50 and less than a million

[aaronc879]

I suspect you might be considered a reasonable fit for ziggy's "austere" clause.

Compared to people on here, yes. However, millions of people live on as little or less than I do. Although most of them do it out of necessity. I do it out of a strong desire to not have to work any longer than possible.

 

[tuixiu]

I agree, in fact I'd put forth it's (b)illions.

Everyone has their own balance of where the fuzzy line of additional years of work vs. additional luxuries in life may lie, and I don't think anyone's pointing a finger at anyone else in judgement for being able to be content with a simpler lifestyle.

 

[ziggy29]

Or perhaps an income stream from something like, oh I don't know, uh..real estate with a property manager so it's passive!

Silly me. I forgot the One True Way....

 

[Red_y]

I retired from fulltime w*rk last year at age 49 with less than 800k portfolio plus about 325k set aside to build a house. I do work at H&R Block (during tax season only) to pull in $4-5k per year.

Low budget tastes and moving to Canada where health insurance is $96/month for two people makes it possible. I have reduced spending by about 500 per month to lessen the initial hit to the portfolio (currently 650k) during these early years of retirement. No pension awaits, just Social Security. Not panicking yet...

 

[crispus]

This thread is inspiring me. My wife's company is closing their local plant. After 34 years she will get non-cola pension, along with company health insurance (currently our cost is about $200 per month), and about 2 years of severance pay. We are both 54 and the fact that we could survive without working makes us happy to know.

 

[ikubak]

I think you can retire on less than 1 million quite easily if you move to Mexico and buy into their national health plan. Less money means you have to be more creative, but it can be done.

 

[Bestwifeever]

A couple of years ago Barron's ran an article about a guy who did it with 600k; I wonder how he's doing?

My original question inplied 1 million or less w/o fancy pensions, COLA products/add ons etc.

A little less than a million without a pension at age 50--that's 12 years til SS, 15 til medicare--is a little scary imho. The smaller the nest egg, the scarier it would get for me.

That's a lot of years in retirement to cover, a lot of health insurance to buy.

 

[Moemg]

A little less than a million without a pension at age 50--that's 12 years til SS, 15 til medicare--is a little scary imho. The smaller the nest egg, the scarier it would get for me.

That's a lot of years in retirement to cover, a lot of health insurance to buy.

I think it would be a lot less scarey for a single person with no debt then a couple .

 

[Sparky]

We had close to $1M when we ER'd 6 years ago - now, everything's down more than 50%. I can't even believe it... We cancelled cable, don't eat or drink out, dumbed down all utilities, phone, internet and are just holding on - don't know if we will have to get jobs. Just waiting...

 

[Bimmerbill]

What about the state of MA, with its insurance plan? If you had little income I think the insurance would be cheap. Some parts of MA are cheap to live in (western probably).

 

[spncity]

Low budget tastes and moving to Canada where health insurance is $96/month for two people makes it possible.

Could you say more about this? Can anyone just move there and buy into the Canadian health insurance? Puzzled by this comment.

Thanks,
spncity

 

[BunsGettingFirm]

Silly me. I forgot the One True Way....

It is one thing to know The One True Way but another to walk it. Wait, I heard that somewhere. Must have been a religious revelation.

 

[FANOFJESUS]

Sold the source of the -$50K debt for a reasonable profit (like about net $65K) put it into savings (Long term CD's and did not redeem them except to roll them over, for the most part) - Retired Pay COLA'd - now SS COLA'd - Personal Savings - 2% SWR - I little part-time work to eat - very low medical costs - it can be done. No strategy except maybe keeping living expenses way down.

Just curious what is your annual spending?

 

[Red_y]

Could you say more about this? Can anyone just move there and buy into the Canadian health insurance? Puzzled by this comment.

Thanks,
spncity

My mistake...I should have said 'emigrated' from the US to Canada. No, you cannot just pick up and move to another country. My partner and I are US citizens, so we applied to become Permanent Residents of Canada through the government ministry Citizenship and Immigration Canada Welcome to Citizenship and Immigration Canada

We applied under the Skilled Worker class where there is a point system to qualify...points are based on work history, education level, age, ability to speak one of Canada's two national languages, etc. The whole process took 15 months to complete and cost about $3000.

