It's hard to admit this here, but I'm going to do it so that I can hopefully start to make some forward movement: I don't understand enough about investing to feel comfortable doing a single damn thing.
My husband and I have a 12 year age difference, which seems important in knowing how risk adverse to be. Further complicating matters, he's a professional musician and while he makes a good income from it, it's all over the map and really unpredictable. He could make six figures next year, or something could happen and the shows could stop completely. There's no way to gauge or predict future earnings. He's got a show next weekend, but until that show happens and the check arrives, we know better than to count on the income.
So large-ish age difference and unpredictable income (he's the main bread winner) are my biggest struggles in knowing what to do.
We've got an emergency fund with a full year's living expenses. I could maaaybe drop that down to six months worth, but wouldn't feel comfortable going lower than that, both due to husband's wack income and large, on-going medical bills.
No debt outside of our mortgage. We're about to sell our old house, and will give us about 20-30K to plunk in Vanguard. But into WHAT? I don't know.
Does anyone have a super dumbed down "here's where 50 year old punks should put their money" Vanguard plan? I'd really love to hear it, or any other advice that you might have.
Thanks for any help!