The Money Mustache Community
General Discussion => Post-FIRE => Topic started by: GOFU on February 08, 2018, 08:59:12 AM
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I know, I know, I know. Everybody is different - lifestyles, interests, activities, all of it. I know that.
I have read a million takes on the percentages - 4%, etc., etc.
But in terms of actual dollars people are spending to live as they please and do what they want to do, how much is it?
I am this close (holding up my finger and thumb with a very small small space between), and maybe it is the paralysis by analysis, but would people be willing to share how much in actual $$ they are spending a year to live an active, pleasant, joyful, and Mustachian early retirement? If there is something extraordinary that skews your number then maybe you can factor that out.
If there are a couple of young kids in your budget that would be of significant interest to me too.
Thanks.
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Your question is completely unanswerable.
1) It depends on where you live
2) There is no point comparing you to other people
3) The difference between barebones and comfortable and luxury are different. Do you have family on another continent you want to see regularly? Do you pay for health insurance?
There is just no way.
I would hazard a really stupid guess that 2-2.5k a month per adult would afford a comfortable lifestyle assuming a modest paid for home in a non-crazy tax burden part of the world. I have no idea with healthcare costs added.
You need to give your own numbers; then perhaps people can suggest if you are nearly there/there/way past there.
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My retirement spending is pretty close to what I was spending when working full time.
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I get it, you are looking for benchmarks to get a "feel good" that your plan is reasonable. I'm not FIRE'd yet, but I went searching for the same thing. I posted this one in my journal recently:
https://www.blackrock.com/investing/literature/whitepaper/retirement-spending-whitepaper-final-stamped.pdf
It's not specific to early retirement, but page 8 has median annual pre-tax income and spending for pre- and post-retirement for three different buckets of wealth levels. Closest thing I've been able to find to a benchmark, and not even Mustachian, but perhaps someone else has found something better.
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My retirement spending is pretty close to what I was spending when working full time.
How does healthcare figure into that?
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Not sure it will help, but in our case it takes about $55k/year for our current lifestyle plus we budget about another $20K for travel annually. This is for a two person Canadian household so we really do not have to budget for healthcare.
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I am living now on $24,000 annually now (and have been for years) so I figure no reason why I couldn't live on that easily in retirement. That amount even allows for modest travel and hobbies. Pension plus my own savings will give me close to $40,000 so I anticipate even being able to save a good amount each year in retirement.
I have the benefit of being able to stay in the group health insurance pool when I take my government pension.
Paid for smaller house (downsized two years ago)
Kids are young adults
Like a lot of no cost/free fun things to do and don't see that changing much
Travel with budget airlines, airbnb, lower cost hotels, use of public transportation or take
vacations within a few hours driving distance of home
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Your question is completely unanswerable.
1) It depends on where you live
2) There is no point comparing you to other people
3) The difference between barebones and comfortable and luxury are different. Do you have family on another continent you want to see regularly? Do you pay for health insurance?
There is just no way.
I would hazard a really stupid guess that 2-2.5k a month per adult would afford a comfortable lifestyle assuming a modest paid for home in a non-crazy tax burden part of the world. I have no idea with healthcare costs added.
You need to give your own numbers; then perhaps people can suggest if you are nearly there/there/way past there.
I understand. I guess I am a little disoriented because where live now can be done for about $800 a month for a couple with two young kids. I know that if I retire back to the US that is not going to be possible. So I guess I am grasping in the dark for how much of a draw I will need to make on the retirement fund- 3, 4, 5%? Maybe if someone can point me to a rough guide of living expenses. I really am out of touch with cost of living.
I don't know what numbers would be relevant to give you.
Let's just say 50 years old with $1 million in savings, 50/50 taxable/tax-deferred. Frugal, modest lifestyle. Not into stuff. Likes long walks on the beach (or in the park or in the mountains) and romantic hot dog barbecues.
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Here's a good 2014 article estimating the cost of a typical middle class Canadian retirement.
http://www.moneysense.ca/save/retirement/how-much-money-you-need-to-retire/
Many Mustachians would spend less but it gives you a benchmark. Canadians need to worry less about healthcare costs/insurance but aren't completely scot free for dental/optical/physio/pharma costs. (I think US Social Security pays more than Canadian CPP/OAS but you would have to figure out your exact numbers. Of interest if you are close to SS age and that would be a factor in income. Doesn't affect expenses.)
The AUS cost estimates are in the same ballpark:
https://www.superannuation.asn.au/resources/retirement-standard
Of course, optimizing your spending will require much less income. I would bet that $40-45K US/yr plus paid off house (plus healthcare insurance for Americans) would be very comfortable for most people.
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We're living on $36,000 a year right now, though my wife is still working. I do not work. 10k is rent paid to the couple we live with ($825 a month). Healthcare is 6k through my wife's employer, and this will be significantly cheaper when she quits. We can get a nice broad network silver ACA plan for $225 a month. If we decide not to travel extensively, healthcare premiums drop to less than $100 a month for a limited network plan. No mortgage (our house is rented), no car loans. Keeps life pretty cheap to live.
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I've often wondered the same thing, but there are so many factors that may not make it helpful. I'll share regardless.
we spend about 55k / year for me, wife, and a 7 year old. we live in midwest, fairly low cost of living, although we do live in a lake community, it's out in the country. Houses range from 750k to 75k.
That will come down some in retirement, also the last 3 years (where that number came from) we have done a lot of work around the house. Included in that number, we spend 7-10k per year travelling. There is fat to trim for sure.
My tentative plan is about 40k when we 'retire'. And that is living pretty darn well, not a big sacrifice.
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and romantic hot dog barbecues.
Is there any other type of hot dog barbecue? I assumed they were ALL romantic. :)
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My excel sheet says our average yearly spending will be 45K.
East Coast, Virginia.
That includes a 1,100 mortgage that we could pay off but nurse along keeping assets invested. Small ranch home, cheap electricity/water/etc.
It also includes 1,000 a month in savings.
Kids are grown, one at home but not for too much longer, she works a part time job to pay for many of the "oh shit" things that kids need money for. Her college fund is fully funded if she decides to go.
So, we paid off the mortgage and stopped the savings, we'd live on 21K. That's with a good internet plan, netflix, charity donations, AAA baseball games, drive to vacations, things of that nature. I'd say we live a very comfortable lifestyle that many would consider sparse, others would consider ostentatious (the extreme frugal types).
We controlled the three most important variables (home and where it's located, car spending, and misc/food spending) to ensure we'd be set up for success. The one monkey wrench here, as others stated, is that our healthcare is cheap/excellent (retired mil health care) so it doesn't affect our COL much.
I hope that helps, although comparing your situation to others is very difficult.
I'd ask you, what do you think is the MINIMUM you think you can live off of? Are you comfortable at that level? It's been suggested that you spend a few months mimicking that situation to really see how you react. Then, make things super painful for a while, adjust your spending upwards just a smidgen to reduce pain (get those massages again?) and settle in.
Good luck to you!
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What are you spending now?
What will change when you retire?
Will those changes save you money or cost you money?
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I understand. I guess I am a little disoriented because where live now can be done for about $800 a month for a couple with two young kids. I know that if I retire back to the US that is not going to be possible.
May I ask where you are now? If I moved back to the developing country where I was born, I figure I still need $3k to attempt to maintain our current lifestyle. I would love to know how your spending breaks down.
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Expenses over the past 3 years have averaged $24k/yr for me. This is the level of spending I plan on using in FIRE. That allows for a very nice lifestyle after covering rent+utilities ($550 all in) $450 can easily cover rest of bills while $1k/month serves as fun money.
Between all of the low/no cost outdoor sports/hobbies we enjoy, travel hacking, and a generally active and nomadic lifestyle, I don't see us needing much more than that to enjoy a nice FI. I will be looking to go past that, to cover unforeseen changes to healthcare costs, larger purchases once we settle down (house maybe?).
I plan on doing this by doing some occasional stints of PT work, and a WR slightly below 4%, that ought to let the stache outgrow spending pretty significantly.
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OK, monthly expenses are as follows (some of these we don't incur every month but totals are broken into monthly amounts):
House (owned and paid for): $50
Groceries/diapers/kids milk: $250
Electric bill: $45
Cell phone: $15
Gas, maintenance and insurance for motorcycle: $15
Medicine/dentist: $20
Clothes: $5
Dining out: $50
Nanny/Housekeeper: $150
Gifts/donations: $100
Travel: $100
TOTAL: $800 There may be a few things here and there during the year, a birthday party or something, but that's about it.
Things we have but don't pay for: High speed internet at home, company car (& all associated expenses), Netflix & MLB.com (we piggy back on the subscriptions of family - don't tell anyone).
Things we don't have and therefore don't pay for: cable TV (don't need or want it), health insurance (thankfully we are all pretty healthy so far, except for typical baby and toddler illnesses)
This is out in the hinterlands of Bolivia. I know I could never live this cheaply in the USA. So pretty much everything is going to be more expensive should we return there. Just trying to gauge the landscape a little. THanks for all the responses.
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That is some badass spending!!
Makes me happy I could move to Bolivia and be FI on $1200/month.
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We live in a MCOL area. We spend 62k/year plus a 10-14k travel budget. However, we are in our mid 60's and healthcare has been a large expense. We spend between 12-15k year on that. Also at this age we are not skimping on anything like we did when younger as we have had 3 friends die between 59-67. When working we never spent that much $ on travel. WE could spend a lot less if we needed too.
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That is some badass spending!!
Makes me happy I could move to Bolivia and be FI on $1200/month.
Yeah, well, there are a lot of reasons why people aren't flocking here.
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I'm mostly interested in the answer to this question from someone in his or her 80s - 90s.
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By 80-90's people's spending decreased. I saw it with my Mom and grandparents. It gets to be a big hassle to travel even if you loved it before. You generally aren't buying clothes or other things.
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By 80-90's people's spending decreased. I saw it with my Mom and grandparents. It gets to be a big hassle to travel even if you loved it before. You generally aren't buying clothes or other things.
Same with my grandparents. They were in the best shape of all their peers. Grandma died at 85. Grandpa is still going strong at 91. Travel started decreasing significantly in their mid-70s and by the early 80s it was almost non-existent. Before that they would go on bus trips, cruises, drive 10 hours to see their son's family, etc.
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By 80-90's people's spending decreased. I saw it with my Mom and grandparents. It gets to be a big hassle to travel even if you loved it before. You generally aren't buying clothes or other things.
I've seen five sets of grandparents end up in homes with varying levels of care (from minor daily assistance with things to full blown always on call medical care). The common denominator amoung all of them is that they spend significantly more than when they were in their 60s. This is despite the reduced travel, and owning of fewer things.
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Most of my family has stayed home until a few weeks before dying. My 2 grandma's spend about 6 months each in a home and one paid for her own care and one went on Medicaid and they were in the same home. It really is a crap shoot how your not so golden years will turn out. My Mom kept my dad home with help from me and between us 3 kids my Mom lived alone with some help from us when she was battling cancer 3x's. Although none of us lived in town we were able to take a few weeks at a time off to help her when she needed it. Now if someone needs round the clock care all bets are off. My 93 yo aunt still lives alone with no help needed. She does pay for cleaners to come in and eats lean cuisine instead of cooking both of which she started a year ago. Fortunately if she needs help down the road she has the $ to pay for it.
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$16K
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I'm mostly interested in the answer to this question from someone in his or her 80s - 90s.
88 year old widower father in law spends $2600/mo. He drives about $25K miles/year still. Doesn't like to stay home much. Eats out 2x per day.
This will go up to about $4,000/mo when he moves into a retirement community, which has to happen pretty soon. Then it will go up more when he moves into assisted living.
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To the OP: if you’re moving back to the US and you’re FIRE, I’d imagine you can live anywhere you want. You get to choose the area and you can make it as affordable as you want. Outside of healthcare the US can be relatively cheap. With your assets, you’re living off of $40k/yr, far more than MMM himself and he makes it work. Granted he does have a paid off house. You and your partner could also work part time jobs for some extra cash. I’m telling you what you already know. Probably best if you research where exactly you want to end up and then build a budget off of that, that will let you know what you need.
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Justin at Root of Good http://rootofgood.com (http://rootofgood.com) spends 40k for his family with 2or 3 kids, including quite a lot of travel for the whole family, and often seems to come in under this target. He puts quite lot of detail about his lifestyle and spending on his blog.
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That is some badass spending!!
Makes me happy I could move to Bolivia and be FI on $1200/month.
Yeah, well, there are a lot of reasons why people aren't flocking here.
It doesn't need to be "Bolivia" for that. Me and my GF are living happily on less than that; about $1k/month...give or take a few bucks depending on traveling expenses. We are not FIRE yet but this just happens to be the amount what it takes for us to live the life we enjoy. However we do endure tons of snow and then there is the occational wolves and bears lurking around the "city core"...
