What do folks forget when making a retirement budget?

[TheWizard]

Emergency fund. We add to it automatically every month. Pays for a new car every 5 years, thats about it. Nice to know it's there.

Well I put excess retirement income into my taxable investment account almost every month but I would hesitate to call it an Emergency Fund.
I prefer Slush Fund...

 

[jr6035]

Well I put excess retirement income into my taxable investment account almost every month but I would hesitate to call it an Emergency Fund.
I prefer Slush Fund...

I agree. My pension covers everything. It's basically the same. But it's not in stocks.

 

[old woman]

Taxes on 401K and it pushing income up so dealing with limits like IRMAA. My 401K was fine at 70, took out about 4% RMD but then it grew more than that so every year the percent goes up and total goes up. You can't reduce the income. I have been converting as much as I dare with all the limits for dividends and things. I am glad the market crashed my 401K is going down, I converted more, hope it stays down until January so I can convert a bunch more. I should have converted most before I was 70.

 

[RobbieB]

^^^ That's right. Budgeting is for the birds.

When the market goes up a lot, you simply spend a lot.

When the market goes down, well, you just spend a little less.

Hehe, ain't it the truth! I cashed out equities in January (that I made a ton of dough on) to buy the boat.

Now boat is bought, but slip fees and improvements / upkeep still need to be paid.

But, I'm glad that I sold a ton in January -

 

[NW-Bound]

^^^ For both of our sakes, let's hope that the market will recover next January, so that you won't have to sell the next batch of shares at low prices.

 

[tb001]

I came in to say dental, since it’s what I forgot when I did my first budget.

Other things that are pushing us up: switching costs of moving and getting the new house where we want it, unexpected expenses with kids, and tree costs, as others have mentioned. We pay a landscaper to do most of our yard maintenance, but the extra tree trimming/removal has been significant.

We bought a 20yr old house, so pretty much everything is going at once. We knew it would be coming, but having to pay a premium for substandard parts because of the shortages was unexpected. I’m just glad we did so much when we first moved in. The pool equipment alone has been a lot more than expected.

I think also, we’re just home more now, so all those little things we might have ignored or forgotten about we have the time to repair or have repaired. Thankfully I budgeted a fair amount for hobbies, so we’re tracking to budget, but if I had gone on past numbers it would have been a surprise.

Someone mentioned stuff that normally gets paid for by your job. DH is self employed, so when he completely stops working there will be some tax impact, since we won’t be able to expense as much. My computer died this year and for the first time in ages I had to purchase one out of pocket.

The flip side to this is that we planned to 95 but the more I see of what 95 actually looks like, the less I want to live that long. And if we do, it will be in a very downsized lifestyle/spend. There’s no way we could maintain what we have now at that age, even if we hired everything out.

We also have a lot more time to optimize savings on monthly bills, cc rewards etc…

 

[FlaMariner]

Taxes.

I did not focus on taxes as I kept hearing "it is so much lower in retirement".

It is but still our biggest expense. And varies greatly year to year because of capital gains.