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For us, the value of the trust is in how we are handling our remaining assets. We expect to live long lives, and our children will be 60-70 years old. Our children are doing very well financially. The trust allows us to pass our assets directly to our grandchildren, bypassing our children...

DW and I just did this last month with OATH...they have offices in many cities/states. Cost was $5K including giving us the docs for funding, transferring our 3 properties to the trust, and also included POA, health directives, and trusts for each of our 6 grandkids. We went to county office...

I recommend you get familiar with a website: www.ebth.com EBTH = Everything But The House It is an auction site in Cincinnati where people sell things, artwork, jewelry, furniture...actually, everything but the house. Don't buy anything yet as you still have time before you get to your...

Fitness...taking care of your aging body. We bike, walk, kayak, yoga, pilates, and OrangeTheory. Whether you call this a hobby or a j*b, it needs to be part of your life. Volunteering...we found being an usher at the local theater and orchestra rewarding because we get to interact with many...

Please understand that those people that did not live to age 62 do not have any choices to make about when to take SSA benefits. It is morbid to think in those terms, but those people do not matter when making YOUR OWN decision of when to take your benefits. At age 62 to age 68, only about 2%...

Can we add facial/body piercings to this thread...or should that be a separate discussion?

Because 529's cannot accept stock, I set up UGMA accounts and transferred highly appreciated stock into the grandchildren's accounts. This allows more of the gift to go to them, and less of the gift to go to the IRS. No tax due for me and no tax due at the gift time for them. If they slowly...

While you are doing your basic math, try to include the impact of income taxes on your decision. In most states (38 of them) SSA benefit is not taxed, and the IRS only taxes 0%, 50%, or 85% of your SSA benefit. There is some value in having more of your income coming from SSA vs tIRA. Some...

If the whole process seems overwhelming, you may want to try group fitness classes where 10-20 people are doing exercises lead by an instructor. OrangeTheory has this set-up and the instructor helps with individual adjustments based on your ability. They use treadmill, rowing machine, and...

Rather than calculating an actual SWR, I take more of a Die With Zero approach to the situation...with some cushions built in. I calculate in Today's dollars how much we could spend each year to deplete all of our nest egg by my age 105. We assume our investment ROI to be 3% above inflation...

We have a BIG cruise planned for July 2025...from New York to Barcelona...83 days in all. Will visit Nova Scotia, Greenland, Iceland, all of Scandinavia....and about 85 excursions have been booked, with 2 more ports to be scheduled....

Here is the Morningstar chart I referred to above...it helps verify that your withdrawal rate is reasonable based on recent market/inflation numbers and years you expect your nest egg to last. 30-Year Starting Safe Withdrawal Rate %, by Asset Allocation, 90% Success Rate Source: Morningstar...

Morningstar has been calculating Safe Withdrawal Rates for the past few year based on percent Equities in your portfolio along with the number of years (10 - 40) you want that portfolio to last. I found it more valuable that the straight 4% rule because I could see the impact of changing my...

In a somewhat related anti-theft effort, my DW wanted to buy some facial cleansing cream at Walmart...but it was locked up behind glass doors. We had to press a button to get an employee to open the glass, but they would not let my DW pick what she wanted...the employee had to get it out of the...

Tim0476-are you willing to post the annuity contract as an attachment here? Most annuities that I have looked at are 80-200 pages long, with most of the words protecting the insurance company. By sharing the details, maybe someone here can point out something that you, your lawyer, and the...

Although it is a little late now, I strongly recommend folks retire TO SOMETHING, rather than retire FROM SOMETHING. Alright, you jumped out...but there is a LOT of planning in your future. Think about a bucket list...whether it is fixing that door in the garage, or going on a cruise. Is...

I looked at the product on Amazon, and the reviews had 46% with 1-2 stars, although more than 1400 people had reviewed the product. That suggests a LOT of people need something that works, but you may not get the results you were hoping for.

At self checkout in Costco, an employee asked to see my card before I began scanning...and she noted that I did not have my picture on the back of the card. She asked for an ID to verify it was MY card. Then she told me that the service desk can add my picture to my card and encouraged me to...

The cruise line was Regent Seven Seas. We had a mid level balcony room and the cost for the 137 day cruise was about $73,000 per person. While that seems like a HUGE amount, it was an ALL-INCLUSIVE pricing: all food (even specialty restaurants), all drink (including alcohol), gratuities, on...

We took a world cruise from Los Angeles all the way around the earth and back to Los Angeles in 137 days. It took 29 days to reach New Zealand from LA, with 4 stops in Hawaii, 3 ports in French Polynesia, Tahiti, Samoa, and 2 ports in Fiji. Lots of sea days, but the ship offered classes...

I was 42 when I had a sigmoidoscopy on Tuesday and my doc said he would like to do a whole colonoscopy. I said, "When?" He said, "Friday." He found a large polyp that had to be cut in half to get it out of me. He was 90% sure the cancer was fully contained in the polyp. I asked how to be...

You can often use credit card(s) to handle all or most of your chunky expense and then pay those bills a month later. That gives you time to decide where you fund the expense from...HELOC, treasuries, Roth, etc.

This chart from Morningstar will provide a Safe Withdrawal Rate for various asset allocations and number of years...with 25 years as one of the columns. It targets 90% chance of not running out of money... The Good News on Safe Withdrawal Rates

https://www.morningstar.com/retirement/whats-safe-withdrawal-rate-today

Just today, I looked at a table of Safe Withdrawal Rates that listed various Asset Allocations and time periods from 10 years to 40 years. There is not that much variation among the central AA choices. I multiplied those rates by MY NUMBER and saw that it did not matter much if I was 70/30 or...