Well, we’re almost 3 years in to the wonderful life of early retirement, even if we did it later than a lot of folks on MMM at 51 & 52. We still wake up every day in disbelief that we don’t have to go to work and we still can’t believe sometimes that this is our life now....last week we spent the day out with friends on Sunday all day and night, ended up in their pool all evening playing Cards Against Humanity and drinking too much beer. :) DH volunteered all day Monday at the county Sheriff’s aviation department like he does every week. Tuesday we drove across the state to check out the east coast beaches (rather than the Gulf Coast beaches we normally hang out on) and spent the entire day in the sun, surf and sand. Wednesday we both volunteered for a local charity (which we do each week) that provides household necessities to those in our community who need it. Thursday we met friends for lunch in a city an hour away. Friday we went to a movie in the middle of the day. Today we did all the yard work and are going over to the neighbor’s to play cards this evening. We spent time in the pool most days, too. This is a typical week for us but it varies pretty widely because, well, it can. We can do whatever we want whenever we want...and we love it.
We’re not nearly as mustachian really as we could be...mainly because we don’t need to be. Still, we spend about 20% of what we use to make each year so I think we’re doing okay. We are blessed to have DH’s Air Force pension providing the biggest majority of our income now. With that comes no cost for health insurance (yay, Tri-care!) which is HUGE. We are taking 3% out of our 401Ks each year to make up the difference and just sucking it up and paying the 10% penalty rather than jumping through any hoops to avoid that. Honestly, we used to live where sales tax was 10% so it doesn’t seem that excessive a cost. We’ve got a small amount of cash set back for anything unexpected that might come up but so far we haven’t had to dig into it for anything that our budget couldn’t handle.
We travel 650 miles each way every 2-3 months to go see the grandkids while they’re this close...since their dad is AF, too, it’s likely they’ll get transferred in the near future and probably be further away. We may end up spending more traveling to see them in the future depending on where they end up.
Our son was just getting out of college this past year and we helped him with some expenses that we won’t have next year, so that’s nice.
DH spends a lot of money doing things to the house because he can...he loves projects...but he’s only making it better so I’m okay with that.
I compared our expenses to MMM’s expenses he posted last year just to see how we did and there are some big differences. Our property taxes are much higher and we still have to pay to insure our home, where he doesn’t. Our utilities are higher, too, but living in south Florida, air conditioning is a must. Our car expenses are higher but that was expected...we don’t live in an area where we can bike and get anywhere. He didn’t account for Christmas at all but we still do. And we don’t do CrossFit or yoga so our money there is Netflix and moviepass. :) Overall we’re about $16,000 a year higher but I’m okay with that. I’ve got our budget projected out for the next 10 years and I think we’ll stay pretty close to this number. It’s worked for the last two years so I think it will continue to work for us. We plan to take social security when we turn 62 so we’ll probably stop taking money out of the 401Ks at that point.
Just wanted to share our experiences so far after 3 years in...if you’re working toward FI so you can do this, keep at it. It is more worth it than you’ve ever imagined.
Here’s our comparison
Mortgage Interest 0 0
Property Taxes. 4730 1895
Groceries 5177 5980
Wine/Beer 1390 321
Restaurants. 724 506
Doctor Visits 0 3807
Health Insurance 2938-Life 6720
Auto and Transport 2600 490
Car Insurance 831 449
Utilities 3300 1575
Cell Phone 600 600
Internet Access 540 540
Home 4706 1696
Home Insurance 1920. 0
Gifts/Donations 571 2000
Crossfit/Yoga 404 150
Misc 2663 2564
Shoes & Clothing 262 622
Christmas 1695 0
Shopping Misc 3900 1000
Books, games, gifts 2642-son 383
Other 580 422
Travel 4076 2335
TOTAL $46,249 $30,193