And to show it's not waaay to extreme of a place to live... Lets just say the wolves also can stay connected through free outdoor wi-fi while roaming the city streets in the dark.. ;-)
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That is some badass spending!!
Makes me happy I could move to Bolivia and be FI on $1200/month.
Yeah, well, there are a lot of reasons why people aren't flocking here.
It doesn't need to be "Bolivia" for that. Me and my GF are living happily on less than that; about $1k/month...give or take a few bucks depending on traveling expenses. We are not FIRE yet but this just happens to be the amount what it takes for us to live the life we enjoy. However we do endure tons of snow and then there is the occational wolves and bears lurking around the "city core"...
And to show it's not waaay to extreme of a place to live... Lets just say the wolves also can stay connected through free outdoor wi-fi while roaming the city streets in the dark.. ;-)
Where are you located?
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That is some badass spending!!
Makes me happy I could move to Bolivia and be FI on $1200/month.
Yeah, well, there are a lot of reasons why people aren't flocking here.
It doesn't need to be "Bolivia" for that. Me and my GF are living happily on less than that; about $1k/month...give or take a few bucks depending on traveling expenses. We are not FIRE yet but this just happens to be the amount what it takes for us to live the life we enjoy. However we do endure tons of snow and then there is the occational wolves and bears lurking around the "city core"...
And to show it's not waaay to extreme of a place to live... Lets just say the wolves also can stay connected through free outdoor wi-fi while roaming the city streets in the dark.. ;-)
Where are you located?
...North of the wall.
;)
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Justin at Root of Good http://rootofgood.com (http://rootofgood.com) spends 40k for his family with 2or 3 kids, including quite a lot of travel for the whole family, and often seems to come in under this target. He puts quite lot of detail about his lifestyle and spending on his blog.
From the blog:
"Our 2018 ACA plan is about $60 per month more expensive than our $16 per month plan from 2017. It offers nearly identical coverage as in 2017 except the deductible increased from $100 to $125 and the specialist office visits are slightly more expensive."
$125 deductible? Where do they live?
We have a $7,250 individual/$14,500 family deductible. We hit individual max out of pocket last year. Hard to keep spending down to $40K when healthcare costs $25K.
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Just about every FIRE blogger that has retired seems to post their annual or even monthly expenditures and situation with enough detail for comparison. Your question is very reasonable and answerable if you consider that the answers will all be from other people with specific conditions that may not apply to you.
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Justin at Root of Good http://rootofgood.com (http://rootofgood.com) spends 40k for his family with 2or 3 kids, including quite a lot of travel for the whole family, and often seems to come in under this target. He puts quite lot of detail about his lifestyle and spending on his blog.
From the blog:
"Our 2018 ACA plan is about $60 per month more expensive than our $16 per month plan from 2017. It offers nearly identical coverage as in 2017 except the deductible increased from $100 to $125 and the specialist office visits are slightly more expensive."
$125 deductible? Where do they live?
We have a $7,250 individual/$14,500 family deductible. We hit individual max out of pocket last year. Hard to keep spending down to $40K when healthcare costs $25K.
Raleigh, North Carolina. They are seeing the benefits of the Cost Sharing Subsidy portion of the ACA. Their income is low enough for a family of 5 that the ACA requires insurers to subsidize the yearly deductible, as well as the premiums.
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Justin at Root of Good http://rootofgood.com (http://rootofgood.com) spends 40k for his family with 2or 3 kids, including quite a lot of travel for the whole family, and often seems to come in under this target. He puts quite lot of detail about his lifestyle and spending on his blog.
The Root of Good guy seems about as close to my situation as I have found. Thanks for the link.
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Raleigh, North Carolina. They are seeing the benefits of the Cost Sharing Subsidy portion of the ACA. Their income is low enough for a family of 5 that the ACA requires insurers to subsidize the yearly deductible, as well as the premiums.
Yes, that's right. Thanks. I had forgotten about cost sharing subsidies.
So, to the OP, yes you can follow their example, but bear in mind their $40K spending is allowable because their healthcare is relatively very cheap due to subsidies. Should those subsidies go away, they could be looking at another $20K or more for healthcare.
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"...they could be looking at another $20K or more for healthcare."
And that's not even care, that's just to insure against the possibility of needing care. Damnation, that makes it almost prohibitively expensive to move back to the US.
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That is some badass spending!!
Makes me happy I could move to Bolivia and be FI on $1200/month.
Yeah, well, there are a lot of reasons why people aren't flocking here.
I'm curious if you'd be willing to divulge the top ones. Are they specific to Bolivia or more Latin America in general? I've though about Mexico.
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Spouse & I live on about $55k/yr when one of us is working and has employer-sponsored healthcare. I'm adding about $15k/yr to that for FIRE healthcare, and the amount could increase much faster than a 3% inflation rate; double-digit annual increases are not unheard-of for health insurance premiums.
We own our home but have a mortgage; we'll probably pay it off in the next year and a half, which will decrease our annual costs by about $9k/yr.
So for us, right now, FIRE costs would probably be about $70-75k/hr in a HCOL area, in the U.S. But given uncertainties around healthcare costs, that could increase quite a bit over the next few years.
We are frugal-ish, but not as gung-ho as some. We like our toys and comforts, but we don't care about keeping up with the Joneses. Our philosophy is to spend money carefully and consciously, and to save when there is no good reason to spend. I'm sure plenty of people could live in our area for much less.
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So of course the answer depends on a lot of variables, but 3+ years in I've found that I spend about $120k/year. Admittedly I think it is a pretty extravagant lifestyle, but it is conservative considering my overall situation. I really wouldn't be much happier spending any more, already spend about 3 months out of the year traveling around the world, but I could easily see being just as happy spending much less (I'd say $75k) would be my personal floor without lifestyle starting to be affected. Of course if the world goes to hell in a hand basket I could be happy on $30k a year too. One thing is for certain though, I'm glad I'm not waiting around for something bad to happen or being worried about burn rates...get busy living!
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I'm curious if you'd be willing to divulge the top ones. Are they specific to Bolivia or more Latin America in general? I've though about Mexico.
Mr. Money Mustache wrote a piece about trust and how important it is in attaining wealth. Bolivia does not enjoy that economic and cultural luxury. And neither does Mexico. Americans and Canadians should realize how good they have it and should respect the reasons why it is worth preserving.
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I'm curious if you'd be willing to divulge the top ones. Are they specific to Bolivia or more Latin America in general? I've though about Mexico.
Mr. Money Mustache wrote a piece about trust and how important it is in attaining wealth. Bolivia does not enjoy that economic and cultural luxury. And neither does Mexico. Americans and Canadians should realize how good they have it and should respect the reasons why it is worth preserving.
I actually had a cab driver in Ecuador ask me why the US was so much richer than Ecuador. I thought about it a little and told him a vaguer version of exactly that. After having thought about the question and reading more about it, I think I really agree that trust is the reason some countries are poor and some are rich. Ecuador is on the dollar because nobody could trust the Sucre. It's also interesting that the big fences Ecuadorians have around their houses are probably a representation of what's keeping them poor.
I'm curious, though, in what ways you've seen that to affect the average FI expat.
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We live on less than 24K a year while living a nomadic life. We don't restrict spending but find that most of the activities we enjoy are free or low cost. We post detailed spending monthly on our blog Off Our Rocker RV. See link below. We have no debt so that does enter into the equation. Prior to FIRE we anticipated that our expenses would be higher but that doesn't seem to be the case.
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I'm curious if you'd be willing to divulge the top ones. Are they specific to Bolivia or more Latin America in general? I've though about Mexico.
Mr. Money Mustache wrote a piece about trust and how important it is in attaining wealth. Bolivia does not enjoy that economic and cultural luxury. And neither does Mexico. Americans and Canadians should realize how good they have it and should respect the reasons why it is worth preserving.
I actually had a cab driver in Ecuador ask me why the US was so much richer than Ecuador. I thought about it a little and told him a vaguer version of exactly that. After having thought about the question and reading more about it, I think I really agree that trust is the reason some countries are poor and some are rich. Ecuador is on the dollar because nobody could trust the Sucre. It's also interesting that the big fences Ecuadorians have around their houses are probably a representation of what's keeping them poor.
I'm curious, though, in what ways you've seen that to affect the average FI expat.
I can't say I have any significant experience with FI ex pats. I've seen a lot of backpackers and grungy hippies come through. Who knows, maybe they're all millionaires in disguise. Someone who is FI could live above all the lack of trust issues in Bolivia or anywhere else if they are just hanging out and getting drunk with no need to do business or earn a living. For an FI person who is doing the long slow travel thing, Bolivia has some amusing things to keep you busy for a couple of weeks or so, and it is inexpensive. After that, though, there are far nicer places, with far nicer people, to pass the time.
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I'm over 60 so most people reading this wouldn't consider me an early retiree, but I still share the trepidation in letting it go. The enthusiasm of all the folks on this forum is alleviating this trepidation.
Here's another little story that helps push me along. Last Summer I was down by the lake watching the sunset when this old man sauntered up beside me. We began to talk. He was about 77. Back at what you folks would consider the dawn of computer times he worked as a programmer on mainframes. The company he worked for was sold and he got some of the money. It wasn't a huge fortune, but was enough to let him retire in his fifties.
He and his wife have traveled the world. He has had many years to do what he and his wife wanted to.
The last statement he made to me with a smile was, "The money still hasn't run out."
I don't think he would have been as happy doing COBOL programming with mainframes. Sometimes you just gotta go for it. Life is too short not to. Sometime, this year,.......yeh.
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If its any help deciding: today one of my work colleagues aged 62 died after collapsing with a big stroke yesterday. Previously well.
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Just about every FIRE blogger that has retired seems to post their annual or even monthly expenditures and situation with enough detail for comparison. Your question is very reasonable and answerable if you consider that the answers will all be from other people with specific conditions that may not apply to you.
Very true!
I live full-time on a boat in the Caribbean. Guessing my specific expenses pertain to about 1% of the crowd here. That said our annual expenses are about $40k for two adults. I was way more concerned, and frugal, the first few years after FIRE as that was the most nerve wracking – did I get my stats right??? Yes, and actually I erred on the side of caution and could have retired even earlier but that allows me a bit more freedom on budgeting today so all is good.
Also going to guess that if I moved back to land-based dwelling I’d probably end up with approximately same expenses anyway – just different categories.
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If its any help deciding: today one of my work colleagues aged 62 died after collapsing with a big stroke yesterday. Previously well.
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Puts it all in perspective, doesn't it?
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If its any help deciding: today one of my work colleagues aged 62 died after collapsing with a big stroke yesterday. Previously well.
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Puts it all in perspective, doesn't it?
Yeah, even if you live to 92+ like my grandmother in law, we don't have a lot of time.
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Raleigh, North Carolina. They are seeing the benefits of the Cost Sharing Subsidy portion of the ACA. Their income is low enough for a family of 5 that the ACA requires insurers to subsidize the yearly deductible, as well as the premiums.
I'm just a little confused by your terminology, "the ACA requires insurers to subsidize the yearly deductible",
Don't you mean, the ACA requires taxpayers to subsidize the yearly deductible?
Or the 52% of households that pay taxes?
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Raleigh, North Carolina. They are seeing the benefits of the Cost Sharing Subsidy portion of the ACA. Their income is low enough for a family of 5 that the ACA requires insurers to subsidize the yearly deductible, as well as the premiums.
I'm just a little confused by your terminology, "the ACA requires insurers to subsidize the yearly deductible",
Don't you mean, the ACA requires taxpayers to subsidize the yearly deductible?
Or the 52% of households that pay taxes?
In the case of the CSRs the rate payers, not the tax payers must pay for the mandated CSR benefit. Since the law mandates people in certain income ranges get lower deductibles the insurance companies must spread this cost to others in the insurance pool. The CSR funding was ended by Trump.
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DW and I live in the midwest and for the last 3 years our spending has been a relatively constant $34K including healthcare only because we received a significant ACA subsidy and were able to keep MAGI low enough to receive CSR on deductibles and prescription costs.
Typically this spending includes about 4 weeks of travel during the year. Nothing extravagant just US based travel.
The stoppage of CSR funding by the government is what caused most of the premium increases for 2018 so insurers collect more from either the government, (taxpayers), through the subsidy amount or the non-subsidized taxpayers.
This year both DW and I start medicare and spending will increase to $40k.
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DW and I live in the midwest and for the last 3 years our spending has been a relatively constant $34K including healthcare only because we received a significant ACA subsidy and were able to keep MAGI low enough to receive CSR on deductibles and prescription costs.
Typically this spending includes about 4 weeks of travel during the year. Nothing extravagant just US based travel.
The stoppage of CSR funding by the government is what caused most of the premium increases for 2018 so insurers collect more from either the government, (taxpayers), through the subsidy amount or the non-subsidized taxpayers.
This year both DW and I start medicare and spending will increase to $40k.
Thank you. This is a helpful response.
Thanks to all the others too for their helpful responses.
