The Intersection of FIRE and Disney

[Starport Seven-Five]

Congrats! That's a great problem to have! I too, feel like my estimates are consistently too conservative as this current environment makes it easy to beat, but i haven't adjusted any estimates because i figure eventually we'll hit a slow down and i'd rather keep low expectations and be pleasantly surprised haha

I manage my expectations well so it's not a big deal. Pretty sure I haven't even shown my wife the projection yet though because I wasn't confident in it.

 

[QueenIsabella]

We had a Zoom meeting with our financial advisor today, and we're up 13% so far for 2021. Not bad, given that we have 2 in college (tuition), 4 licensed drivers (plus a learner), and a huge vacation planned for next year. He told us to take some of our gains now to pay towards the vacation--normally, we use RMDs from an inherited IRA to pay for travel. But, he said to take some gains now, so we will--and later, we'll have more spending money for our huge trip next year.

 

[punkin]

So DH and I are home and decided to look over our finances. There's a pretty good chance if all goes well that DH could retire at 60. We would have to cut back on some things but i think we could do it. At 62, it's really doable. I figure roughly, using the 4% rule if we have enough to generate 65% of our pre retirement income, we should be golden. How do you figure what is enough?

 

[2TxAgs]

So DH and I are home and decided to look over our finances. There's a pretty good chance if all goes well that DH could retire at 60. We would have to cut back on some things but i think we could do it. At 62, it's really doable. I figure roughly, using the 4% rule if we have enough to generate 65% of our pre retirement income, we should be golden. How do you figure what is enough?

punkin...you should start with some hard data. Do you have your SS reports detailing what you can expect to receive from them? Have you talked about whether you'd take SS 'early' at 62, or whether you have the means to meet your obligations for a few years to delay SS (and thus increase what you receive for the rest of your life)? Do you have a very clear idea of what your expenses are, based on tracking for the past year or two? If you are confident on what your current expenses are, and which ones will apply in retirement, you can put together a retirement budget. Some things you cannot know now, and that is the BIG QUESTION with knowing 'what is enough'? Unless you have millions of extra dollars, there will always be uncertainty. What if one of you gets a chronic disease? What if you need to care for/financially help a parent or child? Do you have a plan if one of you needs long term care?
The best you can do is start with what you know (your current budget), add in additional likely expenses (you'll need a car or two over 20+ years of retirement, as well as a roof repair or other home maintenance items), add in health related costs that you may not currently have and then determine whether an amount close to 4% (some will claim 3.5% is safer, some are fine with 5% and higher) and your social security will cover that. There are numerous financial calculators (I like Firecalc) where you can plug in your info and get some feedback based on how well you would have performed based on HISTORICAL data. The 'gotcha' with these is that the future may not look like the past, but it's what we've got. There are also lots of good forums on retirement that you might look at to gather more info.

 

[2TxAgs]

@punkin - happy 20th anniversary on the Disboards! I also hit 20 yrs this year

 

[punkin]

@punkin - happy 20th anniversary on the Disboards! I also hit 20 yrs this year

Thank you. Wow! Had it been that long?

The good thing is that DH gets a small pension at 62, so we wouldn't entirely be dependant on social security and savings. The bad thing is when running scenarios, taking out living expenses at 60 reduces the growth potential of our nest egg.

 

[Starport Seven-Five]

Hope everyone's spreadsheet updates are going well today.

Felt like we did a lot of less than frugal things last year but the numbers look good. Reminds me of a Mad Fientist podcast where he talked about him and his wife completely ignoring the budget and still only spending a few grand more. I guess once you have the fundamentals in place, "splurging" occasionally doesn't change much.

 

[dvcgirl67]

Hope everyone's spreadsheet updates are going well today.

Felt like we did a lot of less than frugal things last year but the numbers look good. Reminds me of a Mad Fientist podcast where he talked about him and his wife completely ignoring the budget and still only spending a few grand more. I guess once you have the fundamentals in place, "splurging" occasionally doesn't change much.

Very true....we'll sit down on Sunday and do our "state of the treasury" meeting . But...it's not really going to change very much. In our mid-50s, so on auto-pilot at this point. We have some outside house projects that we've budgeted for...and we're taking a 5 star vacation somewhere....because we haven't been anywhere in over two years. If the next variant is the bubonic plague...so be it....that's how I'll go out. . Happy New Year everyone!

 

[Sjm9911]

Very true....we'll sit down on Sunday and do our "state of the treasury" meeting . But...it's not really going to change very much. In our mid-50s, so on auto-pilot at this point. We have some outside house projects that we've budgeted for...and we're taking a 5 star vacation somewhere....because we haven't been anywhere in over two years. If the next variant is the bubonic plague...so be it....that's how I'll go out. . Happy New Year everyone!

