I like S&P500 and BRK.B with some fraction in real estate which can be accessed using a Vanguard REIT. I track everything locally using Quicken.
If you want a portfolio on autopilot: https://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Lazy_portfolios#Three_fund_lazy_portfolios
https://www.motifinvesting.com/moti...ons/dividendsplus30-T3htvjcj_416579#/overview
My buddy subscribes to Motley Fools Options and follows those trades to generate monthy income, but it requires you to "work" by doing the trades.
If you want to dig in deep, read Security Analysis by Benjamin Graham.
If you want a portfolio on autopilot: https://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Lazy_portfolios#Three_fund_lazy_portfolios
https://www.motifinvesting.com/moti...ons/dividendsplus30-T3htvjcj_416579#/overview
My buddy subscribes to Motley Fools Options and follows those trades to generate monthy income, but it requires you to "work" by doing the trades.
If you want to dig in deep, read Security Analysis by Benjamin Graham.
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If your goal is financial independence then,
Read the original book of frugality: Your Money Or Your Life
If you want to get serious, and are not a "complainypants" go read every post from the beginning of Mr. Money Mustache — Early Retirement through Badassity blog located here:
https://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2011/04/06/meet-mr-money-mustache/
Read the original book of frugality: Your Money Or Your Life
If you want to get serious, and are not a "complainypants" go read every post from the beginning of Mr. Money Mustache — Early Retirement through Badassity blog located here:
https://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2011/04/06/meet-mr-money-mustache/
@scott -- in Shaker Hts. a lot of the houses trade for the same price as they did in the Ghoulardi days .
My advice to folks in their late 30's and early 40's would be to invest in friends who look to become very successful -- via friendship and support, and the occasional party. Pick the ones you know to be honest.
In the States, the best investment you can make is in a Roth IRA, but 1031 exchanges are indeed valuable.
In the non-monetary sphere -- your parish or synagogue will never let you down, and that's more valuable than money.
My advice to folks in their late 30's and early 40's would be to invest in friends who look to become very successful -- via friendship and support, and the occasional party. Pick the ones you know to be honest.
In the States, the best investment you can make is in a Roth IRA, but 1031 exchanges are indeed valuable.
In the non-monetary sphere -- your parish or synagogue will never let you down, and that's more valuable than money.
That's a problem, in select locations we have 50/1 in the same time frame. I was more referring to the bike to work and the Kraft mac and cheese dinners. Been there, the cheapest eats circa 1971 was a mac and cheese at 6 for $1 and canned mackerel at 25 cents a can, two meals for 21 cents. You would appreciate the fact the my mother sent me used bowling shirts from Milwaukee to supplement my wardrobe.
The whole not working for someone is too much a holy grail for many people. If your talents and skills are in a field that requires a huge infrastructure, so what, you work where it's provided. Retirement early and living like a cheap Yankee is worse than work IMO.
Well, that's funny coming from a retired guy. I myself find the best time to fly RC planes is when the kids are in school, maybe Tuesday at 10:00 AM. The field is empty. I also notice the best time to go boating is on week day late mornings. No crowd on the lake. In fact the highway has no traffic from 10AM till 2:00 PM, so I like to get out then. Same for golf. My boss just didn't understand, so we had to part ways. I now call him up and go out to lunch every few months. He usually has to leave after an hour. Has a huge house and such to pay for.
I think the whole working for someone is too much of a holy grail for most people, but it keeps them out the way for the rest of us who don't.
I almost fell off my chair when I read that -- the fashion plate of Massachusetts Ave.
I hated "hand-me-downs" from my cousin, even as a little kid in grade school I thought I was being re-cast in a Hal Roach comedy.
My mother bought me a pair of red jeans for $2 instead of blue jeans for $4. She thought no one at school would notice. Hmmm... she did notice my black eye at the end of the day and not surprisingly didn't ask me to wear them again. Frugality is in my blood but not to the point of being cruel to children.
Golf was easy the course opened at 5:30 AM. Maybe I was not totally clear, some folks make an almost moral issue out of it. It's best no judgement be applied either way. I'm retired yes, but worked 42 yr. and don't have simple tastes. We have flowed with the economy between buying clothes at Goodwill and flying business class and staying in 5 star hotels and back again and back again, without any shame it's just what you do. I was ingrained with DIY and total resilience (along with lots of bad things) by my father.
