Do you count the part of your mortgage payment that goes to principal as "spending?"
In an ongoing effort to reassess my plans for the immediate future (returning to work temporarily, and whether to hire out part of our home construction) I'm considering the possibility that my wife would quit her job while we're still building. On the plus side, I get an able bodied helper, she'll learn just as much as I will, and we'll get to have a cool experience as a couple. On the negative side, we'll be paying a mortgage on our current house while we build the new one which, at first glance, boosts our spending rate above a 4% SWR. Our spending this year is on track to be $50,000. However, we have a 15 year mortgage so $10,000 of our $17,000 in mortgage payments goes directly to principal. For the principal amount, I suppose we're just temporarily shifting that money from equities to real estate, as we intend to sell this house once the new house is built. I don't expect this situation will be more than 9 months, a year at the most if it takes a few months to move the old house. How do other folks in retirement with mortgages view this, especially those whose mortgages are temporary and then the house equity becomes liquid again?