You probably have antibodies for the plauge. Lol.

Anyway, I may be retired early due to the fact that my job is trying to get rid of us. So, while not the 5 to 10 years more working I had in the plan , it may be doable. They will keep us on, but I fear at like 18 percent less salary. To make that up , I would probably need to work 10 more years to retire at the same pension as I would get now. So, we will see. I guess I could get another job.....but I dont play well with others.

 

[bernina]

Hope everyone's spreadsheet updates are going well today.

Felt like we did a lot of less than frugal things last year but the numbers look good. Reminds me of a Mad Fientist podcast where he talked about him and his wife completely ignoring the budget and still only spending a few grand more. I guess once you have the fundamentals in place, "splurging" occasionally doesn't change much.

I've been working on my YE spreadsheet the last few days. Still waiting for a few final numbers, but it looks like our spending went up slightly while the money I brought in from credit card bonuses, etc. more than doubled. We were able to bring our savings rate up by more than 10% (around 60% of our income went into investment accounts and mortgage principal payments). The 40% of our income that went towards expenses includes all federal/state/social security/Medicare taxes.

We also hit a pretty significant retirement account/vested pension milestone where we could CoastFire these last 7 or 8 working years and still have a nice retirement portfolio.

 

[QueenIsabella]

This weekend, DH and I will look at the year-end numbers, and get a rough idea on our RMD for 2022.

A big upcoming thing for us is, on 5/1, he's able to withdraw from his IRA without penalty. We have no plans to do so, but it's still a milestone.

While my oldest (DD26) was home for Christmas, I went over her numbers with her. At least, the numbers that we know--her statements come to us, because her fees are lower if they're umbrella'd under ours (she checks them online, anyway). She's in charge of her own 403b/457/whatever through her teaching job--we don't ask. But, she has a trust that her grandmother left her, that she'll be able to access when she turns 30--I feel obligated to let her know how it's doing, once a year. She doesn't seem to care, but we feel a duty to her (and her late grandmother) to be good stewards, and that includes an annual accounting.

 

[AlohaNow]

I figured this thread would pop back up at the end of the year! End of year numbers look good. Our net worth increased by about 14%. 2022 should be the year that we add a comma.

Happy calculating everyone!

 

[Samantha*belle]

I figured this thread would pop back up at the end of the year! End of year numbers look good. Our net worth increased by about 14%. 2022 should be the year that we add a comma.

Happy calculating everyone!

The stock market has been bananas. I don’t expect 2022 to look like 2021 for the stock market, but if it does, we will also join the additional comma club!

 

[SouthFayetteFan]

I did a pretty good job with our goals this year. We spent a TON more money - which was ironically my Primary FIRE goal for the year. It's time to loosen the reigns and live a little! I had all of our numbers updated earlier this month (except for a final NW tally) so my wife and I held the SFF Annual Shareholders Meeting a few nights ago. It's a fun way to make my wife aware of all the financial results of the year. Despite our all-time high spending, this still comes in as our 4th highest savings year ever (in terms of absolute $$).

On the NW front, we saw that increase by $277,312.67 - that's an all-time high for us as well.

During 2021 we joined the 2 comma club (beating my goal of hitting that by age 40 by almost 3 full years). We also bought a new Honda Odyssey, bought a new house, and have a new baby due in a little over a week, and yesterday I put a deposit down on a new Honda Accord which we'll likely get in March or April.
The things I did in my early late 20s and early 30s are really paying off now!

 

[ski_mom]

I did a pretty good job with our goals this year. We spent a TON more money - which was ironically my Primary FIRE goal for the year. It's time to loosen the reigns and live a little! I had all of our numbers updated earlier this month (except for a final NW tally) so my wife and I held the SFF Annual Shareholders Meeting a few nights ago. It's a fun way to make my wife aware of all the financial results of the year. Despite our all-time high spending, this still comes in as our 4th highest savings year ever (in terms of absolute $$).

On the NW front, we saw that increase by $277,312.67 - that's an all-time high for us as well.

During 2021 we joined the 2 comma club (beating my goal of hitting that by age 40 by almost 3 full years). We also bought a new Honda Odyssey, bought a new house, and have a new baby due in a little over a week, and yesterday I put a deposit down on a new Honda Accord which we'll likely get in March or April.
The things I did in my early late 20s and early 30s are really paying off now!

