Dtail
Give me a museum and I'll fill it. (Picasso) Give me a forum ...
1. Yes, if your company knows you would like to leave, the rest of your time there could be miserable. I made the mistake of letting my company know I planned to leave early, and it made my life as a project manager much more difficult. I'd suggest if you go down this route, be prepared to leave in 2 weeks if things go south. IF the company is considering handing you a golden parachute, and they know you want to leave, they may decide to let you leave voluntarily with nothing.
2. 100% for me.
3. Don't, just don't. A 1% AUM (assets under management fee) will reduce your spending by 25% if you're planning on a 4% withdrawal rate. You seem unhappy with 'just' obtaining market returns in retirement. Going down the managed assets path adds costs, risks, and definitely isn't guaranteed to beat the market. If you THINK you NEED to do this to make ER work, then it tells me that you don't have enough starting assets, and you're NOT READY TO ER. I'd suggest going with Vanguard's simple three-fund portfolio: Vanguard Total Stock ETF (VTI) Vanguard Total International Stock ETF (VXUS) Vanguard Total Bond Market ETF (BND). In the long run, you'll likely do better with this than paying fees to any advisor. A second best option would be to go with a target retirement date fund that auto-rebalances such as Vanguard Target Retirement 2020 Fund (VTWNX). Higher fees, but hands-off simple.
4. Close, but you need to do some more planning, and get your FIRECALC results to at least 95%, either by cutting spending, or increasing investments. Create multiple option budgets (retired supporting kids, retired without kids, retired one spouse only, etc.). Create a spending plan that takes into account taxes. Do the research on the pension options, and determine the best ages for you and your DW to take SS. I'm a little fuzzy on your income once your pension kicks in, and how much you'll need to supplement from the 401(k). In FIRECALC, you should be inputting the pension as an Pension income on the second tab, and not including it in the Portfolio value on the first tab.
Best wishes!
Op has not input any SS yet. My guess is he gets to 95%+ with the input.