In September 2008 I started tracking our net worth daily as I wanted to see how it would correspond with the quickly deteriorating market. It has been really interesting to watch the results. We hit a low point on March 9th, 2009. We just hit an all time high point this week -- and it is a VERY significant number. Basically I now feel pretty confident that if anything should happen to either of our jobs, we could sell our current home and call ourselves FIRED Not going to cash out now for a number of reasons I won't bog this thread down with, but very nice to be in this position.
We did not sell anything during the downturn. I moved my 403(b) from my old employer over to an IRA at Vanguard in August 2009, putting everything in the 2030 Retirement Fund. We moved the bulk of DH's retirement funds into a target fund at American Funds (his only option -- grrr...) at about the same time. We made a couple of well-market-timed lump sum investments into the kids college funds. We also bought an apartment here in Beijing in spring 2009 at what turned out to be the bottom of a very brief post-crash dip in the property market here. That has been where the bulk of our networth growth has come from -- current value estimates are well over double what we paid -- but the market has also been good to us at a time when we have been able to max out retirement contributions and really step up what we were putting into college funds. I have been pleasantly surprised how easy that has been, given that we took on a fairly good sized mortage. Helps that we've both gotten a few raises -- small, but every bit counts -- and now that I have hit 5 years with my employer they are kicking in 10% to my retirement.
We're currently anticipating changing the kids school and that is going to hit us hard financially, but the more I look at the numbers the more I think it is doable. We might need to cut back a bit on retirement and college savings, but we're still well ahead of where most people are and don't really need to worry too much about the future.
Curious about what others have seen happen in the last three years, especially if you were still working/investing during this period.
We did not sell anything during the downturn. I moved my 403(b) from my old employer over to an IRA at Vanguard in August 2009, putting everything in the 2030 Retirement Fund. We moved the bulk of DH's retirement funds into a target fund at American Funds (his only option -- grrr...) at about the same time. We made a couple of well-market-timed lump sum investments into the kids college funds. We also bought an apartment here in Beijing in spring 2009 at what turned out to be the bottom of a very brief post-crash dip in the property market here. That has been where the bulk of our networth growth has come from -- current value estimates are well over double what we paid -- but the market has also been good to us at a time when we have been able to max out retirement contributions and really step up what we were putting into college funds. I have been pleasantly surprised how easy that has been, given that we took on a fairly good sized mortage. Helps that we've both gotten a few raises -- small, but every bit counts -- and now that I have hit 5 years with my employer they are kicking in 10% to my retirement.
We're currently anticipating changing the kids school and that is going to hit us hard financially, but the more I look at the numbers the more I think it is doable. We might need to cut back a bit on retirement and college savings, but we're still well ahead of where most people are and don't really need to worry too much about the future.
Curious about what others have seen happen in the last three years, especially if you were still working/investing during this period.