I’m a 40-year-old male who’s ready to retire abroad. I live a very minimalist lifestyle. I’m planning to invest $500,000 in SCHD, $250,000 in JEPQ, and another $250,000 in JEPI. I still have my Roth IRA and continue to contribute $7,500 annually. Do you think this is a good investment strategy? Thank you for your advice. 🙏
…in Boldin’s 96% chance of success. That’s partly on me because I’m not confident I’m doing the inputs and assumptions correctly, but mostly on Boldin because they don’t make it easy for me to be confident that I’m doing the inputs and assumptions correctly. That UI is just a mess for the average idiot like me.
If so, what gave you the confidence to make the transition?
We've been thinking about signing up with PlanVision. I've ran our plan through Boldin, FI Calc, Empower, and Fidelity. Even though we got 90%+ in all of them, we are still not 100% convinced this is a possibility. I believe part of our issue is, it would be very difficult replacing our jobs. We would really need a lot of convincing this is a solid plan before actually pulling the trigger.
I would think a financial advisor firm like PlanVision would have experience with helping other clients with their transition into retirement. We tried interviewing other financial advisors, but they all seem interested in going the AUM route. Anyone here used PlanVision to help them retire?
I think I have virtually nothing in retirement currently. Im 36m, im wondering if you think an aggressive ira is a good choice? Im going to find out later today if my company has a 401k, not entirely sure but figured I would look into Ira. I also don't know much of anything when it comes to ira/401k etc. And I had the idea of just trying to risk aggressive investments with an ira with fidelity. Im open to any and all suggestions and any tips. Im pretty clueless about all this, thanks again.
Hello i am 46M and would like to dca between $1500-$2000 monthly in the ETFs until the age of 55....is it possible to reach $400K-$500K by reinvestment everything back into portfolio ?
How many of you rely on a financial planner to manage your IRA/ROTH accounts? Do they add value? Are they worth the commission??
I have funded my Roth IRA for 2026 however due to a second job, I may be approaching or exceed the limit to fund a Roth IRA. I have a traditional IRA that I would need to roll over to my 401k plan if I do a Backdoor roth contribution.
My question is: can I wait until the beginning of 2027 after I get a better picture of my income to do the ira rollover and also the backdoor Roth contribution?
I'm 49 and my wife is 48, and we plan to retire in about 10 yrs. At least that's the number that's been sitting in my spreadsheet.
We've always managed our investments ourselves. Nothing complicated: a 401(k), a Roth IRA, a taxable account, and some cash, mostly in low-cost index funds. All I need to do is update the spreadsheet every few months, make sure we are still on track, then forget about it.
Lately it hasn't felt that simple.
Last Saturday, I went to a nearby state park with my wife. We stopped at a coffee shop on the way home, and retirement came up. She said she wasn't actually sure if she'd want to retire at 60. She still enjoys her job, and the idea of both of us stopping work at the same time feels like a lot to her.
I'd always assumed that we'd retire around the same time, so I opened the spreadsheet again when we got home.
What if I retire at 59 or 60 and she keeps working for another few years? Does that change when we do Roth conversions, how much cash we keep, or when we claim Social Security? Every time I change one assumption, something else moves with it.
I used to think of those as separate questions. Now it feels like every time I change one assumption, three other things move with it. So now I'm stuck.
I've tried throwing some of this into ChatGPT too. It's useful for explaining things like Roth conversions or withdrawal order, but once I ask about our actual situation, I end up feeding it the same context over and over. After a while, it feels like I'm rebuilding my spreadsheet in a chat window.
To be honest, I'm not really comfortable uploading every account detail just to get a better answer.
Sometimes I just want another opinion before I make a big move. I still want to manage our own money.
So I'm curious how other DIY retirement people handle this. Do you pay an advisor once in a while for a one-time review, use something like ProjectionLab or Boldin, or just keep working with your own spreadsheet?
And if you use something that connects to your accounts or reviews your overall plan, how much information are you actually comfortable giving it?
I use to obsess over my progress to retirement, spending hours trying to maximize my nest egg or shorten the runway by changing parameters here and there. Then I realized I wasn't even clear on what I would be doing in retirement ie. what does a Tuesday morning at 10am look like? I wrote down the things that make me the happiest/purposeful/fulfilled in life and this became my mission statement in life. Wealth then became simply the engine to give me the time to experience these things that aligned with my mission. In order to track my progress in meeting this mission, I figured out the "price of my mission" is ie. what I need in order to sustain myself now, up to and including retirement. I built a "wealth dashboard" that gives me a perspective on where I am today, tomorrow, and the external factors that affect my path to the mission price. It's funny because I still crunch the hard numbers but now I see wealth as a means to an end, rather than an endless pursuit of accumulation for some elusive use in the future. It comes down to behavioral science - With these indices in the back of my mind, I subconsciously reflect on my daily habits that impact them for better or worse. I make micro adjustments in my saving, investing, spending, and all other drivers without much effort. In short: 1) What gets measured gets done 2) People are creatures of habit 3) Habits can be shaped through reinforcement (progress towards a goal). Would love to hear your thoughts on your journey and how your perspective on retirement has evolved over time.
Currently everything in my IRA is thrown in an index fund with a .64% expense rate and a 6.2% historical rate of return.
