NW-Bound
Give me a museum and I'll fill it. (Picasso) Give me a forum ...
- Joined
- Jul 3, 2008
- Messages
- 35,712
I did not and will not vote. Reason: I don't know yet where we fit!
Following are our actual expenses, as I obtained from my wife's spreadsheet. You see, as I keep track of our portfolio and our income, my wife keeps track of our expenses. As LBYM practitioners, we have not had the need to budget since we married 28 yrs ago. As long as we stuffed our 401Ks, and IRA or Roth in the years when we qualified, and still had plenty leftover to take to the Scottrade and Ameriprise "casinos", who cared? Found a good airfare to Europe? We're on!
As long as our "cash buffer" (checking account) ran in the high 5 figures, who needed a stinkin' budget?
After coming to this forum, and see how the real early retirees plan their expenses, I suddenly realized we have been way too casual. Yes, the recent market performance plus my fortuitous stock picks allowed us to splurge, but something has changed. I am still making some money from free-lance part-time work, but that may dry up.
Yes, we have been LBYM'ers, but it's time to realize that our means have taken a "haircut". And what if it takes another haircut, ie. a "crew cut"?
Anyway, here are our actual past expenses.
2001: $45.1K
2002: $43.4K
2003: $66.9K
2004: $58.2K
2005: $122.0K
2006: $111.0K
2007: $92.8K
2008YTD: $83.4K
Horrendous fluctuations! And it seems our expenses have reached a "permanently high plateau", to borrow from Irving Fisher.
A little reflecting showed me what happened. In 2001 and 2002, I had some family and career traumas, in addition to being post 9/11, so we did not spend much. Then, in 2003, I suddenly realized that I could never take it with me, and we discovered Europe travel. Of course we got hooked. And the bull market kept feeding my accounts. It was great when we went trekking for 2 weeks, and came back to discover we had more than when we started. Being budget travelers, we could not spend it fast enough.
Then, in 2005 my wife quit her megacorp work in disgust. Great! As I was working only part-time, we had even more time to travel. And then, we spent more money to remodel our 2nd home in the mountain. And our children started college. And we started to buy our own medical insurance.
As all good things must eventually end, WallStreet collapsed, taking the economy and my stock values with it.
We are still OK though, with the 73% of the highwater mark in Oct 07, of which 68-70% is currently in cash and I-bond, while the other 30% is fluctuating wildly.
I just have to sit down to see what are truly "one-time" expense items. I remember the past press releases from one of my former megacorp employers. In the early 90's, when there were doubts that it might not survive, its quarterly reports heroically put a positive spin on the earning, or lack of it thereoff. "Excluding these one-time items, we would have made $xxx per share". The problem was there were always some one-time items, one quarter after another.
Following are our actual expenses, as I obtained from my wife's spreadsheet. You see, as I keep track of our portfolio and our income, my wife keeps track of our expenses. As LBYM practitioners, we have not had the need to budget since we married 28 yrs ago. As long as we stuffed our 401Ks, and IRA or Roth in the years when we qualified, and still had plenty leftover to take to the Scottrade and Ameriprise "casinos", who cared? Found a good airfare to Europe? We're on!
As long as our "cash buffer" (checking account) ran in the high 5 figures, who needed a stinkin' budget?
After coming to this forum, and see how the real early retirees plan their expenses, I suddenly realized we have been way too casual. Yes, the recent market performance plus my fortuitous stock picks allowed us to splurge, but something has changed. I am still making some money from free-lance part-time work, but that may dry up.
Yes, we have been LBYM'ers, but it's time to realize that our means have taken a "haircut". And what if it takes another haircut, ie. a "crew cut"?
Anyway, here are our actual past expenses.
2001: $45.1K
2002: $43.4K
2003: $66.9K
2004: $58.2K
2005: $122.0K
2006: $111.0K
2007: $92.8K
2008YTD: $83.4K
Horrendous fluctuations! And it seems our expenses have reached a "permanently high plateau", to borrow from Irving Fisher.
A little reflecting showed me what happened. In 2001 and 2002, I had some family and career traumas, in addition to being post 9/11, so we did not spend much. Then, in 2003, I suddenly realized that I could never take it with me, and we discovered Europe travel. Of course we got hooked. And the bull market kept feeding my accounts. It was great when we went trekking for 2 weeks, and came back to discover we had more than when we started. Being budget travelers, we could not spend it fast enough.
Then, in 2005 my wife quit her megacorp work in disgust. Great! As I was working only part-time, we had even more time to travel. And then, we spent more money to remodel our 2nd home in the mountain. And our children started college. And we started to buy our own medical insurance.
As all good things must eventually end, WallStreet collapsed, taking the economy and my stock values with it.
We are still OK though, with the 73% of the highwater mark in Oct 07, of which 68-70% is currently in cash and I-bond, while the other 30% is fluctuating wildly.
I just have to sit down to see what are truly "one-time" expense items. I remember the past press releases from one of my former megacorp employers. In the early 90's, when there were doubts that it might not survive, its quarterly reports heroically put a positive spin on the earning, or lack of it thereoff. "Excluding these one-time items, we would have made $xxx per share". The problem was there were always some one-time items, one quarter after another.
