Thanks, guys - and I'll definitely look into that reading. I'm reading JL Collins atm too.
@mjr, you are right, we do need to nut down our strategy totally and are only still working through the process. We are waiting to hear about a salary change (for the better) for DH, and then we can formalise things with budgets and so forth. But our strategy does include Real Estate, with the goal being to have paid off one investment property close to the ER date. We are shovelling some money onto that mortgage while money is cheap (our family home is nearly paid off). We figure we can cash out of that and sell it for ER if needed, but ideally, we'd like to keep it as an investment property because we'd have the rent to get us through any downturns with the share market, so it feels like it rounds things out.
My husband and I feel differently about intergenerational wealth - I hope to at least leave the family home to the two kids (currently worth around 1.2 million). Still, he says we made our own way, and it is the last thing he is bringing into his financial plan. We will see how that goes, I guess ... no use arguing about the kids now!
Our superannuation, hopefully, will grow nicely in the next 13 years (that gets me to 60 and my husband to 62), with my balance currently at 650K and his around 250K. He will get contributions added every year, but as I'm in business for myself, I'm considering putting what I'd typically put into super into ETFs outside of super, only because my super balance is fairly healthy for my age, but our personal share account is not. I understand the tax benefits with superannuation, but I also want to access my money when I want and not when the government says I can. Even conservative calculations show that the balance of $650K should grow to be a decent amount (keeping in mind that figure is only my super, not my husband's ... the two accounts growing together will hopefully be a healthy balance in 13-14 years when we plan to start drawing down).
So, you are right, and we definitely have a lot of work to do to get to a final strategy, but I'm feeling okay about the real estate element with a family home nearly paid off and investment property with only half of its (conservative bank) valuation left to pay on the mortgage.
VDGR does have a 30% bond rate to it, and I believe VDHG only 10%. I might switch our VDGR contributions to VDHG with the 10% bonds. My superannuation has a good chunk tied up conservatively - I've divided some into higher risk but have kept enough that if D-Day were to happen the structure should see us through.
Having said all of that, plan B is that ER doesn't happen smack bang on seven years and we Barista fire with my husband taking contracts in between our travel. And, if my online business keeps going as well as the way it currently is, we will keep that going, which will give us a small monthly income, and outsource more of the day to day running of it (easy to do with fulfilment centres, digital ad agencies to do the marketing etc ...) so we can travel.
Thanks again, everybody, and I'll read the
https://portfoliocharts.com/ and keep learning - a newbie still with ETFs but so wanting to read and absorb what we can so we can create our own plan we feel comfortable with!