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I have two anecdotes:
A coworker of mine is set to retire. He says he/his wife will have up to $6K per month to spend between savings, pension and social security. They are retiring to a nice community on a golf course in coastal Florida and will pay cash for his condo. He asked around and $6K per month is apparently considered a LOT of money among his family and acquaintances down there..."living like kings" was what they were told.
My parents recently retired in a very high cost of living area in northeast U.S. They have a paid off house but have INSANE property taxes due to waterfront property...$20K per year (no that is not a typo). Offsetting that, they have virtually zero healthcare costs. They have 2 cars, a 2000 square foot house, eat out a couple times per week and socialize with friends often. They take two reasonable vacations per year. They live worry free on $6500 per month with little to no penny pinching. They say they could easily live on less if needed.
I think 6K per month provides a reasonable, upper middle class retirement lifestyle for a non-frugal couple. I recognize some people's heads may explode at this figure.
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I'm a single guy spending $1250/mo on average while not retired. LCOL and home is paid off, so that helps. The only change I "need" to make when I retire will be health care, hoping to work the ACA for some sweet PTC/CSR. But at my current stash level, a 4% WR will allow me about $4300/mo to spend (that's after taxes and investment fees have already been subtracted). So, that's a pretty good buffer for fun/travel.
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My FIL and his wife spent 23.000 euro's a year in the last years. This includes a basic level private health insurance of roughly 3.000 euro's a year. They live in the Netherlands.
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@GOFU , I know you said you were looking for info on how much it would cost to move back to the US, but I just wanted to suggest another option to you. Sounds like you're kind of over Bolivia. Maybe you guys could spend a year or two slow traveling to check out some other places. Depending on where you go and how you live, it's not necessarily more expensive to travel for a year than it is to live in the States.
My wife, nine year old daughter and I spent $39K traveling around the world in 2017. We visited Japan, Hong Kong, Mainland China, Vietnam, Malaysia, Cambodia and New Zealand, spending 1 - 3 months in each country. You could also travel in some parts of the world for a lot less than we spent. Friends of ours who also traveled as a family of three for all of 2017, seem to be living well in SE Asia on a budget of only US$1K/month. They just stay at cheaper places than we do and eat mostly street food or cook for themselves at their hostel or apartment...
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My wife, nine year old daughter and I spent $39K traveling around the world in 2017. We visited Japan, Hong Kong, Mainland China, Vietnam, Malaysia, Cambodia and New Zealand, spending 1 - 3 months in each country. You could also travel in some parts of the world for a lot less than we spent. Friends of ours who also traveled as a family of three for all of 2017, seem to be living well in SE Asia on a budget of only US$1K/month. They just stay at cheaper places than we do and eat mostly street food or cook for themselves at their hostel or apartment...
Would love to learn more details of what you are doing......and your friends even more so!
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My wife, nine year old daughter and I spent $39K traveling around the world in 2017. We visited Japan, Hong Kong, Mainland China, Vietnam, Malaysia, Cambodia and New Zealand, spending 1 - 3 months in each country. You could also travel in some parts of the world for a lot less than we spent. Friends of ours who also traveled as a family of three for all of 2017, seem to be living well in SE Asia on a budget of only US$1K/month. They just stay at cheaper places than we do and eat mostly street food or cook for themselves at their hostel or apartment...
Would love to learn more details of what you are doing......and your friends even more so!
@2Birds1Stone SE Asia is just really cheap, especially if you live like the locals. When we were traveling there in 2017, because everything was so inexpensive, we tended to rent relatively fancy places, with AC, pools and sometimes gyms. We usually ate out 2-3 meals a day, mostly at street vendors or little hole in the wall, family run places.
In Vietnam we sent our daughter to a nice, small international school for 2.5 months. The school cost ~US$1200/month, which was our biggest expense. Besides our daughter's school, our living expenses in Vietnam were only around US$30-35/day for a nice triple room in a family run homestay with a small pool and a little restaurant right downstairs. In Vietnam we had no kitchen, so we ate out 3 meals a day. The way we lived in Vietnam, if we had homeschooled our daughter instead of sending her to an expensive private school, we could've easily lived on <US$1K/month for a family of three. Our friends spend much less than that living in Vietnam, because they live really simply. They like guest houses or hostels that cost ~US$6/night. The places they stay don't usually have AC, just a fan. Some don't have screens on the windows, which is local style. We chose not to rent places like that, though, just because it didn't seem worth the risk of getting dengue or malaria...
To avoid further cluttering OPs thread with too much off topic conversation, you're welcome to send me a PM with any other questions you may have, 2Birds1Stone.
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@GOFU , I know you said you were looking for info on how much it would cost to move back to the US, but I just wanted to suggest another option to you. Sounds like you're kind of over Bolivia. Maybe you guys could spend a year or two slow traveling to check out some other places. Depending on where you go and how you live, it's not necessarily more expensive to travel for a year than it is to live in the States.
My wife, nine year old daughter and I spent $39K traveling around the world in 2017. We visited Japan, Hong Kong, Mainland China, Vietnam, Malaysia, Cambodia and New Zealand, spending 1 - 3 months in each country. You could also travel in some parts of the world for a lot less than we spent. Friends of ours who also traveled as a family of three for all of 2017, seem to be living well in SE Asia on a budget of only US$1K/month. They just stay at cheaper places than we do and eat mostly street food or cook for themselves at their hostel or apartment...
This is a thoughtful suggestion and I appreciate it. Yes, you read correctly between the lines, I am over Bolivia. If I could stand living here I would continue to do so because the cost of living is really low. Financially it is a pretty good deal. If I were single I would probably stick it out for a few more years. Unfortunately as a father of two small children this place pretty much sucks. Call me chauvinistic if you want to but I don't want my kids growing up in this culture.
I am glad you and your family are enjoying the extended travel. But I'm afraid I just don't see the appeal. I think about the idea of a year or more in Asia or some place like that and I just think, "For what?" What is it exactly that is so appealing about spending so much time in a place like, say, Viet Nam. Staying in a cheap place (perhaps the upstairs of someone else's house), living out of your backpack, eating food from street vendors and surrounded by people scrounging around for a meager existence? I can see doing that long-term if it was part of a job or calling. Hell, I've been at it myself for over 10 years. But as a leisure/retirement lifestyle I just don't see the appeal. In fact I get stressed out by the very thought of herding my family around like that for such a long time.
I am not trying to denigrate the long-term tourist thing you describe. I really am glad you like it, and $40k does not seem unreasonable for such an adventure. I've done a fair amount of travel, but almost always with a work or business purpose, with tourist excursions tacked on to take advantage of the travel. I guess I'm not much of a tourist. My attitude is that after enough waterfalls and rivers and villages and antiquities and relics and old churches and civilizational ruins you've seen them all. I've almost stopped taking pictures at these kinds of places unless they include family and friends because pictures of pretty much any place on Earth are available on the internet and they are better than any I can take. Maybe you or someone enjoying this lifestyle can explain to me the draw of being in transit for such a long period.
Another reason that living the travel life isn't my thing is that I would also like to be in a position to earn money. I have a profession that I can put to good use in the USA to keep the income flowing, even part time, and I would like for my children to see me as a practicing professional as they grow in these formative years. Dad the role model or Dad the cautionary tale, either brings value to the development of my children that I don't want to forego, and that is not an option if we are hanging out in Bangkok or Ho Chi Minh City.
Thanks to all who offered information to help me in gauging what my needs might be. It seems like health insurance is the main financial killer that I can see, so I need to figure out how to best tackle that. All the rest of the consumption we can control a lot better.
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I don't understand why it is so fun to live on $1,000 a month in Thailand like a local when many people risk their life trying to get into the U.S. I can see the tourist experience to visit those places.
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@GOFU , I know you said you were looking for info on how much it would cost to move back to the US, but I just wanted to suggest another option to you. Sounds like you're kind of over Bolivia. Maybe you guys could spend a year or two slow traveling to check out some other places. Depending on where you go and how you live, it's not necessarily more expensive to travel for a year than it is to live in the States.
My wife, nine year old daughter and I spent $39K traveling around the world in 2017. We visited Japan, Hong Kong, Mainland China, Vietnam, Malaysia, Cambodia and New Zealand, spending 1 - 3 months in each country. You could also travel in some parts of the world for a lot less than we spent. Friends of ours who also traveled as a family of three for all of 2017, seem to be living well in SE Asia on a budget of only US$1K/month. They just stay at cheaper places than we do and eat mostly street food or cook for themselves at their hostel or apartment...
This is a thoughtful suggestion and I appreciate it. Yes, you read correctly between the lines, I am over Bolivia. If I could stand living here I would continue to do so because the cost of living is really low. Financially it is a pretty good deal. If I were single I would probably stick it out for a few more years. Unfortunately as a father of two small children this place pretty much sucks. Call me chauvinistic if you want to but I don't want my kids growing up in this culture.
I am glad you and your family are enjoying the extended travel. But I'm afraid I just don't see the appeal. I think about the idea of a year or more in Asia or some place like that and I just think, "For what?" What is it exactly that is so appealing about spending so much time in a place like, say, Viet Nam. Staying in a cheap place (perhaps the upstairs of someone else's house), living out of your backpack, eating food from street vendors and surrounded by people scrounging around for a meager existence? I can see doing that long-term if it was part of a job or calling. Hell, I've been at it myself for over 10 years. But as a leisure/retirement lifestyle I just don't see the appeal. In fact I get stressed out by the very thought of herding my family around like that for such a long time.
I am not trying to denigrate the long-term tourist thing you describe. I really am glad you like it, and $40k does not seem unreasonable for such an adventure. I've done a fair amount of travel, but almost always with a work or business purpose, with tourist excursions tacked on to take advantage of the travel. I guess I'm not much of a tourist. My attitude is that after enough waterfalls and rivers and villages and antiquities and relics and old churches and civilizational ruins you've seen them all. I've almost stopped taking pictures at these kinds of places unless they include family and friends because pictures of pretty much any place on Earth are available on the internet and they are better than any I can take. Maybe you or someone enjoying this lifestyle can explain to me the draw of being in transit for such a long period.
Another reason that living the travel life isn't my thing is that I would also like to be in a position to earn money. I have a profession that I can put to good use in the USA to keep the income flowing, even part time, and I would like for my children to see me as a practicing professional as they grow in these formative years. Dad the role model or Dad the cautionary tale, either brings value to the development of my children that I don't want to forego, and that is not an option if we are hanging out in Bangkok or Ho Chi Minh City.
Thanks to all who offered information to help me in gauging what my needs might be. It seems like health insurance is the main financial killer that I can see, so I need to figure out how to best tackle that. All the rest of the consumption we can control a lot better.
You don’t have to do 3rd world arbitrage though. Portugal, Spain, Budapest or Malta. Upgrade to first world living, affordable health care, cheaper living and you could still work however you want. All places that you could rent or buy relatively cheaply too and still give your family the international experience.
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I don't understand why it is so fun to live on $1,000 a month in Thailand like a local when many people risk their life trying to get into the U.S. I can see the tourist experience to visit those places.
People risk their lives trying to get into the US because there is so much opportunity to make money. If you've already got money, things are different.
It also depends on the country. Venezuelans and Thais are in a completely different situation.
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I don't understand why it is so fun to live on $1,000 a month in Thailand like a local when many people risk their life trying to get into the U.S. I can see the tourist experience to visit those places.
Different strokes for different folks.
The average household income in Thailand is ~$580/month. So $1k/month means you can live pretty well, and Thailand offers some amazing culture, weather, and nature. I wouldn't want to retire there for decades, but spending a year or two in the SE Asia region while spending $12k/yr and not "wanting" for almost anything sounds pretty damn fun.
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@GOFU , I know you said you were looking for info on how much it would cost to move back to the US, but I just wanted to suggest another option to you. Sounds like you're kind of over Bolivia. Maybe you guys could spend a year or two slow traveling to check out some other places. Depending on where you go and how you live, it's not necessarily more expensive to travel for a year than it is to live in the States.
My wife, nine year old daughter and I spent $39K traveling around the world in 2017. We visited Japan, Hong Kong, Mainland China, Vietnam, Malaysia, Cambodia and New Zealand, spending 1 - 3 months in each country. You could also travel in some parts of the world for a lot less than we spent. Friends of ours who also traveled as a family of three for all of 2017, seem to be living well in SE Asia on a budget of only US$1K/month. They just stay at cheaper places than we do and eat mostly street food or cook for themselves at their hostel or apartment...
This is a thoughtful suggestion and I appreciate it. Yes, you read correctly between the lines, I am over Bolivia. If I could stand living here I would continue to do so because the cost of living is really low. Financially it is a pretty good deal. If I were single I would probably stick it out for a few more years. Unfortunately as a father of two small children this place pretty much sucks. Call me chauvinistic if you want to but I don't want my kids growing up in this culture.