So did I when a friend saw one of them in a trendy retro shop only about 5yr. ago. I gave gave them all to the Salvation Army around 1976. Ice House Mary's, he actually remembered from when we were at MIT together. Mary Malinowski, pickled eggs and pig's feet always available.
So in a nutshell, this amounts to securing a reasonable and stable income *after* you stop working for good?
And you are trying to get that through a passive investment which yields enough cash through interest and/or savvy investments? (not handled by you but by somebody else)
And which is solid enough to last, say, 20 years or more?
If so (I guess that´s more or less the way it should work) let me tell you that that seems to have quite a formidable set of constraints to meet.
Besides mentioning labels (401K, etc.), can anybody comment using some definite numbers?
Such as: "I´ll need xxxx U$ a month to live, I am doing this and that to get them"
So far the numbers I´ve seen mentioned do not add up, I can´t see how an average person can build a portfolio large enough to give him, say, U$3000 a month, so U$36000 a year, which would mean a working capital of U$720000 .... IF he paid no Tax or fees for that , which means that real world capital should be way higher, definitely way over 1000000 U$ in cash.
Now how does an average citizen raise more than 1 Million Dollars in cash just to earn in the future some U$3000 a month? (or 36000 annually).
The numbers simply do not add up, unless I´m missing something essential here.
Somebody care to provide some real numbers?
Thanks.
And you are trying to get that through a passive investment which yields enough cash through interest and/or savvy investments? (not handled by you but by somebody else)
And which is solid enough to last, say, 20 years or more?
If so (I guess that´s more or less the way it should work) let me tell you that that seems to have quite a formidable set of constraints to meet.
Besides mentioning labels (401K, etc.), can anybody comment using some definite numbers?
Such as: "I´ll need xxxx U$ a month to live, I am doing this and that to get them"
So far the numbers I´ve seen mentioned do not add up, I can´t see how an average person can build a portfolio large enough to give him, say, U$3000 a month, so U$36000 a year, which would mean a working capital of U$720000 .... IF he paid no Tax or fees for that , which means that real world capital should be way higher, definitely way over 1000000 U$ in cash.
Now how does an average citizen raise more than 1 Million Dollars in cash just to earn in the future some U$3000 a month? (or 36000 annually).
The numbers simply do not add up, unless I´m missing something essential here.
Somebody care to provide some real numbers?
Thanks.
I have been through two divorces, the last one will cost me over $500,000 by the time it is finished. Yes, I was really shocked when I tallied it all up.
I still hope to retire with over 800,000 in assets if all works out as I plan. I'm doing worse that many of my friends. My fault.
It isn't hard, you do have to put money aside every payday and forget it exists.
I have a pension, 401k, and mutual fund investment in addition to a house which will be paid off when I retire. Paying off the house is a big issue, because rent it the largest per month cost a person has. Get rid of a house payment and life is much easier.
The Mutual fund has returned twice the inflation rate over the past 20 years. I'm looking at another fund that has an even better track record.
My brother retired with less than I will, and is doing very well. But he watches his spending, and has a very nice garden which helps supply a lot of his food for the year.
A lot depends on what one expects to do when retired. Travel and see the world, you better have a lot of money.
Go hunting, fishing, gardening and raise a few chickens? Keeps one busy and cuts down on food costs.
One big variable a lot of people don't take into consideration is the cost of gas. I see many people buying RVs who travel and plan to travel when retired. When gas hits $5 a gallon in a few years they will really be in a pinch with vehicles getting less than 10miles/ gallon. A 500 mile trip will set them back $250 in gas alone. The trip I took last summer would cost $1800 in gas. That will really eat into ones budget.
So, a lot depends on ones expectations. When you retire, what will you do?
I still hope to retire with over 800,000 in assets if all works out as I plan. I'm doing worse that many of my friends. My fault.
It isn't hard, you do have to put money aside every payday and forget it exists.
I have a pension, 401k, and mutual fund investment in addition to a house which will be paid off when I retire. Paying off the house is a big issue, because rent it the largest per month cost a person has. Get rid of a house payment and life is much easier.