I'm so impressed! DH and I are much older (51 & 56), but reading along this thread makes me wish a couple of things:
1. I'd started tracking everything earlier. (I have good records for the last 4 or so years)
2. That my kids will be more mindful of their overall financial picture than we were.

We're in very good shape. We work for the same company and have been career employees there. We make pretty good money and have a good pension plan.

In addition to the pension plan, what has helped us is just an overall frugal nature. We were poor when we got married and just tried to do things that we wanted / needed to be while spending the least possible amount of money.

At this point, since our salaries have grown, I have a hard time still not being completely frugal with myself. For example, I have a hard time not ordering the cheapest thing on the menu when eating out. It drives DH nuts, but I tell him that it's served us well over the years lol

We will probably retire at the same time (DH is kind to me in this regard lol) when I'm 55 or 56. I've started working through some of the retirement manifesto spreadsheets (at the recommendation of someone here) and it has made me feel very good about our position and am confident we will be ready when I'm old enough to officially retire from the company.

Anyway, just wanted to say Happy New Year to everyone and thanks for all the information that you've supplied in this thread!

 

[ski_mom]

I've been working on my YE spreadsheet the last few days. Still waiting for a few final numbers, but it looks like our spending went up slightly while the money I brought in from credit card bonuses, etc. more than doubled. We were able to bring our savings rate up by more than 10% (around 60% of our income went into investment accounts and mortgage principal payments). The 40% of our income that went towards expenses includes all federal/state/social security/Medicare taxes.

We also hit a pretty significant retirement account/vested pension milestone where we could CoastFire these last 7 or 8 working years and still have a nice retirement portfolio.

Congrats on your milestone - it's great to recognize where we are on the road to retirement!

Just curious how to account for the money you bring in from credit card bonuses? I am on the I love CC thread and we play at the somewhat conservative level. I typically just reduce the amount that we spend on travel and I have a separate document detailing out each trip and how much we spend / saved with points, but I love seeing how others track things too.

 

[bernina]

Congrats on your milestone - it's great to recognize where we are on the road to retirement!

Just curious how to account for the money you bring in from credit card bonuses? I am on the I love CC thread and we play at the somewhat conservative level. I typically just reduce the amount that we spend on travel and I have a separate document detailing out each trip and how much we spend / saved with points, but I love seeing how others track things too.

Thanks!

In a nutshell I include an offsetting credit for the net amount I brought in from churning.

Here's a snapshot of how I tally up our income/savings/expenses for the year. These are round numbers I threw together as an example using one income.

 

[ski_mom]

Thanks!

In a nutshell I include an offsetting credit for the net amount I brought in from churning.

Here's a snapshot of how I tally up our income/savings/expenses for the year. These are round numbers I threw together as an example using one income.


View attachment 635083

Thanks for sharing!

I am wondering how you get around the highly compensated employee rule about contributing to your 401k? Unless it's a state thing or your co-workers all contribute high amounts to 401k as well? DH and I are just starting to run into it, so I don't know a lot about it, I just know it has always messed with the amount that my boss was able to contribute to his 401k. In the past, he was the only HCE at our company, now that they will be additional HCEs, I know it somehow gets split between all of us (and my new boss doesn't contribute too much, so that should be helpful to us).

 

[bernina]

Thanks for sharing!

I am wondering how you get around the highly compensated employee rule about contributing to your 401k? Unless it's a state thing or your co-workers all contribute high amounts to 401k as well? DH and I are just starting to run into it, so I don't know a lot about it, I just know it has always messed with the amount that my boss was able to contribute to his 401k. In the past, he was the only HCE at our company, now that they will be additional HCEs, I know it somehow gets split between all of us (and my new boss doesn't contribute too much, so that should be helpful to us).

DH and I have never been classified as HCE, maybe because we both work for fairly large corporations/organizations (big 3 auto for me, blue cross affiliate for him) and I'm guessing neither of our salaries are anywhere close to the top 20%. I know a few folks that work for smaller companies/organizations with a good portion of lower income employees and they do get hit with the HCE designation and have additional limits placed on them.

 

[ski_mom]

DH and I have never been classified as HCE, maybe because we both work for fairly large corporations/organizations (big 3 auto for me, blue cross affiliate for him) and I'm guessing neither of our salaries are anywhere close to the top 20%. I know a few folks that work for smaller companies/organizations with a good portion of lower income employees and they do get hit with the HCE designation and have additional limits placed on them.

Ah, that makes sense, thanks. I didn't know about the top 20% stipulation. We definitely work for a smaller company (around 100 employees) and are near the top in earnings, so unfortunately that won't help us.