Greetings, all, I'm looking for some advice. My wife and I are in our mid-30's and are saving for "retirement" sometime in the next 12 or so years. My target age is somewhere around 48–50. I'm wondering where we should be investing our money now so that we can live off of it if we want once we are financially independent. (Granted, we may continue to work if we still are in fulfilling jobs!)
Here's where we're currently at:
My wife's 403b: ≈$43,000
Vanguard Traditional IRAs: ≈$63,000
Vanguard Roth IRA: ≈$33,000
Vanguard Brokerage (taxable) account: ≈$7,000
Between us we will be contributing about $17,000 a year to our 403b's (like a 401k for non-profits) and $11,000 to our IRAs.
My main question is this: Should I be putting our annual IRA money ($11,000) into Roth or Traditional IRA's? I'm worried that once we hit 48 or 50 we won't be able to access the money in a traditional IRA or 403b without taking a penalty. I'm wondering if I might put $5,500 in a Roth and $5,500 in a Trad. IRA each year. That way, once we "retire," we could pull from the Roth tax- and penalty-free while doing a traditional to Roth IRA conversion.
What do you all think? What are your strategies? We have about 12 years left working and I feel like I need a good strategy from here on out to make sure we can draw on our money when we're ready.
Thanks, all!
