Hi forum, some case study type questions posed for you all from a long time reader, first time poster. My wife and I are on the cusp of some transitions. We are both 30, and she is finishing medical school , starting residency and earning 55k a year somewhere, with benefits, then will be earning 150k a year as a pediatrician for the next 26 years, knock on wood. I've paid for her education and would love to quit working formally and get into my hipster passions full time (beer brewing, wood work, construction, sculpture, gardening) and see what sort of ventures pop out. My question is, when we find out my wife's residency placement, can I quit and not worry about new work for a while? Can we buy a house to remodel at the same time? Wondering as much from the financial side as from the emotional side from people who have taken hiatuses or stopped careers to let their hobbies run wild.
Currently we live cheaply in prime brooklyn with the wife a full time student, my income is around 125k, and we have about $100k in retirement funds, $150k in cash (liquid to buy a house in a few months), $150k in taxable investments, two cars owned outright that we may drive farther than the other side of the street some day (damn street parking). Expenses are broken into rent and utilities- $1000, food, car insurance, subway, fancy hand tool purchasing addiction, travel at another $1000 a month. Aside from the housing expense, I don't see our spending patterns increasing too much.
We would be moving to either the Bronx, south San Francisco/Daly City, oakland, or seattle, or staying put in brooklyn. Houses we have been looking at would be little shit boxes with in law potential at $500k or so. The house would suck up all our cash, and we'd either finance the rest to have a housing expense of roughly $1,800 a month, or if we found a deal close all cash, using our investments and tapping parents' helocs and paying them back (if I stopped working they'd get better use from the tax deduction of the first 100k heloc interest anyway). Housing expense in that case would be roughly $2,100 a month due to the heloc interest, plus monthly costs for material to renovate with.
Any suggestions on cities to move to, or to stay put? Jobs to keep or quit? Look for a deal to pay cash for or settle in and finance a home purchase? Thanks for reading.