There seems to be many books out there about how to accumulate money and invest money, but fewer books on how to actually spend your money in retirement. Living Off Your Money by Michael McClung is one of the better books I have read about how to spend your money in retirement.
The book covers two main topics that I found of value. The first being how to harvest your money, do you sell bonds, sell stocks, or a combination of the two to provide cash to pay for living expenses. The author compares a number of common harvesting methods and proposes a new one of his own called Prime Harvesting. It is his strategy of prime harvesting that I find most valuable from the book. Under prime harvesting, the retiree basically lets their bond to stock allocation float based on market conditions.
The second main topic of the book is regarding the withdrawal rate during retirement. Again the author compares numerous existing withdrawal rate methods and also adds his own. Although the author presents an interesting new take on withdrawal rates, I feel his proposed withdrawal rate is overly complex and was tuned based on historical data.
Overall I think the book is well worth the read. The thing I liked most about the book is the ability of the author to think outside the box and present some ideas that are new to the retirement and investing world. The book isn't cheap. I was able to get my local library to order a copy to add to their circulation. The author also provides the first few chapters of the book as a free download from his website. The free download includes his proposed Prime Harvesting method which I found to be one of my main take aways from the book. The free download can be found here.
Livingoffyourmoney.com