I am glad you and your family are enjoying the extended travel. But I'm afraid I just don't see the appeal. I think about the idea of a year or more in Asia or some place like that and I just think, "For what?" What is it exactly that is so appealing about spending so much time in a place like, say, Viet Nam. Staying in a cheap place (perhaps the upstairs of someone else's house), living out of your backpack, eating food from street vendors and surrounded by people scrounging around for a meager existence? I can see doing that long-term if it was part of a job or calling. Hell, I've been at it myself for over 10 years. But as a leisure/retirement lifestyle I just don't see the appeal. In fact I get stressed out by the very thought of herding my family around like that for such a long time.
I am not trying to denigrate the long-term tourist thing you describe. I really am glad you like it, and $40k does not seem unreasonable for such an adventure. I've done a fair amount of travel, but almost always with a work or business purpose, with tourist excursions tacked on to take advantage of the travel. I guess I'm not much of a tourist. My attitude is that after enough waterfalls and rivers and villages and antiquities and relics and old churches and civilizational ruins you've seen them all. I've almost stopped taking pictures at these kinds of places unless they include family and friends because pictures of pretty much any place on Earth are available on the internet and they are better than any I can take. Maybe you or someone enjoying this lifestyle can explain to me the draw of being in transit for such a long period.
Another reason that living the travel life isn't my thing is that I would also like to be in a position to earn money. I have a profession that I can put to good use in the USA to keep the income flowing, even part time, and I would like for my children to see me as a practicing professional as they grow in these formative years. Dad the role model or Dad the cautionary tale, either brings value to the development of my children that I don't want to forego, and that is not an option if we are hanging out in Bangkok or Ho Chi Minh City.
Thanks to all who offered information to help me in gauging what my needs might be. It seems like health insurance is the main financial killer that I can see, so I need to figure out how to best tackle that. All the rest of the consumption we can control a lot better.
@GOFU To be honest, I don't disagree, at all, with your characterization of perpetual world travel as being, basically, meaningless. You're right. With very few exceptions, we're not usually contributing anything of value to the places we visit, mostly just hanging out, drinking cappuccinos, eating good food, going for walks, lying on the beach, talking with people we meet, reading books and playing on the internet. In our case, though, a long vacation without any work responsibilities was exactly what we had been looking for. After many years of working hard, with no real vacations, we were ready to take a break and just relax for awhile after we FIREd in 2016. Another reason we decided to do long term family travel was to expose our daughter to the world. Growing up in a pretty rural place, we wanted to give her a chance to see some big cities like Hong Kong, Paris, Tokyo, Kuala Lumpur, Auckland and London in real life, not just read about them in a geography books.
Although there are, for sure, some challenges to long term family travel, in general, we've enjoyed this past year. Our style of travel is pretty low key and unhurried, usually renting Airbnb apartments for at least a month at a time to get the discounts. More than anything, what I like is to just get a feel for what it's like to *live* in the cities we visit, not to rush around and make sure we see all of the important sites, although we always do a little sightseeing, as well.
Right now, we're in Athens for the month of March, where we've been alternating days of going out to explore the city with days of staying home to do schooling, read books, play on our electronic devices and just relax. On days when we stay home, usually we'll cook breakfast and lunch ourselves and then take a walk in the evening to a nearby restaurant to eat a nice dinner. Last week, we spent a day at the Acropolis, and tomorrow morning we're planning on going to the National Archaeological Museum, but in between, we've spent days just walking around the city, sitting in the parks, hanging out in little cafes sipping coffees and Coca Cola, and also several days where we just stayed home and took it easy.
@GOFU , I'm curious to learn more about your belief that it's important for your children to see you as a "practicing professional." I've heard others make similar statements, but, to be honest, I don't really understand why that's important. When I used to work at a job, I'm pretty sure my daughter didn't see me as a "practicing professional." She just saw me as gone from her life. Now that I don't have to go to work every day, I'm grateful to be able to spend more time with my wife and daughter. Maybe I'm missing something, though. What is it you think is so important about your children seeing you as a "practicing professional," and is that more important than their seeing you as a dad who is always available to read books to them, go for walks, play?
Also, how did you end up in Bolivia? That seems like such a random place to be living. Do you live in a big city? Countryside? What's life like there?
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@Shane I prefer to keep this thread on track for people to share information about their retirement spending numbers and the significant drivers thereof, as an educational/guidance tool for me to evaluate options.
If you like I can try to answer your questions about my ideas of modeling a professional life for my children and my Bolivia experience via private message.
To respond to you briefly about world travel, I am all in favor of it as a useful component of experiential education for children and adults. In fact, when my kids are a little older, old enough to actually form significant memories of the places we go, I plan to make travel part of life with them.
As I said before, I am glad you are enjoying your travel experience. Taking a year or so to do that in a relaxed and deliberate manner, after retiring from many years of hard work, sounds the realization of a dream.
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Our family of three is planning on returning to rural Hawaii in late summer, 2018 and are conservatively budgeting ~US$3K/month for living expenses. Hoping to rent a 2 bedroom/one bathroom house for between $1K - $1.5K per month, including all utilities and internet. For groceries, we'll probably spend ~$600 per month. Insurance, registration, depreciation, maintenance and fuel for a used, fuel efficient car will probably run ~$300/month. That leaves us ~$600/month left over to spend on eating out, entertainment, etc, which seems reasonable based on past experience.
Alternatively, we've also considered living on Oahu, but COL there is considerably higher. Oahu is a beautiful place to live, there's lots of stuff to do, and some neighborhoods are easily walkable/bikeable, but it's also relatively crowded and can be expensive, especially for housing. Based on internet searches, a 2 bedroom apartment in a nice, walkable/bikeable neighborhood, not too far from the beach, where we wouldn't necessarily need to own a car, would run about $2500/month, all in. Groceries would probably cost our family of 3 ~$800/month. Not owning a car, we'd probably spend at least $100 per month on public transport, Uber and occasional vehicle rentals. Since there are more things to do on Oahu, we'd probably spend more on eating out and taking part in various activities, so we're thinking we could possibly live a comfortable, semi-Mustachian lifestyle on Oahu for ~$4500/month.
@GOFU , if you have time and would like to send me your thoughts on why you think it's important for our children to grow up seeing us as "practicing professionals," I'll be happy to read your ideas and respond by PM. It's something my wife and I have talked about recently, and one of my brothers also brought up similar concerns to me not too long ago. If you're willing to share, I'd also be interested to learn more about what you've been up to in Bolivia and what it's like living there long term. South America is a place we haven't visited yet, but we're definitely interested in going there some day.
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@GOFU , if you have time and would like to send me your thoughts on why you think it's important for our children to grow up seeing us as "practicing professionals," I'll be happy to read your ideas and respond by PM. It's something my wife and I have talked about recently, and one of my brothers also brought up similar concerns to me not too long ago. If you're willing to share, I'd also be interested to learn more about what you've been up to in Bolivia and what it's like living there long term. South America is a place we haven't visited yet, but we're definitely interested in going there some day.
I don’t have kids but I too am curious about why it’s important for kids to have this “practicing professional” perception of their parents. I’m also curious about how the OP ended up in Bolivia. I think you should keep this conversation going or start a separate thread.
To stay on topic:
Wife and I live in N.H., ages 44 & 39, no kids, 1100 sq foot house, 2 cars. Our average spending for the last 18 months has been about 4K per month but our essential spending is only about $2800 per month. We will both work part time, about 12-14 hours a week to pay for our discretionary expenses in order to keep pressure off our assets. I’m not officially FIRE’d yet but will be in about two weeks but my wife left her job in June 2017. I posted our case study not long ago and i wrote out our detailed monthly budget in one of my replies. Here’s the link if you wanna take a look:
https://forum.mrmoneymustache.com/case-studies/is-this-fire-plan-'razor-thin'/
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(NO FACEPUNCHES PLEASE!)
I've been FIREd since 2000 at age 41, living mostly in HCOL areas (NYC and DC), and have spent between $6-9K/mo. depending on whether I've had ACA health insurance or individual, whether I was paying the costs for my ex as well as myself (more for housing, food, etc) or just me (more for dating), whether I was in school (tuition adding) or not (entertainment costs adding), etc.
Here are some of the things I've found to be true over that time:
Unless I wanted to own and operate a boat/RV/jet/vacation home (I don't), it's hard to see me wanting more than say $10k/month even in a HCOL area. (But that's just me in my current situation...maybe if I had stayed in my career with its then-exponentially-growing salary, I might have experienced more lifestyle inflation and found myself 'needing' more things)
I love to travel and travel a lot, but have found that my costs when traveling, aside from airfares, even when factoring in lots (~33%) of travel in HCOL areas like Europe/US/Canada (the other 67% in Asia/Mexico/South America), wind up being about the same as when I stay at home. So traveling winds up being almost 'free' when I have longer trips.
If I needed to, I could pretty easily cut back on housing costs (to save $2,250/mo), car costs ($275/mo), and 'toys' (computers and other gadgetry at $250/mo) to bring monthly expenses down to about $4k/mo... and that's without even touching my crazy-for-MMM entertainment and food budgets
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(NO FACEPUNCHES PLEASE!)
I've been FIREd since 2000 at age 41, living mostly in HCOL areas (NYC and DC), and have spent between $6-9K/mo. depending on whether I've had ACA health insurance or individual, whether I was paying the costs for my ex as well as myself (more for housing, food, etc) or just me (more for dating), whether I was in school (tuition adding) or not (entertainment costs adding), etc.
Here are some of the things I've found to be true over that time:
Unless I wanted to own and operate a boat/RV/jet/vacation home (I don't), it's hard to see me wanting more than say $10k/month even in a HCOL area. (But that's just me in my current situation...maybe if I had stayed in my career with its then-exponentially-growing salary, I might have experienced more lifestyle inflation and found myself 'needing' more things)
I love to travel and travel a lot, but have found that my costs when traveling, aside from airfares, even when factoring in lots (~33%) of travel in HCOL areas like Europe/US/Canada (the other 67% in Asia/Mexico/South America), wind up being about the same as when I stay at home. So traveling winds up being almost 'free' when I have longer trips.
If I needed to, I could pretty easily cut back on housing costs (to save $2,250/mo), car costs ($275/mo), and 'toys' (computers and other gadgetry at $250/mo) to bring monthly expenses down to about $4k/mo... and that's without even touching my crazy-for-MMM entertainment and food budgets
No face punches from me. To each his own. Thank you for your input.
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Posting to follow. Very interesting thread.
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My retirement spending is pretty close to what I was spending when working full time.
No kids, house/car payments? I am 29 years old with an 18 month old and one on the way. Currently have mortgage, house payment, daycare, saving for schooling, weddings, and other necessities. I can only imagine how much less I would be spending in my early years of retirement when I will no longer be paying for any of the aforementioned, assuming good health.
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Also once you don't work some expenses go down that are work related but others may go up because you have the time and energy. For instance, when working we rarely went to events, entertainment venues etc because we were too tired. Now we have the time and energy for these things. We didn't travel much either and that has changed too. for instance this summer we will go on a month RV trip and usually we take 2 cruises/year.
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PTF
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PTF
I'm afraid I don't know what this means.
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PTF
I'm afraid I don't know what this means.
Posting to follow. There's some discussion about that:
https://forum.mrmoneymustache.com/forum-information-faqs/suggestion-for-new-rulefaq-to-optimize-use-of-forum/
https://forum.mrmoneymustache.com/welcome-to-the-forum/what-is-the-deal-with-all-of-the-ptf-responses/
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PTF
I'm afraid I don't know what this means.
ROFLCOPTER
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We semi-retired with a $48k/yr budget for a family of 4. Our monthly nut is $3k which includes a $850/mo mortgage payment and $125/mo of subsidized ACA insurance. The other $12k is for vacations, vehicle replacement, and home maintenance.
Quitting megacorp did not realize any meaningful cost savings as I was already packing lunch, doing my own laundry, and driving an efficient car.
My hobby expenses have certainly gone up as I have the time to indulge them. They are very seasonal, spiking in the winter time, then dropping to near zero during the warmer months.
I don't track that closely, but so far, our monthly expenses seem pretty much on target. It is still too early to say if my car/home expense projections are accurate. That said, our withdrawal rate has been very low, around 1% or so, due to higher than expected part time income. The part time schedule has been great, we still have summers and holidays off, unlimited (if unpaid) sick time, and flexible schedules that allow us to attend nearly all of our children's activities.
We are probably working a bit more than we need to, but it does serve as insurance against ACA repeal and/or a big pull back in the market early in our retirement. My wife, who is putting in more hours than myself, did recently decide to cut her hours by 33%, which will be nice. Occasionally, I muse that we could have semi-retired several years earlier if I had known the part time work was going to be there, but the ACA/market uncertainty would have still been there, and any adverse conditions would have made an even more substantial impact on our 50+ year retirement trajectory.
