Sailing to Cuba is on the list!
Plan
I can formally retire from work in 4.5 years, which gives me health benefits from 55-65 (I would be 53 upon retirement), and also half tuition for my children at college. My primary employment is as a professor. I am currently limited in the amount I can consult as I have a 12 month appointment (work year round). I'm hoping I can do more consulting after retirement to replace some of the lost income.
I am assuming an additional cost (above my 52k/yr) of 50K for each child's college (100k total extra cost for two kids college). This seems a little light, but I teach at a good public school and with the half tuition (from 12k to 6k per yr) and including what I'm already spending on them, the offset seems OK?? Plus at least one of them will almost surely receive lots of scholarship money.
Modeling
I started modeling my savings and forecasting growth about 6 years ago, and only recently went out and searched the other programs online like firecalc. It gave me more confidence that these other programs were more optimistic (97% success) than my own modeling (93%)....assumes no oil or consulting income, so reality is probably a bit better.
I am now thinking of trying to move to a 9 month appointment at work (from a 12 month). This would cost me 20-25k/yr, but I'd have my summers off. My thinking is that the time now (with kids at home) is more valuable than time later (after they are gone). Basically if I have to work an extra yr or so to make up the lost income it would be worth it to have summers with them now..... And in the end, it still the same total number of months to work. My problem is, I am having a very hard time pulling the trigger. I've lived most of my life in delayed gratification mode (with the exception of buying my boat a few years ago).
Can anybody see any reason why I should not move to a 9-month appointment, or any other glaring problems with what I've described?
