On the stocks, they are just given to my partner, so we really didn't purchase them and can only cash out at certain points when there is enough time vested. It is a pretty solid biotech company, but yes, that could evaporate, certainly.
The house is crazy, yes. Very HCOL. We are fortunate to have a rental that pays about 3/4 of our housing expenses, although our income doesn't allow us (now) to take any deductions on maintenance, etc. We will definitely sell and move when we are ready to FIRE. The crazy thing is that we would be hard pressed to find a home for our family under what we pay right now, taking the rental income into consideration (which has gone from 1000 a month in 2008 to 2600 a month now, and prices seem to continue to rise). We have a three bedroom, two bath house in the SF bay (plus the two bedroom rental). You'd be hard pressed to find a studio in Oakland/Berkeley for 1200. Nuts, I know. But living here has enabled us to make some good earnings and pocket some good money to take with us with we parachute out , so I'm grateful for that. (And for my mustachian partner, who had the good sense to buy this house when he did).
I know we could pull the trigger now and maybe we should. What is stopping us is insurance. And cancer. I've been free for a few years now, but something like that does may you wary, and I don't feel confident with the current plans slowly working their way through congress. I think any middle aged or older person with any illness history (let alone cancer) is looking at some very high premiums.