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I've been retired for 14 months and in that time we've downsized to a handful of storage tubs at a friend's house and a few pieces of furniture (at one of our kid's). We're nomadic. I'm 56 and he's 66. We have a second grandchild coming on line this fall. Family is all in the Portland OR area.
We travel internationally some of the time (some cheap and some expensive places) and in the States we house sit (free) and rent spendy furnished apartments in Portland (expensive).
We're finding that our average monthly cost of living ($3750 or so) has been pretty constant over the past couple of years. Meaning, staying in one place (while working, and then newly retired) seems to be about the same amount of money as moving from place to place (after retirement). This surprised me but I have great data (I'm a QuickBooks nerdy whiz). Spending varies a great deal from one month to the next (and from one place in the world to another) but seems to average out over time at that same level. Huh.
We are also examining the idea of "perma travel" and whether or not it makes sense for us. From what I can tell so far I think I like the idea of it better than the reality of it. We're probably going to scale it back so that we have more nesting time in a home base (of course we need to actually have a home base of some kind first...and Portland is not the cheap seats...)
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(NO FACEPUNCHES PLEASE!)
I've been FIREd since 2000 at age 41, living mostly in HCOL areas (NYC and DC), and have spent between $6-9K/mo. . . .
This is the sort of "unMustachian" spending level I'm anticipating when I retirement -- my wife won't retire until some 5-6 years after me (and will continue to earn her low six-figure salary). I've got a generous pension coming, and should have $850k+ in 401k stash that I can access penalty-free right away at age 54. Planning to draw just under 2% from the 401k to supplement the pension. This should put me at or above current (pre-retirement) spending. Will make necessary adjustments when the wife retires.
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By means of geographical arbitrage my new plan is to FIRE on ~$18k/yr.
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By means of geographical arbitrage my new plan is to FIRE on ~$18k/yr.
Pack light and keep moving? Go where the climate suits your clothes? Or where the cost of living matches your desire to spend?
On the one hand that sounds great to a restless soul like myself. On the other hand I'm not sure how long I could keep it up.
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PTF
I'm afraid I don't know what this means.
ROFLCOPTER
You stumped me with that one too.
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By means of geographical arbitrage my new plan is to FIRE on ~$18k/yr.
Pack light and keep moving? Go where the climate suits your clothes? Or where the cost of living matches your desire to spend?
On the one hand that sounds great to a restless soul like myself. On the other hand I'm not sure how long I could keep it up.
A combination of all of the above.
Be flexible on when/where you do things.
We are looking for some adventure and to explore new cultures and areas. Our plan includes SE Asia for 6-12 months , thru hiking the Appalachian Trail for 5-6 months, spending a year in Europe (have a paid off family flat in Poland for home base), spending 6 months in Central America learning how to surf and speak Spanish, cook etc, Exploring the national parks in the USA by converted cargo van or a trailer camper for 9-12 months, Thru hiking the PCT, Thru hiking the CDT (triple crown), Motorcycling from NY down to the southern most part of South America, and eventually circumnavigating the world over the span of 3-5 years by sailboat.
Those are the big ones, we may only do a few, or we may be able to knock them all out intermittently with a tiny bit of work thrown in between.
We are about to be 31 and 27 years old, the above will keep us busy for a solid two decades if we do it right. None of it is very costly. If we throw in some work here and there, we will likely draw less than 4% from our portfolio in most years, even starting at a modest high six figure starting point.
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PTF
I'm afraid I don't know what this means.
ROFLCOPTER
You stumped me with that one too.
Posting to follow (ie, so this shows up when there are replies; people prefer it over the 'notify' button).
ROFL = rolling on the floor laughing.
LMGTFY... http://lmgtfy.com/?q=roflcopter
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$20k to $70k for 1-2 persons depending on COL and fun budget.
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I don't understand why it is so fun to live on $1,000 a month in Thailand like a local when many people risk their life trying to get into the U.S. I can see the tourist experience to visit those places.
People risk their lives trying to get into the US because there is so much opportunity to make money. If you've already got money, things are different.
It also depends on the country. Venezuelans and Thais are in a completely different situation.
I personally think the whole risking lives to get into the US meme is massively exaggerated. One of my "Malaysian" (Malaysian in almost every way except for actual nationality) is actually trying very hard to get rid of her US citizenship right now (guess what, there is a large queue for giving it up as well as getting it) which she accidentally acquired by being born there and which is turning out to be a serious pain tax-wise. As for myself, my PhD advisor was furious that I didn't even want to apply for any job in the US after graduation but I definitely wanted to get back to Asia and vastly prefer the lifestyle here. (Also, those classmates of mine who did their PhD in Asia did much better than me and my US classmates career-wise despite my PhD being from a top 10 US university.)
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To go back to being on topic, my expenditures come out to about US$30k/yr living in a LCOL country (Malaysia) with about a vacation a month (usually in a decent 4-5 star hotel), a 3 br apartment in a complex with a nice infinity pool overlooking some forested hills, gym, sauna etc and within a short walk of a train station, eating out most of the time, playing bridge often and partying out once a week or so when I am not traveling.
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To go back to being on topic, my expenditures come out to about US$30k/yr living in a LCOL country (Malaysia) with about a vacation a month (usually in a decent 4-5 star hotel), a 3 br apartment in a complex with a nice infinity pool overlooking some forested hills, gym, sauna etc and within a short walk of a train station, eating out most of the time, playing bridge often and partying out once a week or so when I am not traveling.
Seems rather low considering the 12 vacations a year and eating out majority of the time. Most be a low rent fee on top of it. Well done!
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To go back to being on topic, my expenditures come out to about US$30k/yr living in a LCOL country (Malaysia) with about a vacation a month (usually in a decent 4-5 star hotel), a 3 br apartment in a complex with a nice infinity pool overlooking some forested hills, gym, sauna etc and within a short walk of a train station, eating out most of the time, playing bridge often and partying out once a week or so when I am not traveling.
Seems rather low considering the 12 vacations a year and eating out majority of the time. Most be a low rent fee on top of it. Well done!
The trick is to find nearby places to travel and the more I go around here, the more I find to do. I had planned to travel to Japan/US this summer but it looks like I will finally just spend it near here since it is just so much better value for money and the food/climate are much more suited to me (probably not true for many others). To give you a taste of what it costs to get a decent vacation here, I will give a rough breakdown of my recent 1 wk trip to Medan. The hotel, the Four points (which is one of the best in Medan), was the bulk of the cost costing just under US$350 for a week's stay with breakfast included and including 3 dinners I had in the excellent restaurant there. The flight, airport transfers, other eating out, local transport and sightseeing came out to US$180 for the week. The other eating out was surprisingly little given Medan's culinary reputation since the hotel breakfast was extensive and tasty but I could indulge myself to my heart's content with my favorite fruit, the durian, which has become expensive in Malaysia due to sudden demand from China. One of the hotel dinners I had, an oxtail soup which was re-interpreted by the chef to be grilled oxtail and a vegetable soup, was amazingly good and would not be out of place in a Michelin starred restaurant (I have been to a few). I am not including about $50 worth of coffee beans (an obvious thing to bring from Sumatra though it is only a bit cheaper than in other places) and $50 of other souvenirs and food (some of which I forgot in the cab back home :() since those are all for the back home.
This actually overstates the cost of the vacation a bit since I would have probably spent about US$100 for the week here eating out, playing bridge, partying, getting massages etc.
Now, Medan is not a major tourist destination by any means which makes it a bit cheaper and my trip last month to Sandakan was a fair bit more expensive - a much longer flight, slightly more expensive hotel (the Four points again but worth the extra cost due to the breathtaking view from the room imho) and much more expensive but amazing tourism as the Malaysian government takes further steps to charge foreigners prices close to international ones for the good tourist stuff (distances are also much more to get to the forests and rivers as they are not that close to the city). Everything came out to about US$850 or so for the eight day trip but I think that was very good value for a trip that included seeing sun bears, orangutans, proboscis monkeys (both semi-wild ones that come right up to you and truly wild ones in the forest), rhinoceros hornbills, the bird's nest caves etc. together with good food, a hotel with a great view and so on.
These vacation costs could be brought down considerably quite easily with moderate hotels etc. but since I can afford it, I do it this way. But this gives me great confidence about whether I have enough since I could easily cut 30-40% of the costs on these vacations and have them still be pretty good - ditto for housing. On of my British friends who is retired here lives quite comfortably on about US$20k/year also taking about a vacation a month but stays in a 1 br apartment here (in an expat area) and in moderate hotels while traveling.
The apartment rent with utilities is about Us$650/month. This is on the high end for away from the city center due to the proximity of the train that gets you there in 20-30 minutes and nice, new facilities (3br, 1200 sf). The main trick is to avoid the expat areas and food which are very overpriced. This suburb has cheaper food (US$1.8 for an unlimited south Indian vegetarian meal or US$0.4 for a simple chapati/dal, US$1.2 for a decent meat portion - compare this to US$3-4 for the Starbucks coffee in downtown and the expat areas) and services (US$10 for a one hour Thai massage compared to US$18 or so downtown, a bit more for the oil massage but I learnt to my surprise that that is a code word for them to ask you for extra services :redface:) making it a great deal. If one doesn't care about the facilities, renting a townhouse is much cheaper and would only be about Us$450 a month.
I am considered a bit of a weirdo here as I don't have a car and this is a very car-centric country (much, much more so than the US - many people spend more on their car than on their house). However, the public transport is okay for most places I go to and I don't mind walking a kilometer or so which the middle and upper class locals would consider totally unacceptable. Grab (the local equivalent for Uber) is okay for the rest and the two or three rides I take a week still make this combination much cheaper and hassle-free than having a car. And since I am traveling quite often, this is even more true.
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Day trips or short trips from KL are also good value. I am taking a US$55 day trip next Saturday to see the famous fluorescent algae off the west coast of Malaysia. This includes a return 2.5 hour bus ride, boat trip and sea food dinner with guide which is not unreasonable (but not cheap by local standards) and the phenomenon is, of course, only seen in a few places worldwide.
My next long vacation is going to be much longer and expensive than usual as my alma mater has offered volunteer positions to alumni on a two week research sailing trip on the Java Sea from Jakarta to Pontianak. They have made it abundantly clear that this is not a cruise and it is going to be dorm style and definitely not luxury accomodation with many in a large room and with limited fresh water and that is one is expected to help out with the research activities to the extent that one is capable of. OTOH, the boat is a true sailing boat, is going to some fairly remote places which are apparently chock full of very beautiful islands and one is going to be traveling with very smart and adventurous people. It is not very cheap either (US$1250 for everything included on the 2 week trip but not the to/fro flights - this is apparently the actual cost incurred since it is definitely not a profit-making venture as I personally know some of the organizers) but sounds like a once-in-a-lifetime experience and so I have signed up for it. All in all, it will cost be around US$2k including the few days of hotels to see Jakarta and Pontianak themselves, the return flights etc and it will be a 3 week vacation.
This definitely puts me well over budget for the next month but I am confident I can make it up on the other months.
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@physdude , are you a US citizen? If so, how do you stay in Malaysia long term? MM2H visa?
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@physdude , are you a US citizen? If so, how do you stay in Malaysia long term? MM2H visa?
No, not US citizen but don't want to reveal too much due to privacy concerns (let us say citizen of a large Asian country and have lived for a long interval in Singapore before). I am indeed in Malaysia on the MM2H visa which is a decent deal. The Philippines visa is a better deal comparatively speaking but the life in Malaysia is far better and, surprisingly, cheaper (I suspect this is because of the low population density).
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Physdude, why did you choose Malaysia? Why a Kuala Lumpur suburb? Why not a place like Bali, Bangkok, Chiang Mai or Danang, for example?
I am also considering retiring in SEA, haven't decided where yet.
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@physdude , are you a US citizen? If so, how do you stay in Malaysia long term? MM2H visa?
No, not US citizen but don't want to reveal too much due to privacy concerns (let us say citizen of a large Asian country and have lived for a long interval in Singapore before). I am indeed in Malaysia on the MM2H visa which is a decent deal. The Philippines visa is a better deal comparatively speaking but the life in Malaysia is far better and, surprisingly, cheaper (I suspect this is because of the low population density).
Thanks, @physdude . Agreed, the quality/cost of living in Malaysia is high. The people are nice. The infrastructure is good. The food is delicious! In 2017, we spent ~3 months in Malaysia, mostly in KL, and liked it a lot. Riding Uber and Grab cars everywhere for just a few ringgit was great! In a place like KL, where Uber and Grab are almost free, owning a car doesn't make much sense to me. I'm looking forward to self-driving Uber cars coming out. Never having to worry about parking will be a great.
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Physdude, why did you choose Malaysia? Why a Kuala Lumpur suburb? Why not a place like Bali, Bangkok, Chiang Mai or Danang, for example?
I am also considering retiring in SEA, haven't decided where yet.
Am traveling to Singapore for the briefing on the sailing trip and so not checking the forum very often.