The Mutual fund has returned twice the inflation rate over the past 20 years. I'm looking at another fund that has an even better track record.
My brother retired with less than I will, and is doing very well. But he watches his spending, and has a very nice garden which helps supply a lot of his food for the year.
A lot depends on what one expects to do when retired. Travel and see the world, you better have a lot of money.
Go hunting, fishing, gardening and raise a few chickens? Keeps one busy and cuts down on food costs.
One big variable a lot of people don't take into consideration is the cost of gas. I see many people buying RVs who travel and plan to travel when retired. When gas hits $5 a gallon in a few years they will really be in a pinch with vehicles getting less than 10miles/ gallon. A 500 mile trip will set them back $250 in gas alone. The trip I took last summer would cost $1800 in gas. That will really eat into ones budget.
So, a lot depends on ones expectations. When you retire, what will you do?
In the USA if you make $36,000 / year from interest, dividends and capital gains, you will not owe any taxes. This was a surprise to me, as I had always assumed what you did above. So I entered $500 interest, $5,500 dividends, $15,000 capital gain ( assume you sold $30,000 of stock that had doubled in value while you owned it ) into Turbo tax. The total income is $21,000, std deduction is $12,600, exemption is $8,100 for two people. Taxable income is whopping $290. The tax bill is Zero.
My trajectory follows exactly that -- I don't see what the problem really is, then again the type of work I do isn't just a laptop-and-coffee-shop*. There's no way, even if I'm able to spin this project I'm working on as a startup/etc, that I won't be beholden to larger institutions where those billion-dollar infrastructures (and collaborative brain-power) exists. I also don't expect to be retiring as early as my father did: he went to work right after college and I went to (years) of graduate school, which, economically, wasn't the best course. We made different life choices (not to mention the economic landscape of today) and have different motivations.
* I maintain a slightly cynical view that the absolutely massive (and massively redundant) amount of software development is substantially buoyed by the low infrastructure demands of the field (relative to, yanno, hard-hardware).
In the US, everyone contributes to Social Security Insurance, 6.2% for you and 6.2% from your employer on wages up to $118,500. I started paying into it in 1963!
In addition, you and your employer pay 1.45% into Medicare tax on wages up to $200,000 and 2.35% on the excess over $200,000.
For a long time it wasn't difficult to hit the max on these ceilings. When boomers like me retire at age 70 we will get $2,954 per month from contributions we put in.
There are thousands of homes (many $40K-$50K) in Florida for instance that people downsize into and live solely off of SS.
BTW I was in the same place as many of the concerned folks here, I was already 31 (1981) and all I had was a $1000 savings bond that my grandmother left me, one day I had to take my bucket of pennies on my desk and roll them up to buy lunch so I decided this has to stop and put the bond in a money market fund. I remember this day like it was yesterday.
Just stick with it, and do what you have to do there is no shame in not doing as well as so and so.
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Funny accounting
"6.2% for you and 6.2% from your employer" language invented by congress to make you happy. Surprised they didn't go with 2% from you 10.4% from your employer. Where did both of the 6.2% amounts come from? They both came from your compensation for working. Your whole paycheck comes from your employer. Taxed 12.4 / Payed 106.2 = 11.6% of your compensation payed all by you the employee.
"6.2% for you and 6.2% from your employer" language invented by congress to make you happy. Surprised they didn't go with 2% from you 10.4% from your employer. Where did both of the 6.2% amounts come from? They both came from your compensation for working. Your whole paycheck comes from your employer. Taxed 12.4 / Payed 106.2 = 11.6% of your compensation payed all by you the employee.
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The situation in many European countries would probably upset you even more. I never gave tax burdens a second thought, ever, the company gives you a $10,000 bonus that's $5000 in your pocket nothing to lose sleep over. I had a classmate commit suicide when he tried a stock manipulation to avoid taxes on some options and failed. Honestly for my entire working life I simply computed all extra income like bonuses and equity at 1/2 and simply worried about more important things like my 4 children's wellbeing.
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My mother stuck with the two or three that were neighborhood local. The colors were something to behold.
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