I don't want to get into telling any old war stories but I've scratched and clawed for every penny I ever made.?ÿ However the last twenty years of surveying have enabled me to reach a point in my life where money isn't as important as it used to be.
I sold the shop and retired 5 years ago.?ÿ Nowadays I live on my SS bennies and still do RW work for one of my old clients.?ÿ For an "end game" scenario it's quite comfortable.
But now I'm realizing if I continue to make money (as opposed to spending it) I will eventually cash in all my chips and some close member of my family gets to pay the taxes and chuckle at my funeral.?ÿ What fun is that?
So my question to all you fellers here that are in the "over 70" club (or close)...how much money in the bank does one need to just drop it all and be 100% retired??ÿ ?ÿ
Just wondering where that point is for someone to quit making deposits and start spending it.?ÿ It's really a gray area to me...pun intended maybe. 😉
how much money in the bank does one need to just drop it all and be 100% retired??ÿ ?ÿ
Talk about an ??it depends? post, Unc, you won. ?????ÿ
What kind of lifestyle, how many kids, how many weird relatives, Travel..Etc. ad nausea. Right off the bat I would say anywhere from $100K to $100M. Hope this helps.
For starters, add up your checkbook and/or credit card payments, plus pocket cash if it is significant.?ÿ Average the last 2 or 3 years.?ÿ Adjust down for recent vehicle purchases or up for impending ones. Add your health insurance deductable. Consider whether you or spouse might need nursing home years and whether you have insurance for that.
Then guess how much less than inflation your investments will earn.
Project that for as long as it is believable you might live.
There's no way to be entirely safe, but that should give you some idea where the ballpark is.
The missing piece of data is your date of death. You need more if you're going to die at 90 than if you're going to die at 80. The continually changing, largely increasing, average age at death helped to destroy the concept of employer-sponsored retirement plans. Those plans kept requiring supplemental funding from company profits.
Life annuity providers usually assume that the terminal age in their mortality tables is 110 or so. The reserve required is a combination of the interest the fund earns and the funds left when a participant dies early.?ÿ
Individuals have neither supplemental company profits nor funds saved by not paying early bucket-kickers.
So, the answer is a mere guess estimating the loss of buying power of dollars, interest earnings, the amount of capital you can safely withdraw, and whatever else you deem important.
For someone 65, a conservative number, one that would likely more than guarantee a comfortable life, might be $1-3 million.
Of course it depends on whether you live in Los Angeles, Orlando, OKC, or Caddo Gap. That's why I would start with your spending history.
@bill93 yeah but, you're gonna' be just as dead in Orlando as you would be in OK. Seems like a wash, to me.
That depends on what you want to do.?ÿ I'm 57 now, planning on starting to collect full SS at full retirement age, which, for me is 67.?ÿ I love what I do and probably will not walk away until I'm forced to.
I'll keep making those deposits as long as I am able to, after I am gone and cremated, those investments, assets and bank balances pass to my daughter.?ÿ When she is taxed on the money and estate, so be it.
In the end, you can't take it with you.
This is a worthy topic to consider.?ÿ For example, are you going to have your funeral held at some exotic destination venue with a subsidized guest list in excess of 500 mourners. Or, crispy critter in a can stuck in a posthole with no headstone.
One can investigate the best way to transfer certain assets to descendants or other heirs in a manner that minimizes taxes.?ÿ Or, die and let them fight for whatever is left after the Government and the lawyers take most of it.
One can invest in dull but generally positive opportunities to increase easily converted assets.?ÿ Or, one can spend all day and most of the night putting $100 bills in the big one-armed bandit at the nearest casino and tipping the ladies who supply your drinks $20 minimum per drink.
Live it up, Dude.?ÿ Buy new socks and toss out the ones that were already too loose to stay up five years ago.
A fellow who was a classmate of my sister lives in Peru.?ÿ He has explained that is incredibly cheap to live there.
How good is the medical care in Peru?
OPINION ONLY: Funeral and weddings are the bigest waste of money known to mankind, next to blackjack and homemade beer. I plan on leaving the funds associated with either to my offspring. Cost me about $20 to get married and upon the "final exit" the medical dudes grab whatever organs are worth keeping and the rest heads into "the oven". (currently $399.95/body) And that's all folks. ?????ÿ
I, too, worked hard for what I have and my wife worked just as hard as I did.?ÿ I came to the realization about a year ago that I'm not going to live forever and any money left in the bank won't do me any good.?ÿ So far the income from our investments are replacing any withdrawals that are added to our Social Security for our finances.?ÿ
My wife talked me into buying a new truck even though my old one was still running okay.?ÿ I decided that buying a truck every 15 years was about right.?ÿ If this one lasts 15 years it will most probably be my last one.?ÿ We sold our little motor home and bought a travel trailer.?ÿ We plan on going somewhere once a month.?ÿ Dang fuel costs right now are the big drain for that though.
I agree with FL/GA about the funeral though.?ÿ I plan to have my ashes wash down the Flint River to Apalachicola, Florida and the Gulf of Mexico.
Andy
I'm not sure what will happen, but when I gave up the fight in my WJMFURSI divorce, and listened to my poorly trained pole dancing(true, and I didn't know at the time but the results played out accordingly ) my financial future became a vacuous hole that I'm going to be working until the day I die.
At least I enjoy what I do do when I'm not in traffic so I'll die mostly content and no kids to leave anything behind for anyway.
it's always amazing what you can get used to, at both ends of the continuum for sure.
You're probably better off than you want to believe, and that's a safe place to be.hell if I reach 70, I'm going to be happier than a tick up a dog's butt.
????
One method is 4% safe withdrawal rate. Add up expenses divide by 4% and you have the lump of money you need invested (shares/property etc not just bank deposits). Key to making this work is lean out the expenses, if retired you got more time to do this and becomes a game if you are that way inclined.
4% assumes 30-year payout and historically average returns on funds. If you keep to safer investments, see a bad economic period, or live longer it risks running out.
One big factor is the cost of assisted living and/or nursing assistance when you get decrepit old, and I can tell you both are $$$ expensive, like into six figures.
@chris-bouffard yes you can. I'll write you a check for it.
hell if I reach 70,
It ain't no different than 50 except for more aches and pains. You really don't notice because your nevous system is shot and you can't see or hear as good. And the number one gripe, ED. ?????ÿ
One big factor is the cost of assisted living and/or nursing assistance when you get decrepit old, and I can tell you both are $$$ expensive, like into six figures.
My Mother-in has been an assisted living for the past 8 years. She is 98 and thank god has a pension. Her current monthly fee is almost $8k/month. (Windsor of Palm Coast) This does not include meds, depends, and daily supply needs.