Malaysia is great because the cost of living is about as low as it gets while the infrastructure is top notch and is actually better than many first world cities. It is also an amazing travel base due to air Asia and the other budget airlines and a very good airport, which while far from downtown, has great connectivity to it (hint for travelers - unless you are in an extreme hurry, take the bus to downtown rather than the train - it is just US$3 and very comfortable and only a bit slower while the train is about $15).
Penang is a cheaper and better option for those who don't travel very often and like nature as it has a lot of nature which is one thing that KL lacks. However, Penang does have much fewer cultural activities than KL.
Sent from my Lenovo P2a42 using Tapatalk
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We live in a relatively HCOL area and I have been fire'd 3 years and my DW works for simply HC and anything she makes is 100% saved but is really is minimal. So our budget with 2 in college and 2 at home, a paid for house no debt it 82k a year. Largest part of that is soccer travel and seeing our kids in college as one is 4 hours away and the other is 12 hours away. We pretty much travel every weekend. Once we get pass that stage which wont be for awhile our costs will drop dramatically and easily would live on around 50k a year and well below our current withdrawal rate but then depending maybe we might want to do more just for us but i dont really see that happening as we are pretty simple. I would add that this year we have been under budget a minimum of 1k a month usually quite a bit more as well and have done extensive remodeling the last couple years to the house we downsized into.
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One issue with countries such as Malaysia is relatively high inflation which needs to be taken into account though the starting costs are low and almost absurdly so if you compare with HCOL places like HK, Silicon Valley or Manhattan. Just today, I found that the south Indian unlimited veg meal has been upped in price to $1.90 from $1.80 (RM 6.5 to 6.9) in the nearby place (a large single portion of any chicken dish remains at $1.3 or RM 5 for now) and I am seeing similar increases in the posh areas of the city where it can reach $2.5 now. This is still absurdly cheap for a meal that can easily provide half or more of the day's nutrition but at the rate of increases I am seeing I wouldn't be surprised if it doubles in price within the next 10 years.
I have no idea of how to fit this into the SWR but it probably makes more sense to use a somewhat lower SWR here to account for this - 3 or 3.5% maybe. Returns on EM assets tend to be higher and will reflect local inflation so having some local investments might alleviate that concern.
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One issue with countries such as Malaysia is relatively high inflation which needs to be taken into account though the starting costs are low and almost absurdly so if you compare with HCOL places like HK, Silicon Valley or Manhattan. Just today, I found that the south Indian unlimited veg meal has been upped in price to $1.90 from $1.80 (RM 6.5 to 6.9) in the nearby place (a large single portion of any chicken dish remains at $1.3 or RM 5 for now) and I am seeing similar increases in the posh areas of the city where it can reach $2.5 now. This is still absurdly cheap for a meal that can easily provide half or more of the day's nutrition but at the rate of increases I am seeing I wouldn't be surprised if it doubles in price within the next 10 years.
I have no idea of how to fit this into the SWR but it probably makes more sense to use a somewhat lower SWR here to account for this - 3 or 3.5% maybe. Returns on EM assets tend to be higher and will reflect local inflation so having some local investments might alleviate that concern.
In general, economic theory holds that, all other things being equal, the exchange rates should compensate for differences in inflation between two countries. Therefore, one would expect the ringgit to depreciate in value over time, making up for the faster rising prices in ringgits compared to lower inflation rate in, say, the United States.
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Hey Hey!! This thread has gotten 100 posts! Where do I put in for my medal, or at least a chest to pin it on?
Thanks to everyone for their contributions on this topic and to the spread of useful information. Your posts have been thoughtful and informative, and surely much appreciated by many.
I had the chance this month of April 2018 to visit the USA for a couple of weeks. Due to an illness in the family and some other circumstances I got an up close and personal look at the costs of health care, elder care, housing and daily living expenses like groceries.
First, as a side observation, the abundance that reigns in American society is really staggering. If you have not spent significant time living in a lesser developed or poorer place outside the USA you may not have had occasion to think too much about it, but to my eyes the grocery stores alone are a modern day wonder. Produce, meat, bread, dairy, home health, junk food (candy, soda, chips, cookies), beer/liquor, spices, prepared foods, frozen, fresh, boxed, bagged, organic, gluten-free and on and on. The cleanliness, the order, the automation, the efficiency, confidence in the products, the trust!! that allows one to so easily access it all. I could go on for hours. And if you know how to eat well and shop well it is not expensive.
The abundance extends to civil infrastructure, systems of credit, protection of private property, generally reliable legal systems, the opportunity to build personal wealth and so much more.
Now all this abundance comes with a societal cost in terms of commercialization of culture, significant waste, the tendency to under-appreciate, predatory lenders and pernicious lawyers and many other negatives. But there is no denying the basic material and especially alimentary abundance that pervades and is within reach of almost everyone.
I am only going to touch on a couple of points here, but I would be interested in how people manage the seemingly prohibitively expensive items like health care/health insurance, housing, and parochial or private education.
My observation is that if you shop wisely at a marvelous grocery store and prepare your own food, the daily cost of living and eating is extremely manageable. I prepared some excellent tasty, nutritious and abundant meals for two and three people for just a few dollars each. Of course I am a savvy shopper and an awesome cook, but from my ability to observe, the food aspect of a family budget is not, or at least should not be, problematic in the USA.
On the other hand, health care and elder care will ruin your ass quick if you are not well insured. Rehab or residence for an old person in a skilled facility, around $10,000 a month at least. How the hell is a family supposed to afford that? Hospital is worse.
Two bedroom one bath houses in mediocre neighborhoods in a midwestern city for $200k? Damnation that is a bite. Get out to the suburbs to a "good" school district and the price goes up 50% and the property taxes which never end cost as much as a bachelor pad apartment.
$10,000 a year for two kids to attend Catholic grade school? Grade school! Holy shit. Then of course there are the fundraiser auctions and supplies and activities which inflate that price. High school and college even worse.
These brief points merely scratch the surface, I know.
Many people don't save much because they are ill-informed or undisciplined. But it seems these basic costs sure do make it difficult for even a Mustachian to bank for a good retirement.
How do people handle these types of big basic things?
Once again thanks for participating in this thread.
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I'm going to choose hookers and blow over an elder care facility.
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Without employer subsidized health care it is a difficult thing. Even with that, for example, while my current employer does not require me to contribute out of my paycheck for healthcare premiums (a rarity nowadays, was much more common back in the 70s), my previous employer did and for a plan a non-Mustachian who does not understand how math works, they would pay about $3,000-$4,000 in their contribution for premiums (usually about $140/week for family coverage). Or you can move to a high deductible plan, which takes the employee portion down to about $40/week. Yes you have a higher deductible but if you add in the premium difference in a well structured program the high deductible plan could save the typical family about $1,000/year at any claims level, so I could be totally healthy or have a heart transplant and I'd still have money with a high deductible plan.
Long term care is one thing I struggle over, so I pray for something that just takes me when I get sick, like my grandfather who was fine and then just died in his sleep of a heart attack one night. I hate to think of the burden on my family otherwise, but I must admit I have not looked at the long term care policies to see if they make sense. My grandmother is currently in assisted living so I understand the cost through speaking with my parents. They are currently funding that for her through savings she had and she was the head of a corporate cafeteria as her job so no college education. They were also immigrants from Communist bloc so they knew how to save, probably better than a lot of Mustachians, so not sure how typical this would be, but it does show that they found a way even on a meager income to save enough. She is turning 95 this year and the facility she is at is about $8,000/month and quite run down but likely typical of most. For many others (my wife's father is the example I'll use), they do not have enough, they work through savings and then Medicare pays for the facility but you need to deplete everything you own to get there. And then it is a Medicare facility which is not always great and typically has a long waiting list. They were lucky in that a bed opened up in one very near his home, so his wife could easily visit (17 year age difference so she is still able to be on her own). He has since passed, but I think that situation is more typical, in that people do not have savings and it defaults to the social safety net.
Public school eliminates the under college costs for everyone who is not full of the belief that somehow a private education is always better. It is better at creating pretentious snobs, but I've seen a lot of private school kids that are dumb as rocks. The student is important. Inner city and rural school districts certainly present a problem, but many solid suburban school districts exist around every major city. It does usually place you in a housing situation as you describe, but this goes back to the LCOL space talked about a lot on these boards. I was born and raised in Chicago. Everywhere there is as you describe. Insane property taxes ($15,000 for a typical 2,500 sq foot 4 bedroom) and high costs (I sold a house like that for about $300K back in 2005, they are higher now). I know live in a city in Ohio and have a very similar home on a bigger piece of land that I bought for just over $200K and may less than $5,000 in property taxes, for what I would say is a better quality of life. Much better park districts, flourishing arts and culture and everything is less expensive from groceries to homes to sales tax. This is in one of those "good" school districts you talk about, one of the best in the state and also well rated nationwide.
For college you can impact that as well. Again, Ohio has the largest number of colleges of any state. In state tuition rates cut over $20K per year off of almost any tuition bill. Sure you might need to explain to your child the reality that virtually no employer not on Wall Street or Silicon Valley cares which school your degree is from and fight against the culture to attend some overpriced school with a lackluster placement rate and academic program and that just breed more of those pretentious snobs talked about earlier is not what they need. Northwestern is a good example of that.
Hope that helps understand how we survive here in the land of abundance.
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How do I handle:
health care/health insurance - ACA.
housing - Own place outright. 200K for a house, not in my area, try 460k.
education - No children, so not an issue.
elder care - Both parents are dead, not an issue.
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I am only going to touch on a couple of points here, but I would be interested in how people manage the seemingly prohibitively expensive items like health care/health insurance, housing, and parochial or private education.
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How do people handle these types of big basic things?
A lot of it is wishful thinking and hoping that the worst doesn't come to pass.
You have to remember that a lot of us don't deal with healthcare or elder care emergency costs on a daily basis, and if we do, we're accustomed to them and have built the costs into our budgets already. This is just How It Is. You just keep working until you've got 25x annual expenses, whatever those annual expenses are.
For health care, spouse & I try hard to stay healthy and we pay the exorbitant premiums. I'm on COBRA right now from a previous job (that gives you access to 18 months of employer-sponsored healthcare after you leave a job, but you pay the entire cost), but after that runs out, I'm not sure what I'll do. Probably the ACA, with fingers crossed that subsidies still exist.
I have (non-Mustachian) friends who avoid seeing doctors and dentists because they can't afford to, which leads to health problems getting worse and more expensive, until there's a crisis they can't avoid. Sometimes this leads to some pretty awful outcomes.
No kids, so no kid expenses.
For housing, we were lucky to buy at a good time, and we've stayed in our "starter" home for many, many years. We'll probably own it outright by the end of next year. As rents and real estate prices increase so dramatically, I am more and more grateful that at least housing is one cost we've got well in hand. But we could easily have bought in 2008 and ended up in real trouble.
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I have (non-Mustachian) friends who avoid seeing doctors and dentists because they can't afford to, which leads to health problems getting worse and more expensive, until there's a crisis they can't avoid. Sometimes this leads to some pretty awful outcomes.
I'm not sure about this. I live in Australia and we have a good health care system but I still avoid doctors and dentists as much as possible. My dad is a retired doctor and mum is still working as a nurse. I think that taking care of yourself is the best way to avoid a crisis. I don't think medical care is great at avoiding crises.
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I have (non-Mustachian) friends who avoid seeing doctors and dentists because they can't afford to, which leads to health problems getting worse and more expensive, until there's a crisis they can't avoid. Sometimes this leads to some pretty awful outcomes.
I'm not sure about this. I live in Australia and we have a good health care system but I still avoid doctors and dentists as much as possible. My dad is a retired doctor and mum is still working as a nurse. I think that taking care of yourself is the best way to avoid a crisis. I don't think medical care is great at avoiding crises.
The preponderance of evidence supports the theory that preventative care is effective at improving people's self-perceived health level as well as improving outcomes. That involves regular blood work, urinalysis, and physical examination (say annually or biannually depending on age).
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I have (non-Mustachian) friends who avoid seeing doctors and dentists because they can't afford to, which leads to health problems getting worse and more expensive, until there's a crisis they can't avoid. Sometimes this leads to some pretty awful outcomes.
I'm not sure about this. I live in Australia and we have a good health care system but I still avoid doctors and dentists as much as possible. My dad is a retired doctor and mum is still working as a nurse. I think that taking care of yourself is the best way to avoid a crisis. I don't think medical care is great at avoiding crises.
The preponderance of evidence supports the theory that preventative care is effective at improving people's self-perceived health level as well as improving outcomes. That involves regular blood work, urinalysis, and physical examination (say annually or biannually depending on age).
