I'm reading these fixed-income / ladder / etc discussions with great interest. I'm almost 67 and I took SS at my FRA because the long-term training gig I was living on abruptly disappeared. I may get occasional jobs to pad the account but it's not something I can count on. Now I need to figure out what to do going forward.
I'm one of those who couldn't live very well on fixed income alone -- just not enough in the tank. But a chunk of my net worth is in two rental properties that throw off a good return. I also have a mortgage on my house -- only 2.75% & tax writeoffs so I'm in no hurry to pay it off. The rentals cover the mortgage, household expenses, and utilities. SS covers almost everything else.
My liquid investible $$ is currently in a few stocks (which I mostly ignore, given my track record with stock investing), and mostly in 6-month Tbills and MM funds returning 5-5.5%. I've only been living on this for a few months, but I'm currently drawing about 2% of that investible $$. In 4 years I'll pay off a car loan and the payments are about equal to that 2% draw, so maybe then I won't need regular withdrawals at all? (I could pay off the loan, but it's only 3.25% so I'd rather leave that money in Tbills.) But I've also taken some big withdrawals to install solar, looking at a heat pump, etc.
I thought I would live very comfortably on a set of investing strategies (60/40 and some more complex stuff) that produced a great consistent return for the last 35 years -- until almost the day that I freed up my cash and invested in them, right when everything went wonky in early 2022. Great timing. I'm not sure if they'll work in a rising-rate environment. (But then I'm not sure stocks will either ...)
For now they're clawing back the 2022 losses but it's definitely not something I can count on any more.
What would you do in that situation? Stick 60% of my investible cash in VOO or similar and build a ladder with the rest?