r/RetirementReady

Given the current state of the United States socially, politically, and economically are you considering moving, or applying for a residency permit to another country? Have you been considering this move for a long time or is it a recent urge?

Has anyone had any luck with finding any tools to find places in the US to retire that aren't just lists like The 10 Best Cities to Retire in the Midwest? I find that the same cities always pop-up and the depth of these articles is about as much as 50-100 words can provide (which isn't much). I'd love to hear how others are finding their final settling places.

I am extremely financially stable. I make $3938.58 per month from VA Compensation and I get an increase to my compensation at least 2.5% every December. My rent is only $1095 which includes water, gas, food donation, pantry, air-conditioning and Me having the privilege to live with my dog. I am currently living in a very small city that has less than 50,000 people. I only fill my gas tank 2 to 3 times per month.

The only thing I want do is save up around 10 grand to buy 1 acre of Land and use my VA construction loan to pay for building a home. Every Month there’s always something I have to fix something; which includes my car. Or I have to go fix one of my items I have like for example I had to get my phone fixed because my iPhone power up and down buttons before that I got my PlayStation five fixed, etc.

Food is so expensive nowadays which is more expensive since I’m trying to be on the carnivore diet, but everything that is meat is extremely expensive. I eat at least three steaks per week, have subways around twice a week but when they’re only on sale, for example I got myself a foot-long meatball sub for only $8.76. Still more expensive than it was over 20 years ago but still better than paying over 20 bucks for one sub. I wish it was five dollars for a Subway sandwich like it was back in the day.

I refill on my water bottles every two weeks so I always get at least three cases of 48 water bottles. My car insurance is $220 per month and my car payment is currently $131.06 per month. Again I keep trying to save money. I always put $700 in my savings account but by the end of the month. I have to use it again and put another $700 for the next time the first of the month. It’s a vicious cycle. I have a lot of needs in a lot of wants and I just don’t really care for giving up my wants because the first of the month I pay all my bills everything and I have a little over two grand to play with for the most part they still always squander it on mostly emergencies and food I spent at least $900 on food/drinks. I don’t know what to do. I’m always ready for emergencies though, because it always happens to be in the beginning of month, so I always fix it.

I’m currently not working I should but I am 100% Disabled Marine Veteran; there are a lot of jobs. I cannot do even though there’s some I really wanna do that can physically still hurt me it’s just I am retired and I can do whatever I want. I just don’t really care for the pain. I’m gonna deal with in the future because at this point, I’m at the end of the road in life, I am literally living in the golden years of the boomers. The only jobs that they’re hiring here in Cedar City are in fast food restaurants, grocery stores, clothing store, random stores, etc. and I don’t want to do that. I want work in farming even though I’m disabled I still want to learn more about plants how to plant my own food. I just wish things were different. You have to know someone to get into that field and the only way to get into it is if you know somebody or if you major in agriculture, which I am doing right now, I want to be a farm manager or work in a greenhouse working on plants, making sure they’re good to go and having the sprouts for certain foods they’re making. Like for example I have to make sure the potatoes are creating other potatoes instead of dying from bugs or dehydration.

I know it’s a long post but in short I want help I don’t know what to do. What’s the point of saving up when I’m retired. I’m NOT going to worry about anything. I’m losing a decent amount of weight every week and I just don’t really care about saving because what’s the point the veterans affairs compensation is never gonna go away.
Not until I die no one’s getting inherited my compensation even if my dumbass actually gets married has kids I don’t think my children are going to inherit my veterans affairs compensation.

But the good news is I keep myself distracted with doing whatever I can for my church. I became a Latter Day Saint and I just don’t see any other purpose besides doing that and working on a farm. I hope I can find myself a job after I graduate with my bachelors degree in agriculture, but I don’t care. I really don’t care because I literally have everything I need. Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t it the whole point of retirement to work so you can pull out retirement or have a pension and live out your life to the fullest. That’s what I’m doing. Working saving money being in the whole rat race in general; I just don’t really care for it. I don’t really care about work. I don’t care about saving money. The only thing I care about is being a Latter Day Saint; I keep being a good Latter Day Saint
and help other people out and enjoy my life by playing video games, working out, waking at 4 AM in the morning every day just do whatever I want. It’s amazing and I just don’t know if I’m the only one on this, but I know my situation is very unique and special and I’m very grateful for it, but I just can’t relate to other people my age they are working and saving up for retirement. They are trying to get that promotion while I’m the only one who’s retired who is this young being only 24 years old a retired 100% Disabled Marine Veteran who does whatever he wants and helps at the LDS church as much as he wants and that’s just the only thing that gives me joy in life. So go ahead and give your opinion about it. I will give the TLDR; at the end of this post right now besides that live strong I would love to hear you guys’s comments and advice.

TLDR: A 24 Year Old 100% VA Disabled Marine Veteran; I am extremely financially stable and I joined a great religion that keeps my mind and body busy. I also work out and play video games on my free time at least five days a week. Everything is Great in my life, but I cannot relate to anyone I just don’t really care about working or saving money so this is just me venting, but you guys can give me all your advice you want and comments that you want to give for clarity. I am willing to answer any question. I understand my situation is very unique and special and I’m very grateful for it. Thank you for reading my post.

My wife and I are 56 and retirement is upcoming. The plan was always to retire at 62, but my wife's job is incredibly stressful and she doesn't think she can hold on to 62. We do have twins who are slightly on the spectrum - not 100% sure they will ever fully be able to support themselves - so I want to ensure I leave them a decent amount.