I don't know if your statement is factual. I'm not having a go here but I'm honestly not sure. I've never seen that evidence. I think eating well and exercising (a healthy lifestyle) are probably the best protection against health crises. I know that one of the leading causes of death is actually health care.
http://www.health-care-reform.net/causedeath.htm
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK225187/
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I have (non-Mustachian) friends who avoid seeing doctors and dentists because they can't afford to, which leads to health problems getting worse and more expensive, until there's a crisis they can't avoid. Sometimes this leads to some pretty awful outcomes.
I'm not sure about this. I live in Australia and we have a good health care system but I still avoid doctors and dentists as much as possible. My dad is a retired doctor and mum is still working as a nurse. I think that taking care of yourself is the best way to avoid a crisis. I don't think medical care is great at avoiding crises.
The preponderance of evidence supports the theory that preventative care is effective at improving people's self-perceived health level as well as improving outcomes. That involves regular blood work, urinalysis, and physical examination (say annually or biannually depending on age).
I don't know if your statement is factual. I'm not having a go here but I'm honestly not sure. I've never seen that evidence. I think eating well and exercising (a healthy lifestyle) are probably the best protection against health crises. I know that one of the leading causes of death is actually health care.
http://www.health-care-reform.net/causedeath.htm
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK225187/
I'm sure there's tons of room for improvement, but you can't really take those numbers and then jump to "healthcare kills people." Of the 225k deaths / year cited in the first link:
- 12,000 deaths per year due to unnecessary surgery
- 7000 deaths per year due to medication errors in hospitals
- 20,000 deaths per year due to other errors in hospitals
- 80,000 deaths per year due to infections in hospitals
- 106,000 deaths per year due to negative effects of drugs
Only the first one "unnecessary surgery" (Unnecessary by whose standards? Are we talking purely face-lifts or something?) can really be attributed to "death by healthcare". The others are all some variation of "there was a super sick person here already, and in the process of trying to make them better something happened and they died." By blaming all these deaths on the healthcare industry and concluding that it's better to stay away you're assuming that they wouldn't have died of whatever brought them into the hospital in the first place. Which is kind of ridiculous, people don't just go to the hospital recreationally.
Odds are that if you a) get an infection at a hospital and b) die from it, you already had some pretty incredibly serious health problems. Who knows what, maybe a compromised immune system from cancer / cancer treatment, HIV, 3rd degree burns over half your body, whatever. But if the infection is what actually kills you then that's what they'll write down, and then people write alarmist articles about how dangerous hospitals are. Which, fine, let's make them better, but "avoid hospitals at all costs" is not really the logical conclusion.
Even as a complete mistrustful cynic who doesn't want to do any research you can still be pretty confident that preventative care is a net positive from one simple fact: insurance companies pay for it completely. That means they have run the numbers internally and found that paying a little bit for preventative care will save them money in the long run by avoiding more serious problems; they wouldn't do it if there wasn't profit involved. Or you could, you know, trust the entire medical community to know what they're talking about in the field of their expertise.
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I think eating well and exercising (a healthy lifestyle) are probably the best protection against health crises.
Just a follow-on note: I think the vast majority of doctors would agree with you. But then they'd also say that preventative care is the second best protection. It's not a one-or-the-other situation.
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Some preventative tests make no sense once you are older. For instance your colon lining thins out as you age so it is better to quit doing colonoscopies by 70. If they puncture your colon you usually die from sepsis. I was reading that pap smears are no longer recommended after 65 and mammograms are better not to have done every year because the radiation can cause the cancer. I think you have to weigh the risks versus benefits.
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Some preventative tests make no sense once you are older. For instance your colon lining thins out as you age so it is better to quit doing colonoscopies by 70. If they puncture your colon you usually die from sepsis. I was reading that pap smears are no longer recommended after 65 and mammograms are better not to have done every year because the radiation can cause the cancer. I think you have to weigh the risks versus benefits.
Making those calls is a big part of an MD or NP's job, and yes, they have to weigh the risks versus the benefits.
You the patient, on the other hand, should probably not be making those calls unless you're coming from a medical background. Googling a condition or procedure for an hour or two is not a substitute for years of education and training.
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I am definitely making the call for myself since the doctor wants all tests done on a schedule except for paps. She agrees with that. At 64 I am no longer a sheep and read books written by doctors and discuss it with my friends. We are all highly educated so not stupid people.
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The great thing about the internet is it allows us all to be a little bit more educated about what kinda of preventative care we think we might want to have done routinely. I'm 34 and just saw a dermatologist for the first time. I didn't have a particular reason to go but I'm not really knowledgeable on skin cancer so I wanted a general check just because I've had some serious sun burns in the past and I'd prefer not to find out down the road that I've had something for a while and it's spread or something like that. Annual blood work might catch something that would otherwise not be found until you finally got sick from whatever was causing the abnormality.
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I do annual blood work and a checkup. Since skin cancer runs in my family I also see the skin doctor once a year for an entire body check. Mr Green make sure your wife checks your back monthly because melanoma can develop where you don't see it and is deadly. A friend of mine died at your age from it.
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This isn't completely impossible to figure out for yourself. The biggies:
Health insurance cost: ???
Cost to put your kids through college: ??? I'll add that sure, you could be all soap box pantsy and in an old guy voice say "when I was in college, I worked 80 hours a day, took a double class schedule and got my PhD in 2 years". For me, education is wicked important and I'm willing to pay for a fancy private school, so long as the kid is really putting the effort in. I'm actually doing that now to the tune of $65k a year. If you'd rather soap box it and have your kid work at Wal*Mart forever, go for it.
Taxes: This can be managed by only pulling out what's absolutely needed from investments to keep your income low. Hard to do if you have 2 kids in college at say $50k each and health insurance is $30k a year.
The rest is mouse nuts (and what most people focus on). Eating, housing, cars......mouse nuts. Without college costs or health insurance costs, I could easily retire right now, buy myself a Nissan GT-R and live till I'm 85, leaving millions to my wife at that point.
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Car Jack, do you even realize that most people can't afford 65k/year for private tuition and do not live in your world? The median salary for a family of 4 in the US is around 50k last time I checked.
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Mouse nuts is pretty funny though.
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Let's assume you live in a socialist country with cheap healthcare and education. How much do you need to pay for the mouse nuts then?
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Let's assume you live in a socialist country with cheap healthcare and education. How much do you need to pay for the mouse nuts then?
It just so happens I do. The mouse nuts cost me about $800 a month, but most people do it for less.
Not sure if by "cheap" you mean low cost or low quality. Both apply here.
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I think eating well and exercising (a healthy lifestyle) are probably the best protection against health crises.
Just a follow-on note: I think the vast majority of doctors would agree with you. But then they'd also say that preventative care is the second best protection. It's not a one-or-the-other situation.
I'm not sold on this premise and so I thought I would look it up.
https://nutritionfacts.org/video/is-it-worth-getting-an-annual-physical-exam/
https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/a-checkup-for-the-checkup-do-you-really-need-a-yearly-physical-201510238473
. In other words, being seen by your doctor once a year won’t necessarily keep you from getting sick, or even help you live longer. And some of the components of an annual visit may actually cause harm. For example, lab tests and exams that are ordered for healthy patients (as opposed to people with symptoms or known illnesses) are statistically more likely to be “false positives” — that is, when test results suggest a problem that doesn’t exist. Even if these inaccurate findings affect only a tiny percentage of the more than 200 million adults who would undergo such exams, the monetary, practical, and emotional costs are huge.
I'm not stating that the practice of regular check-ups is definitely bad but maybe it's not that beneficial.
The only test I've taken in my entire life (44 yo) is a skin cancer test as per the one mentioned above.
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The rest is mouse nuts (and what most people focus on). Eating, housing, cars......mouse nuts. Without college costs or health insurance costs, I could easily retire right now, buy myself a Nissan GT-R and live till I'm 85, leaving millions to my wife at that point.
Interesting point. I live in Australia and I'm not paying my kids college costs (it's basically a debt based system but not as bad as the US system) or worrying about health care. End of life costs though can add up significantly. My Uncle recently passed away and he had dementia. He had a lot of money but it cost a lot putting him into an old age home. I'm hopeful this doesn't happen to me but if it does I again hope that I don't have enough money and the government subsidises the cost or I have enough and the kids get screwed over.
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The great thing about the internet is it allows us all to be a little bit more educated about what kinda of preventative care we think we might want to have done routinely. I'm 34 and just saw a dermatologist for the first time. I didn't have a particular reason to go but I'm not really knowledgeable on skin cancer so I wanted a general check just because I've had some serious sun burns in the past and I'd prefer not to find out down the road that I've had something for a while and it's spread or something like that. Annual blood work might catch something that would otherwise not be found until you finally got sick from whatever was causing the abnormality.
One of the issues in trying to make decisions about our individual preventive care is that the medical establishment is making decisions based on population data and we are, well, just ourselves. So I made decide that after one clean colonoscopy I will never, ever do that again based on the percentage chance, as an individual, that I will develop cancer vs all the possible errors, pain and inconvenience of testing, etc... of doing it again. That may be rational based on the individual risk vs costs (financial and otherwise) whereas the medical profession, from a population analysis, may conclude that finding the needle in the haystack that is going to cost them millions is slightly, ever so slightly cost effective to test everyone. But those costs never account for our personal costs in the process.
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I was thinking that this question has way to many posts.
Then I reasoned, it has so many posts, because it is unanswerable.
Some couples are willing to live an $20k while others need $100k.
It depends on your location, property taxes, health condition and healthcare
expenses, travel or not, eating and drinking habits, what do you want to drive,
or ride, new clothes or second hand, morning coffee at home or Starbucks,
cook at home or eat out, expensive hobbies, low cost or none, house plenty
warm and cool, live in outdated home or need modern upgrades, garden or
supermarket, high cable and cellphone bills or not, insurance costs and a
hundred other thinks to spend money on, OR not.
So the variable has a 5 to 1 or more range, it is an unanswerable question.
You could also ask, "how much does to cost to live while working?"
People live on $12k to $1M a year.
I would ask the OP, what are you spending now? That's how much it costs you.
Unless, you want to change your habits, most people don't.
Rant over/
Have a thrifty day! :-)
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I was thinking that this question has way to many posts.
Then I reasoned, it has so many posts, because it is unanswerable.
Some couples are willing to live an $20k while others need $100k.
It depends on your location, property taxes, health condition and healthcare
expenses, travel or not, eating and drinking habits, what do you want to drive,
or ride, new clothes or second hand, morning coffee at home or Starbucks,
cook at home or eat out, expensive hobbies, low cost or none, house plenty
warm and cool, live in outdated home or need modern upgrades, garden or
supermarket, high cable and cellphone bills or not, insurance costs and a
hundred other thinks to spend money on, OR not.
So the variable has a 5 to 1 or more range, it is an unanswerable question.
You could also ask, "how much does to cost to live while working?"
People live on $12k to $1M a year.
I would ask the OP, what are you spending now? That's how much it costs you.
Unless, you want to change your habits, most people don't.
Rant over/
Have a thrifty day! :-)
The original post expressly acknowledged that individual responses and their applicability to the situations of others would vary. For the second time you chime in to say the question can't be answered, despite the fact that nearly a hundred other people have answered the question (and numerous other related questions besides). The answers have been very helpful to me and perhaps others ("PTF"!!!) in identifying significant drivers of spending and needs/opportunities for efficiency.
To those who have contributed to the substantive discussion, thank you again.
"I would ask the OP, what are you spending now? That's how much it costs you."
Wrong. I detailed my own spending numbers and categories three months ago, specifically stating these are not useful in determining future needs as I contemplate whether I should return to live in the USA after living and working elsewhere for over 10 years.
"I was thinking that this question has way to many posts."
Way too many posts? Such non-mustachian spending of scarce pixels and precious keystrokes. Someone should tell them over at the "Top is In" thread.
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I want to clarify that Medicaid (not Medicare) pays for nursing home care in the US. Medicare pays for short terms stays for rehabilitation after a hospital stay. People think that Medicaid is just for those "welfare people ". Not realizing that many middle class families need it at the end of life.
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I was thinking that this question has way to many posts.
Then I reasoned, it has so many posts, because it is unanswerable.
Some couples are willing to live an $20k while others need $100k.
It depends on your location, property taxes, health condition and healthcare
expenses, travel or not, eating and drinking habits, what do you want to drive,
or ride, new clothes or second hand, morning coffee at home or Starbucks,
cook at home or eat out, expensive hobbies, low cost or none, house plenty
warm and cool, live in outdated home or need modern upgrades, garden or
supermarket, high cable and cellphone bills or not, insurance costs and a
hundred other thinks to spend money on, OR not.
So the variable has a 5 to 1 or more range, it is an unanswerable question.
You could also ask, "how much does to cost to live while working?"
People live on $12k to $1M a year.
I would ask the OP, what are you spending now? That's how much it costs you.
Unless, you want to change your habits, most people don't.
Rant over/
Have a thrifty day! :-)
The original post expressly acknowledged that individual responses and their applicability to the situations of others would vary. For the second time you chime in to say the question can't be answered, despite the fact that nearly a hundred other people have answered the question (and numerous other related questions besides). The answers have been very helpful to me and perhaps others ("PTF"!!!) in identifying significant drivers of spending and needs/opportunities for efficiency.
