Money goal or time goal?

[retiringat50]

i had a money goal and was darn close to it (before the drop this past month)
Now its a time goal. Waiting till im 10yrs fulltime and im getting out! personality conflict w/the immediate boss

 

[megacorp-firee]

Yes, your situation is similar to mine. Heres the only thing that has me worrying.

As you said, we could live on our pensions alone (wife has one also), if we needed to, but we'vre been saving like maniacs for a while now and I have spreadsheets showing our projected end value at the end of the 7 years (when I turn 50). We've already gotten used to this final number and have made plans based on the income we think we will be able to draw based on that number. But my spreadsheets are based on 9% avg return and as the market has dropped and if we dont get 9% over these final 7 years, we obviously wont have the amount of money we thoguth we would.

Since we are already making plans based on that number, we would have to either lower our expectations of retirement or work longer. Neither sounds like fun, so its annoying / depressing.

whoops ... sorry to hear that.

I guess we differ in that I had originally (about 4-5 years ago) lowered my projected avg return to 5% to run the numbers. I was able to raise this conservative number as each year ended and I had made substantially more. At the end (right before retirement), I was projecting 7% per year. But during that time, we did not have any major prolonged downturns, so I was 'more than' ok. As I got closer my buffer got fairly big. Big enough to set up the income stream and cd ladder and not have to be overly reliant upon a large swr. My withdrawal rate is a smidge more than 3%.

You may need to rerun the numbers and be a bit more conservative to see where you are. Then you can decide if you want to keep to your timetable or delay it a bit. The alternative is to lose sleep and periodic bouts of annoyance and depression. Best of luck to you on your planning.

btw, I have found that 7 years is a long time (counting backwards to 2000/2001, we went thru one heck of a ride and survived) and anything can happen (up and down). If nothing else, I have learned to be flexible in life.

 

[Shawn]

I have a time goal because I'm waiting for lifetime medical through my employer/pension. That will be in less than two years when I turn 50.

That said, money is a factor too. I've estimated how much I'll have if I retire at 50, 51, 52, or 53. My estimated SWR plus pension is about 100K at 50, and 150K at 53. That's a significant difference but I don't know if it's worth the extra three years. Gosh, I sure hope not.

Also, especially at the beginning of retirement, I'll be able to easily live off my pension and not touch my savings. Since my pension is not really impacted by the market, significant drops, while disappointing, do not cause me much pain. I'm still in the accumulation phase. Stocks are cheaper now. I'm stocking up.

 

[Spanky]

We are very close to our $ goal while waiting three more years for the eligibility for reduced health insurance premium, the oldest daughter to complete college and the youngest one to enter college. We will not have any pensions.