Please assess my situation

[ePalmtrees]

I will try to make this as concise as possible.

Work: I have no real skills to get a "normal" job. I've worked for myself online for the past 10+ years. For the past 5 years I've made my money outsourcing and selling coloring books on amazon.

I really don't want to work anymore because I can't balance and I become a workaholic and truly miserable. I want to become a full time writer. I'm lucky because my income is passive. I'm not actively working but foresee, knock on wood, money coming in at least for the next year, and making a profit of 80-100k this year.

I am in my late 30's, one young child by my ex who gives me $500 a month and isn't involved, another baby on the way with my current partner (oops). Partner has his own business and is more in the building the business phase than making money phase, even though the business is a few years old, basically can't contribute, I am trying to work on the relationship in many regards but I am basically on my own for finances.

I have about 125k in savings, 125k in retirement & hsa accounts, a vacation rental house that I would make 100k on if I sold it but makes a 3-5k profit plus pays off 7k in equity every year. Counting equity that's over 10% on the 100k that I could get out of it so I don't see what I could do better with the money than keep it.

Biggest expenses: 1200 mortgage, 740 useless health insurance that will increase after baby, and of course I'll meet my $6500 deductible this year. 300 for preschool. I'm fairly thrifty otherwise except for groceries, I can't meal plan, I spend about $700 monthly.

I want to know what to do with my money. I have 25 k in a high interest savings (4.59 - 5%) account that I consider my emergency fund. That's the max I can have or I'd put it all in there. So that leaves me about 75 k in cash and after expenses/taxes maybe 5k a month in savings.

I don't want to live in my current house forever. I don't know if I should try to buy another house and rent this one. I could make a profit of about $300 a month on it, not factoring in expenses. I like the house but it's not perfect by any means. It literally smells like shit outside a lot of time from a nearby sewage treatment plant (the disclosure when I bought it said a few times a year, it's like 30% of the time, cool, luckily mostly at night, but still).

It's only 10 years old and a good rental house, I bought it planning on using it for that after I moved on. The problem is the housing market here sucks, anything that I would want as my forever home I couldn't afford, and I don't even know if I want to live here forever.

I could move into my significant other's house which is a garage he's been converting into a house for years but it's not finished and it's 30 minutes away .. just not ultimately what I want to do although financially finishing it and moving in and having no rent is probably the best option. It's also down a sketchy steep dirt road that kind of unnerves me.

I just feel so much uncertainty because of the nature of my "job" and I never know what's going to happen. That makes me want to hang on to every penny, but if I do that, it will just get eaten up by inflation. If I had put all my money in the stock market in 2013 when I had a *really* good year, I'd have twice as much right now.

I've got my retirement account in a vanguard total index fund, but I'm having trouble pulling the trigger on my cash outside retirement. I've been fighting it because I'm scared but am coming to realize stock index funds are really the best investment.

Maybe I should try to buy a rental property somewhere but the local market is not good for investors, and it seems like so much to learn about and so much effort to find a good deal - that's a full time job in itself. My current rental is the first house I bought and it just happened to make an awesome rental and I got a really good deal on it so it works.

I'm not even sure what my question is. I want to be smart with my money but I feel like I have so many variables going on and uncertainty. What should I do with my current extra 75k?

I guess I want what I currently have to be enough to retire on but I'm coming to the realization that it's not.

Currently I'm maxing out my hsa and roth ira contributions per year (about 13k total).

I should probably just keep working and increasing my income but I really feel like I will become a workaholic and miserable again (and my book will never get done and I'm a crappy Mom when I'm in that state, honestly)

[ePalmtrees]

Edit: on the current house making 300 not factoring in expenses, I meant like unforeseen repairs & maintenance.

[zolotiyeruki]

When you say you "can't mealplan," what do you mean by that?  That you find it very difficult to plan, or that it's difficult to execute the plan?  For a family of two, that $700/mo should be more like $200/mo.