There's a long thread about Moving to Canada, including my story, in the forum here
http://www.early-retirement.org/forums/f28/fire-to-canada-17770.html

 

[Alan]

Low budget tastes and moving to Canada where health insurance is $96/month for two people makes it possible.

We are fortunate that we are able to move to the UK should the need arise. After 6 months residency we would be covered by the NHS, plus private insurance is also available as a supplement.

It is not something we want to do - we love it here and our children have grown up and live here - but it is a safety net that is nice to have.

 

[haha]

This thread is inspiring me. My wife's company is closing their local plant. After 34 years she will get non-cola pension, along with company health insurance (currently our cost is about $200 per month), and about 2 years of severance pay. We are both 54 and the fact that we could survive without working makes us happy to know.

Crispus, reading it here does not mean that you know it, only that someone asserted it.

So be safe and make up your own mind about all of it.

Ha

 

[Jarhead*]

See my by-line. I "retired" at 38 with a NW of about -$50,000 (yes that is a minus). Had COLA'd Retired Pay of about $10K, lifetime low cost medical care. 3 teenagers at home. All 4 kids are college graduates. Lived in VA, FL and OH and 30 years later NW is about $2.5MM - no inheritances, no windfalls. Just plugging along in life. Would I like to do that again? No, but it can be done today but would have to be about a $36K of retired pay, medical care, and a positive NW would help.

John Galt, wherever you are, fuggitabout it!

Even in your wildest dreams, you couldn't top OAGs above post.

 

[Dawg52]

See my by-line. I "retired" at 38 with a NW of about -$50,000 (yes that is a minus). Had COLA'd Retired Pay of about $10K, lifetime low cost medical care. 3 teenagers at home. All 4 kids are college graduates. Lived in VA, FL and OH and 30 years later NW is about $2.5MM - no inheritances, no windfalls. Just plugging along in life. Would I like to do that again? No, but it can be done today but would have to be about a $36K of retired pay, medical care, and a positive NW would help.

You need to write a book on how to do this. Better yet, Obama needs to appoint you to a cabinet position.

 

[Bestwifeever]

OAG I truly admire your retirement success and this doesn't diminish it, but when you say

Sold the source of the -$50K debt for a reasonable profit (like about net $65K)

Wouldn't that mean your -$50K net worth was actually +$65K net worth (sounds like you maybe had a piece of property worth $115K that had a $50K mortgage on it or something, or at least something worth $115K that you used to offset the negative $50K situation)?

 

[OAG]

Just curious what is your annual spending?

Current 2009 Budget is $45,980 (Everything; which includes "doubling up" on RE Taxes so that I can Itemize Deductions on 2009 taxes).

 

[OAG]

OAG I truly admire your retirement success and this doesn't diminish it, but when you say



Wouldn't that mean your -$50K net worth was actually +$65K net worth (sounds like you maybe had a piece of property worth $115K that had a $50K mortgage on it or something, or at least something worth $115K that you used to offset the negative $50K situation)?

Yes, you are correct, but that happened about 7 years into "retirement".

 

[OAG]

You need to write a book on how to do this. Better yet, Obama needs to appoint you to a cabinet position.

Sorry, I can't qualify, I actually pay my taxes (all of them).

 

[FANOFJESUS]

My hat is off to you too OAG, good job.

 

[dm]

How about retired in Oct. 2007 and now have less than a million? My wife has a part time job at the local college, she teaches one night a week, spring and fall. Plans were that she could give that up this year. Looks like she will need to keep the job for a while longer if things don't turn around. She works 4 hrs a week for 28 weeks so it isn't that bad. It pays the health insurance.

One of our sons is having some trouble financialy and we would like to help, but really cant do much. A year ago it wouldn't have been a problem.

 

[donheff]

Current 2009 Budget is $45,980 (Everything; which includes "doubling up" on RE Taxes so that I can Itemize Deductions on 2009 taxes).

Man, I am adding that one to my spending plan. Inspirational OAG.

As for all the nay-sayers, I think you are holding a mirror to your life style. I couldn't imagine retiring on that amount either. But millions and millions of Americans living right here do fine (by their own lights) with that level of income during their working years. In the VA countryside near my weekend house I think a majority of the residents live on incomes less than $40K. They have small, one or two bedroom houses on concrete slabs, they don't travel much, and they don't go out to fancy restaurants. But they do stop in at the local diner for coffee and breakfast on Saturday mornings after hunting and seem to be pretty darn happy.