So, we are thinking of retiring by 12/31/29 - we will both be 59. We are currently in the accumulation stages for retirement. Our 401Ks currently total around $2.6 million - it is about an 85/15 split between Traditional/Roth. We both contribute the max each year to ROTH. It is all invested in S&P 500 ETFs.

We also own a home and have savings outside of our 401Ks. When we sell the home based upon today's prices after expenses and mortgage payoff - we should net around $1.2 million plus we expect to have another $500K in cash savings.

We will use our cash to buy a retirement home - not sure what it will cost - anywhere from $600K to $1million, which will leave me with $700K to $1.1M in cash.

It is our hope to have around $200K a year to spend in retirement. We currently spend around $180K a year, but I won't have a mortgage or my ridiclous NJ RE Tax to pay - which is around $50K together. Plus I will live in a lower cost state (almost any state is lower cost than NJ).

My friends who just retired say we have plenty of money and that we should retire now. I was thinking about a 4% withdrawal rate and he was mentioning QQQI and SYPY that pay over 10% and my withdrawal rate is very low.

How would you deploy my 401K funds and my cash so that I could have $200K annually for spending and continue to grow my portfolio. Obviously there is risk in QQQi and SYPY or everyone would just investment all their money there. Any help or guidance would be appreciated.

EDIT: I want to add that I am not planning on touching my 401Ks until 65. I hope to live on the proceeds from house sale and cash saved until then. My 401Ks should grow significantly in those 9 years. Also my wife and I will both get max or close to max SS, so at 65, together we should get over $100K/yr. So, I will need to draw less than $200K/yr from my 401Ks. However, if we find ourselves short of cash before 65 - we might draw something the last year or 2 to cover the difference.

This not a set in stone and all the numbers run plan - this is just what I have been thinking that will work..

Newbie here to fatFIRE so please humbly accept my apologies upfront if I commit any rookie mistakes.

57, $9.5M NW, with $6.4M investable (VOO, balanced tech and international funds e.g. VYMI), $2M in home equity and no debt. Just over $1M in additional assets set aside for college for the kids. Planning to try and retire early next year- I am still employed at present- base + cash bonus is $450K, and vested RSUs will provide $200K a quarter until I retire. So for right now, life is comfortable. We do not buy art, don't really have a desire for jewelry, cars are paid off and we only spend money on family travel but even then we eat and live with the locals where ever we go.

My one question is how we think about college for the kids given our situation. Our oldest is off to a private college this fall ($85K a year all in), our youngest is still a high school sophomore and we have no idea where she will go to school but are assuming an in state university per her desire. We have a 529 loaded with 2 years of tuition and then have an adjacent brokerage account that we use to grow the principle and funnel annual profits in the 529.

My question: Given my situation, would anyone recommend a different thought process when it come to tuition planning? I am also open to any thoughts on my FIRE status as well in case anyone wants to comment more generally.

Thank you kindly!

“While exact, official federal decile data fluctuates based on specific tax years, analyzed data from the U.S. Census Bureau and the Bureau of Labor Statistics highlights a massive divide between the lowest and highest income percentiles for retired households. [1, 2]

Estimated Annual Income by Decile (Households 65+)

(From OP- I only included the top 5 deciles here)

5th Decile (Median - 50%)
Around $56,680
The true middle. Income is evenly split between Social Security, employer pensions, and occasional part-time work.

6th Decile (50% to 60%)
$56,680 – $72,000
Increased influence of traditional pensions and structured 401(k)/IRAwithdrawals.l

7th Decile (60% to 70%)
$72,000 – $92,000
Substantial private savings distributions begin to rival the household's Social Security income baseline.

8th Decile (70% to 80%)
$92,000 – $125,000
Asset-driven income (dividends, real estate/rent, interest) becomes a primary driver.

9th Decile (80% to 90%)
$125,000 – $188,000
High retirement-account balances. Pensions and savings make up over a quarter of all revenue.

10th Decile (Top 10%)
Over $188,000
Driven by active wages/business earnings (39% of total mix) and significant investment portfolio returns.

How Income Sources Vary by Decile
The drastic gap between deciles exists because the types of income change entirely as you move up the wealth ladder:

The Top 20%: Rely primarily on earned wages and market assets. Over 39% of their total income comes from ongoing employment or business earnings, and 18% comes directly from investment dividends, interest, or rental properties. Because of these heavy market ties, a small percentage of wealthy retirees pulls the national "mean" retirement income up significantly higher than the median. [2, 3]”

[1] https://www.fool.com
[2] https://www.fool.com
[3] https://www.congress.gov
[4] https://www.census.gov

We’ll already be in a high enough bracket that RMDs won’t impact IRMMA nor our social security being taxed. And we’d rather have more money now while we can maximize it in our go go years. Kids are getting gifts along the way and won’t mind having to use what’s left over 10 years, so that’s not a concern. Curious what others think?

Working on a readiness list before I take the leap into retirement next year and included final expense insurance for senior citizens in the list but now I am having second thoughts about whether it is a good thing to have or just another savings option on the list. All other items on my list are pretty much standard, income plan, healthcare coverage from the time when I retire until I start collecting from Medicare, draw down plan, estate documents.

I am leaning towards self funding since I am healthy and disciplined, but I want to make sure I am not missing a reason the insurance is the better line item for someone in my position. Is there a planning reason to prefer the policy that I am not seeing or is this genuinely a personal call between two reasonable options?

I’m looking in options in America and it’s seem insane for paying so much for retirement. Anyone tied Thailand as an option?