Recent content by phoneguy55

I KNOW....isn't that crazy.....? If I am able to make my payments on time now.....why wouldn't I be able make them at $200 less a month. Sheesh... Now add to that, the whole "underwater" aspect of the lowered housing markets, and I am pretty well stuck with my old rate. Oh well....I had done all...

Thanks Koolau.... I hear what you are saying. My whole gameplan is working out as I had planned, except for doing a refi. If saving $2k a year is going to cost me even half of that, then it doesn't make sense to change my plan, even if it does hurt to not lower my Mortgage by 2 points. Hopefully...

Thanks for the link. That's what I have found also....I can get a refi.....but at the cost of a few points....which defeats the purpose. That's why I started wondering about setting up a "virtual paycheck" by taking distributions from my IRA. I could lower my annual lump withdrawal from the 401K...

....I wish I had the time to refi my mortgage before my hasty retirement last year, but had to decide within a few weeks time. Other than a car loan or a home refi, I most likely would not need to borrow any money, but it would be great to knock a few points off this mortgage.

Just starting my first full year of ER, and wondering about my lack of "verifiable income stream". I have my old employers 401K which I am going to pull a one-time-per-year lump out of to live on.( they don't allow any other kind of distribution scheme ) Doing such will last me well into time my...

Khufu:... As in your previous comments regarding my situation, I thank you for your attempt to warn me of the pitfalls that many have fallen victim to through lack of planning and possible lack of fiscal discipline. I have always been an organized, regimented, and overly cautious planner who...

HTown Harry:.... Thanks for the link and the information about "consumption smoothing" . I read quite a bit about it since I saw your post last night. Since I am not one to be wreckless ( by any means) I will always err on the side of needing more than I can even envision as I get older. But...

Harley: ...well, I most certainly have not lived my life doing "anything" rashly....but this did all happen within a 3 week timespan. Absolutely no intention of going,...and then gone by the 1st of the month. I did scramble and get 3 different professional "opinions" just on whether I could...

Hi A.R. ... I am still formulating a game plan, as this is only day 4. I just met with my CFP, and his advice is (plan 1): get a job to lessen any distribution from the employers 401K or..(plan 2) set up monthly distributions from 401K at 70-80% of last salary, and try to lower bills as much...

that does seem to be my best hope, so I will pursue that tack for sure. The 80% thing may prevent it though, and paying the loan down to satisfy that requirement will be counter productive also. I may have to just wait a while, but not without exhausting all possibilities first. Thanks again....

Running man... Excellent pragmatic breakdown of the situation given the variables I shared. I just looked over the retirement papers and see that if I had chosen the annuity pension the amount would have been $26.5K / yr. The lump sum pension was $478.5K which I opted for.( separate 401K at...

thanks for sharing your experiences,...maybe I will be able to do this. The asset depletion loan option stated above seems like it may be tricky for me. From the few web sites that describe the details, you either need to be borrowing over $300K or be able to put a substantial percentage down. I...

I will check on that asset depletion loan. Maybe I need to prove (over time) that the current monthly payment is being met, and lowering it by a few hundred a month would not be a risk. That is one of the many ways I need to lower my monthly bills. The $400 a month SUV, may have to become a...

OK.....( whew ) .....I just read through that article on "The Annuitization Hurdle". In fact I read through it a few times, since it was much like a cross between Latin and a physics theorem ( to me ). But actually, I did garner the gist of what he was saying. I think... If one were to...

This whole early retirement roller coaster that I am sitting in the front car of, came on too quickly for me to refinance my 4 year old mortgage down from the current 5.5% rate. Now that I am "unemployed", I wonder how easily ( if possible at all) it would be to refinance such a new mortgage. (...