Is that not a very high expense rate for a pretty meager rate of return?
Seems like I can just throw everything in VTI and maybe 2 or 3 other ETF’s and make a killing compared to that.
Edit: Invesco Select Risk: Moderate Investor Fund R is the fund. Ticker symbol ONMIX on Fidelity.
Tl;dr version -- does it make sense to hold a TIPS ladder in an IRA, sell off equities from a brokerage account, and then rebalance my portfolio within tax-deferred accounts (IRA plus retirement accounts)?
I have a five-year bridge from my anticipated retirement in a few years to when I intend to start drawing from Social Security. I've estimated my fixed expenses before Social Security in current-year terms, and I have more than that in index funds (VT+VXUS) within a brokerage account. So far, so good!
The key uncertainties from now until Social Security (financially) are inflation and market returns. My plans: (a) purchase a TIPS ladder for that five-year period, and hold the TIPS bonds within my IRA so I'm not taxed every year on the gains; (b) cover my expenses directly from the brokerage account by selling VT+VXUS as needed; (c) after selling brokerage assets, rebalance my portfolio within my IRA and retirement accounts. I could use the cash from the TIPS bonds at maturity for that, or I could use the TIPS bonds for Roth conversions, and rebalance from bonds in 401a accounts -- and I think I can just make decisions on a year-by-year basis.
I think by doing this, I protect my ability to cover my minimum fixed-spending needs, and still pay only/largely capital-gains taxes except where I do Roth conversions. Obviously if the market drops precipitously I'll also need to pull from tax-deferred accounts, but the TIPS ladder will certainly cover that.
Anything wrong with my reasoning?
Also, one thing I learned from a test-purchase of TIPS bonds: the TIPSladder.com site is not clear that when it suggests buying [CUSIP#] x 12, that means buy $12,000 in face value, at least in the Schwab interface where it goes up by $1000 increments.
Addenda: Thanks for all the responses!
Currently have a three fund portfolio. S&P 500, total international fund and an intermediate term bond fund. About four years from retirement. Given today’s valuations and the tech heavy S&P 500 I’ve been contemplating directing part of my contributions in my 403B to a large cap value fund. Any thoughts, comments, opinions are welcome.
Hi everyone. I recently cashed out of a business and am sitting on a big chunk of money, which is going to be the bulk of my retirement money.
Like most of you, I was planning on putting it in equities and taking about 4.5 percent every year to live(using guardrails)
It seems like most people rely on the market over time making about 10 percent when they do their calculations.
I am a just a couple of years from retiring and considering everything going on, deathly afraid a big crash will cut my account in half.
I know no one knows what will happen and I understand time in the market beats timing the market but heres my question:
What guaranteed interest rate would you have to get from another investment that you would decide not to get into equities?
For example, if I knew I get a guaranteed 6 percent interest somewhere with no chance of losing principle, would that make up for not getting an average 10 percent in the market with the risk of a drop? If not 6 percent, what about 7?
Hope that makes sense and thank you everyone taking time out to help others learn.
This is a little mental exercise.
There is much focus on IRMAA, Roth roll overs, when to take SSI, which bucket to spend first etc. In a hypothetical world, how much savings would make it impossible to benefit from any planning? If you have a billion dollars in personal assets at age 60, you are gonna pay! No tax brakes. You pay the max, right?
So, what is the lowest ("high net worth") amount of assets you could have and not benefit from retirement planning?
Hi, I’ve never used a financial planner, which was probably a mistake. Now, we’re at the point to figure out what state is our best move for our official retirement home/presence. — east coast with options from Virginia to New Hampshire.
How do we find the right planner. What are the fees like?
What would you do? I can continue to add to a 403b (1k/month) or use that $ to invest in brokerage account. Or max out Roth IRA for spouse (mine is already maxed out). Me:55 him:60.
Been reading around the net on this subject, and I've been alarmed at the number of retirees with a large percentage of their net worth in equities. Concerned because a prolonged bear market could really sting and reduce these retirees' quality of life. Haven't seen many threads on this topic here, so I thought I'd poll the group. What percentage of your portfolio is in stocks and which percentage in safe assets?
My dad is retired and my mom is retiring in the next month and they are a bit anxious with the unknown of retirement. My dad has been trying to adapt to the change for the past little bit, and my mom is nervous. It's almost like a 50/50 excitement and also angst due to not knowing how to make the most of it. Is this a common feeling? What worked for you to resolve any angst you had, or are you still figuring it out? Just want to gather some insights to hopefully help my parents through this transition.
My FA has me invested in many Dimensional Fund Advisors (DFA) funds (mutual funds and ETFs) . From day one, the FA told me these funds are only available through registered advisors. This remains true for DFA mutual funds, but not for their ETFs. DFA now offers ETFs that are available to retail investors, and many are 1:1 equivalents of the advisor-only mutual funds, so the transition for those holdings should be straightforward.
My main question is around the DFA mutual funds. Based on research and input from AI tools, I believe I can keep my existing mutual fund shares after delinking from my advisor, but will not be able to purchase additional shares going forward. Has anyone gone through a similar transition and been able to retain their DFA mutual fund holdings at Schwab? And if so, are dividends reinvested automatically or paid out as cash?
I plan to meet with my FA within the next month to begin the transition. Any input or firsthand experience would be greatly appreciated.