You've listed about $3k/mo of regular expenses.  Out of an income of $80-100k, that's fantastic.  If your spending is really $36k/year, you'll need a stash of $900k to meet the 4% SWR.  You're at about $200k, and it looks like you can add about $40k/year.  Keep that up, and you can retire in 10 years.  Your rental property will cut that down even more.

I heard an interesting bit of advice the other day: "run your life like you'd run a business."  With so many things on your mind, I think it may help to compartmentalize the various issues you're dealing with.  You should treat your retirement investments in isolation from your rental property, and your rental income separate from your personal home, and all three should be treated separately from your business income.  Your partner's business should absolutely be isolated and insulated from your personal finances.  Yes, they all can potentially affect your eventual financial position, but they should be approached separately.  Also, having to juggle so many issues is exhausting.  If you can cut down on the number of things you have to think about, it will take away a lot of stress.  It's like mental decluttering!

So, thoughts on the money front: 
1) Plow the $75k into an index fund and quit worrying about it. 
2) If you want, you can keep the $25k as your emergency fund.  Keep in mind that credit cards can also act as an emergency fund.
3) With your income and filing status, you really should be working on minimizing your taxable income.  That means that you should be contributing to a Traditional IRA rather than a Roth.
4) I think it would be worthwhile for you to research a Solo 401k, to give you further options for tax-deferred savings.

On the house you live in:  Other than the smell, are there other aspects of the house that bother you?  Do you have needs that your home does not meet?  Can any flaws be fixed?

On the uncertainty of your income, and employability:  There's not much you can do about what the entire market does, but you *can* affect your own ability to earn money.  How much time does your current gig require?  Do you have free time that you could use to develop marketable skills? Even such mundane things like being able to use Microsoft Office could help you qualify for clerical/office work if the need arose.  You also have enough cash on hand that if you lost your current income, you could live off savings while going back to school.

Rental house:  It nets you $10-12k/year.  Since it doesn't make sense to sell it, have you considered selling your current residence and living full-time in the rental instead? It sounds like it's in the same area.  You'd lose the $10k of income, but you'd also lose the sewer gas smell and a lot of your current mortgage.  You'd also have to worry about one less house worth of maintenance.  If that's not an option, that's fine--I'm just pointing out some options.

[lbmustache]

Getting rid of your current house and living in the rental came to my mind too. I would maybe wait till post-baby to consider buying any new property.

Your post has a lot of "can't"s and "don't want"s. Which is fine to a certain degree - we're all here because we "can't" or "don't want to" do something. However, your post kind of seems a bit self-limiting to me and I think you have a lot of potential.

No skills? EVERY SINGLE PERSON has skills unless you're just a lump. You can talk, you can type, you can do basic math and know English. That qualifies you for a zillion jobs. Are you good with people? Good with computers? Think about things you can do and things that you are good at, and see what matches up. Now, you don't want a new job it sounds like, which should be fine given your income level.

"Can't meal plan" what exactly can't you do? Make a shopping list? Prepare meals? You're saying you have no ability to learn this or put in the time to do it?

[SunshineAZ]

I want to know what to do with my money. I have 25 k in a high interest savings (4.59 - 5%) account that I consider my emergency fund. That's the max I can have or I'd put it all in there. So that leaves me about 75 k in cash and after expenses/taxes maybe 5k a month in savings.

I am curious where you found a savings account that pays 4.59 - 5%.  Is it through a bank?  Are you located in the US?

[ePalmtrees]

https://www.doctorofcredit.com/high-interest-savings-to-get/

Consumer's credit and Insight.

[ePalmtrees]

Cooking and meal planning is just kind of my weakness. I hate to do it. I'm not good at it and can't think of anything to make. I also feel resentful because I feel like I do everything else, make the money, parent, manage the household, clean, and then at the end of the day I'm tired and lazy and resent having to cook and make dinner. I spent most of my adult life living in cities and eating out or getting takeout from restaurants.

But I do spend too much on groceries. I don't even try to budget.

I still have a mortgage on the rental property and it's also too small at this point, that's why I moved out of it. It wouldn't work with a young child and a baby on the way.