We didn’t cash in any stock or appreciated assets in 2021, which kept our income pretty low. We just had some dividend income and I earned some pay from board work. Mostly, we just lived off of savings. Our accountant pointed out that married couples with income less than $80K pay 0% long-term capital gains tax. I hadn’t paid attention to that before, so we … Continue reading Capital Gains Wrinkle
I complained a lot about the economy in 2021. I didn’t like the trillions in debt-driven government spending and the ensuing inflation. Still, I acknowledged that the markets continued to rise – as the ‘Trump Bump’ became the ‘Biden Bump’. Yesterday, I tallied up how we finished the year with our portfolio. Our retirement savings were up an impressive +15%. Our gains were led by … Continue reading New Year’s Assessment
Prices are going up. Consumer price inflation ballooned to 6.8% in November as massive increases in government debt and supply-chain issues over the last year were reflected. The Fed & Biden believe they can get back to a 2% annual average target, but clearly that’s going to take some doing. Retirement plans are especially susceptible to rising prices as fixed investments, pensions, bonds, and social … Continue reading What’s The Impact Of Inflation On Your Retirement?
I’m sure you’ve heard the saying about time, energy, and money. When you’re young you have time & energy, but no money. You trade your time for money when you are an adult. In the end, you are left with time & money, but no energy to enjoy it when you are older. It’s truly the Devil’s Dilemma. Early retirement fights those trade offs. While … Continue reading Time. Energy. Money.
I waited a long time to get a look at my MegaCorp retiree health insurance benefits and they just arrived. It’s open enrollment time right now and I just booked my new insurance plan. As background, I worked at one MegaCorp for 24 years and a second for just 3. I’m an official retiree of the first one, where I went from temporary Administrative Assistant … Continue reading MegaCorp Retiree Health Coverage
President Trump once said, “the stock market does whatever the stock market wants to do.” Still, that didn’t stop him from claiming that his policies resulted in the ~75% growth in the S&P 500, following his election. The ‘Trump Bump’ got a lot of attention, but it’s worth noting that we’ve seen a nice ‘Biden Bump’ in the year following his election, too. The S&P … Continue reading The “Biden Bump”
Monday’s post about retirement benchmarks by age generated a lot of discussion. I think we all agree that few Americans have the sense to challenge our dubious cultural assumptions when it comes to personal finance. It also caused me to look back on this post from 2017 when I did the math on how quickly one could retire by saving HALF of their income …. … Continue reading ‘50% Rule’ Revisited
When I was starting in my career, it wasn’t clear to me how much we should have saved in our twenties & thirties. This was before the Internet and there was a real dearth of useful information available. Recently, my former MegaCorp Boss sent me an interesting article from Quicken that shared the median retirement savings and savings goals decade by decade for Americans. I … Continue reading Retirement Savings – Benchmarks & Goals
Once, two of my brothers skipped elementary school to “play hooky”. They left home, but instead of going to school, they went to the park. After they were playing on the playground equipment for a while, the younger brother said, “where are all the other kids?” “Other kids?” the older one replied. “Yeah – doesn’t it take a lot of kids to play the game … Continue reading Where Are All The Other Kids?
Someone recently asked online how much cash or other ‘safe/liquid’ investments did people carry into early retirement as a buffer against a market downturn. It’s an important decision to make heading into retirement and it was the final financial preparation we put into place ourselves. About 3 years before I left MegaCorp, we started accumulating a pile of cash equal to 3 years of spending. … Continue reading Benchmarking: Cash / CD Buffer
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