Frequent contributor, Klaus Wentzel, mentioned that his dividend-driven portfolio was roughly +8.5% in 2025, after netting out the year’s living expenses. I’m watching the Sugar Bowl right now, so I thought I would add up how our portfolio ended the year. For benchmark’s sake, the S&P 500 was +16.6% (x-dividends) and the bond market (VBMFX) was +3.0%. We finished the year with a pleasing +14.3% … Continue reading Terrific 2025 Returns
Wednesday is the last day of 2025, so I thought it was a perfect time to assess the “expert” predictions from New Year’s Eve last year. I looked up a bunch of predictions at the time, and at the end of the year, only 6 of the 14 have been resolved positively. 8 of the predictions were worse that expected. The immediate economy looks like … Continue reading New Years Predictions Assessed
I turned 59½ this year. As we get close to the end of the 2025, that means we now have a green light into our 401Ks. With paid corporate board work behind me, our income has dropped sharply—in a good way. No W-2s, no consulting, just modest interest and dividends. We’ve been living off cash from selling our rental property, which has pushed our federal … Continue reading End of the Year Roth Conversion
We just finished a few wonderful days of holiday / fun activities with friends and family. We have more planned this week. We went to a terrific Lady A Christmas Concert, shopped an indoor Holiday Market, enjoyed lunches with friends, went to a fun Minnesota Wild game with buddies, drove my Jeep in a holiday light parade, watched a silly Hallmark movie, and were able … Continue reading The Calm Before Christmas
Just a quick post this morning to share this chart I came across from Visual Capitalist. I’m sure most readers here understand the difference between “mean” and “median”, but the gap between these is pretty shocking. I’m sure many would look at the “median” column and think they are doing OK. The fact is that half of these people are in a tough place if … Continue reading Mean vs Median Wealth
My sister-in-law posted this on Facebook last night and I found myself nodding with everything on the list. For us, early retirement has been a major enabler for all 7 of these “luxuries”. Plenty of time to live, more focus on keeping fit / playing sports, no work stress, sleeping in each morning, traveling without a care, home improvements as a spare time hobby, and … Continue reading Seven Things To Be Thankful For …
We went to my Mom’s senior center apartment on Saturday and enjoyed walking around a Holiday Boutique they were hosting. One of my brothers was there, too. While I was there, I took care of a couple bills she had. My Dad passed away last year and I became the primary “money guy” for my Mom. I had started taking care of their checkbooks, … Continue reading Long Term Care & Insurance
One of the terrific things about having a place in Celebration FL – the “town that Disney Built” – is that we have a regular stream of friends, family, and acquaintances that are regularly swinging by Walt Disney World for vacation. This past week we met up with a MegaCorp friend who comes to WDW pretty often. They retired to Florida, but live about … Continue reading It’s A Small World
We’re still learning what it’s like to have two places — one in Minnesota and one in Florida. It’s funny how different the same place can feel depending on why we’re here and how long we stay. Sometimes a trip to Florida feels like a vacation. We don’t really settle into a routine — we just enjoy the sunshine, check out favorite restaurants, and maybe … Continue reading Two Places, Two Speeds …
Happy Halloween! Candy prices are up this year, but we’re still splurging on the full-size chocolate bars. We switched to the big bars 10 Halloween’s ago – the year I early retired. My AI research tool thinks that the price of Halloween candy has roughly DOUBLED since 2016, so you might think we’re cutting back. No, our stock market investments have gone up … Continue reading Happy Halloween Splurge
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