To those who have contributed to the substantive discussion, thank you again.
"I would ask the OP, what are you spending now? That's how much it costs you."
Wrong. I detailed my own spending numbers and categories three months ago, specifically stating these are not useful in determining future needs as I contemplate whether I should return to live in the USA after living and working elsewhere for over 10 years.
"I was thinking that this question has way to many posts."
Way too many posts? Such non-mustachian spending of scarce pixels and precious keystrokes. Someone should tell them over at the "Top is In" thread.
Well there, I've been thoroughly facepunched. :-)
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I want to clarify that Medicaid (not Medicare) pays for nursing home care in the US. Medicare pays for short terms stays for rehabilitation after a hospital stay. People think that Medicaid is just for those "welfare people ". Not realizing that many middle class families need it at the end of life.
Medicaid only pays for nursing home care if you, first, spend down your assets to the point where you are, basically, broke. If a doctor certifies that you (may) only have ~6 months to live, Medicare will pay for outpatient hospice care, which is better than a nursing home, IMHO. Nobody *has* to hand over all of his assets to the medical industry at the end of his life. Nursing home care is a choice. Just say no.
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Thanks for all the info here! We're currently in the US (couple w/ a 3 yo) spending ~50K per year. We both work, though, so that includes preschool. I've lived in Taiwan and China as well, which are a lot cheaper. And we're currently thinking about relocating to Canada in ~2 years. Reading this thread (and the impact of healthcare on early retirement) makes me even more interested in that possibility. I'm 41, DW is 37, and we're probably 6-8 years away from FIRE, so we'll have lots of pre-medicare healthcare costs in our future if we stay in the US.
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To qualify for hospice in home care someone must live with you full-time or they turn you down. I just went through this with a friend.
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You don't always get a choice on nursing home care- you are assuming competence. My BIL moved in with my mother in law who had dementia- when it got so that she broke her hip and could no longer be cared for at home, then she went into a nursing home. I suppose there was a choice, he could have just walked out and left her to starve. But she didn't get to make the decision.
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You don't always get a choice on nursing home care- you are assuming competence. My BIL moved in with my mother in law who had dementia- when it got so that she broke her hip and could no longer be cared for at home, then she went into a nursing home. I suppose there was a choice, he could have just walked out and left her to starve. But she didn't get to make the decision.
I propose a law that says my family can smash me in the head with a rock or put a pillow over my face in my sleep once I get so confused I can no longer care for myself or recognize anyone I know.
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Even the laws that allow assisted suicide still have the person be of sound mind and give consent to getting the Rx to kill them. Then the person has to actually take the Rx themselves.
There are many situations where a medical event happens and renders the person in a nursing home.
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If you don't mind the occasional volcanic eruption you can apparently live in paradise for around $700/month.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/may/10/hawaiis-evacuees-on-life-by-the-volcano-people-think-were-crazy-to-live-here (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/may/10/hawaiis-evacuees-on-life-by-the-volcano-people-think-were-crazy-to-live-here)
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If you don't mind the occasional volcanic eruption you can apparently live in paradise for around $700/month.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/may/10/hawaiis-evacuees-on-life-by-the-volcano-people-think-were-crazy-to-live-here (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/may/10/hawaiis-evacuees-on-life-by-the-volcano-people-think-were-crazy-to-live-here)
Wow. That is very telling. They knew a backyard volcanic eruption was likely and still moved in anyway. If people are going to have to bail them out then they either shouldn't be allowed to live there or should be required to have insurance or other means to take care of themselves.
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We spent just under $60k last year for family of 3. That includes a mortgage and, yes, a car payment. That feels like a normal year for us.
FIRE budget - we will keep the mortgage for now, pay off the car, add ACA health insurance. On paper we are still $60k, but I want to add a buffer and shoot for $70k safe withdrawal. Stretch goal is $80k safe withdrawal available if needed for unforeseen expense, or if we want a Europe / Denali level vacation every year. Downsize the house in a few years allows for more travel or lower budget. Full SS kicks in in 11 years, so I think a 4.5% rate is safe initially, then drop to 2.5-3% after SS.
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We have been FIREd for 18 months and spent $60,000 last year for two people. This also included a mortgage and although our vehicle is paid for we currently budget about $2500 a year for our next one in about 10 years. We also spent $10,000 on two months in Thailand and Bali but $2000 of that is from next years travel budget floated from savings.
Our transition to FIRE consisted of us switching from making $100,000 netting $90,000 banking $40,000 and living on $50,000 approximately. When our pensions reached a point where they more than covered our expenses I knew we were good. We do live what I consider a low consumption lifestyle. That said we have payed cash for our toys the last few years we worked and have a camper, small sailboat, two kayaks and two bicycles and motorcycle that all get used on a regular basis.
Early Social Security should kick in about 9.5 years from now and although it will be reduced due to retiring at age 50 and 51 it will still be around $20,000 more a year. Life's good.
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If you don't mind the occasional volcanic eruption you can apparently live in paradise for around $700/month.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/may/10/hawaiis-evacuees-on-life-by-the-volcano-people-think-were-crazy-to-live-here (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/may/10/hawaiis-evacuees-on-life-by-the-volcano-people-think-were-crazy-to-live-here)
Wow. That is very telling. They knew a backyard volcanic eruption was likely and still moved in anyway. If people are going to have to bail them out then they either shouldn't be allowed to live there or should be required to have insurance or other means to take care of themselves.
This is similar to my feeling about New Orleans. On one hand I'm sorry people got flooded out of their homes when a hurricane ran through. On the other, really, did you think your luck could last forever? And then you want to go back? I believe unsustainable cities like this just need to be abandoned. Are we going to do the same thing with Miami when global warming raises sea levels?
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To qualify for hospice in home care someone must live with you full-time or they turn you down. I just went through this with a friend.
I'm sorry for your loss, Cassie. Different agencies have different rules, because this is absolutely not true in my area. I went through this with a friend, too.
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We have been FIREd for 18 months and spent $60,000 last year for two people. This also included a mortgage and although our vehicle is paid for we currently budget about $2500 a year for our next one in about 10 years. We also spent $10,000 on two months in Thailand and Bali but $2000 of that is from next years travel budget floated from savings.
Our transition to FIRE consisted of us switching from making $100,000 netting $90,000 banking $40,000 and living on $50,000 approximately. When our pensions reached a point where they more than covered our expenses I knew we were good. We do live what I consider a low consumption lifestyle. That said we have payed cash for our toys the last few years we worked and have a camper, small sailboat, two kayaks and two bicycles and motorcycle that all get used on a regular basis.
Early Social Security should kick in about 9.5 years from now and although it will be reduced due to retiring at age 50 and 51 it will still be around $20,000 more a year. Life's good.
How did you spend so much in Thailand/Bali? All the ladyboys?
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Dicey, that is interesting. I just assumed it was a general rule as it is too dangerous to be alone. Losing friends is hard as you know. We have lost 3 friends between 59 & 67.
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How did you spend so much in Thailand/Bali? All the ladyboys?
[/quote]
We actually had close to $900 left out of out $10,000 but mentally I think of the trip having cost $10,000 because that's what we budgeted. We flew Air Asia from Thailand to Bali and then back to Thailand before returning to the U.S. We also flew within Thailand to Krabi, Chiang Mai and back to Bangok so this added some extra expense.
In regards to the lady boys we were on Khaosan Rd. and I commented to my wife "Hey that last beer girl was a dude!" to which my wife replied, "All six of them are". Good my wife was there as I was oblivious to the first five "girls" not being authentic.
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Haha, that's awesome.
I have read a lot of blogs and watched a lot of vlogs on SE asia recently. Seems like most are able to live amazingly well on ~$1k/month. I guess if you are do short term stays all over the place it adds up. Most of those are 1+ month rentals.
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Dicey, that is interesting. I just assumed it was a general rule as it is too dangerous to be alone. Losing friends is hard as you know. We have lost 3 friends between 59 & 67.
In order to qualify for hospice care a doctor has to certify a patient is sick enough that she might die in the next six months. It's funny the state would be worried it's too "dangerous" for a hospice patient to be alone... Wonder what they're worried about? I mean, what's the worst that can happen? :)
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I know it's weird. One reason my mom didn't have hospice until a week before she died. She didn't want to leave her home.
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Just before my grandfather died at 92, he spent about 6 months in an assisted living facility and HATED it. He, literally, tried to escape on foot, with his walker, two or three times that we know of. Once they caught him a few blocks away at a McDonalds eating a Big Mac. The other time, staff from the assisted living place caught him at a convenience store as he was about to buy some illicit snacks. Apparently, my grandfather's doctor had him on a strict low-fat diet, which he hated, and he wasn't allowed to eat nuts, because the staff were afraid he might choke. It's seems bizarre to me to worry about a 92 year old man choking on some peanuts or dying from a heart attack because he ate too much fatty food. WTF is the point of living if you can't do the things you enjoy? It just makes no sense...
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Dicey, that is interesting. I just assumed it was a general rule as it is too dangerous to be alone. Losing friends is hard as you know. We have lost 3 friends between 59 & 67.
In order to qualify for hospice care a doctor has to certify a patient is sick enough that she might die in the next six months. It's funny the state would be worried it's too "dangerous" for a hospice patient to be alone... Wonder what they're worried about? I mean, what's the worst that can happen? :)
I know you're not being serious, but falling, breaking a hip or arm, then dying of starvation over the course of a week because nobody visits and you can't reach the phone doesn't sound like a good way to go.
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Dicey, that is interesting. I just assumed it was a general rule as it is too dangerous to be alone. Losing friends is hard as you know. We have lost 3 friends between 59 & 67.
In order to qualify for hospice care a doctor has to certify a patient is sick enough that she might die in the next six months. It's funny the state would be worried it's too "dangerous" for a hospice patient to be alone... Wonder what they're worried about? I mean, what's the worst that can happen? :)
I know you're not being serious, but falling, breaking a hip or arm, then dying of starvation over the course of a week because nobody visits and you can't reach the phone doesn't sound like a good way to go.
Yeah, sure, but that doesn't seem like a very good reason to not allow somebody to stay in her home alone. It wouldn't be hard to attach a small cell phone or emergency alert button to a lanyard around a patient's neck, so that in an emergency she could call for help. It just seems like if a patient is expected to die within six months or less, anyway, worries about "safety" shouldn't need to be taken quite as seriously...
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The Bureau of Labor Statistics provides very detailed consumer expenditure data for the U.S. cross-tabulated in many different ways. I used this data when I was trying to determine how reasonable my estimates of retirement expenses were.
The data may be found here:
https://www.bls.gov/cex/tables.htm#crosstab
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My sister told our mom to keep her cell phone in her pocket at all times so she could call for help. She forgot to and had laid 24 hours in her waste until her sister checked on her. Then they took her to a hospice facility where she got awful care even though it looked nice.
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The Bureau of Labor Statistics provides very detailed consumer expenditure data for the U.S. cross-tabulated in many different ways. I used this data when I was trying to determine how reasonable my estimates of retirement expenses were.
The data may be found here:
https://www.bls.gov/cex/tables.htm#crosstab
I have also found this data to be very helpful in making predictions about future expenses. But I think it's best to look at these numbers by comparing what you are spending now compared to the numbers in the data compiled by the BLS. For example, if you are currently spending more than the average amount stated by the BLS, then you will probably also spend more than the average in the future as well.
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Dicey, that is interesting. I just assumed it was a general rule as it is too dangerous to be alone. Losing friends is hard as you know. We have lost 3 friends between 59 & 67.
In order to qualify for hospice care a doctor has to certify a patient is sick enough that she might die in the next six months. It's funny the state would be worried it's too "dangerous" for a hospice patient to be alone... Wonder what they're worried about? I mean, what's the worst that can happen? :)
I know you're not being serious, but falling, breaking a hip or arm, then dying of starvation over the course of a week because nobody visits and you can't reach the phone doesn't sound like a good way to go.
Yeah, sure, but that doesn't seem like a very good reason to not allow somebody to stay in her home alone. It wouldn't be hard to attach a small cell phone or emergency alert button to a lanyard around a patient's neck, so that in an emergency she could call for help. It just seems like if a patient is expected to die within six months or less, anyway, worries about "safety" shouldn't need to be taken quite as seriously...
Yes! This is what Atul Gawande’s Being Mortal is all about. There’s a big trade-off for the elderly between safety and freedom. Most children want their parents to be safe, but most older people would prefer less safety and more independence.
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Yes I agree most people prefer freedom.
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My sister told our mom to keep her cell phone in her pocket at all times so she could call for help. She forgot to and had laid 24 hours in her waste until her sister checked on her. Then they took her to a hospice facility where she got awful care even though it looked nice.
@Cassie sorry to hear your mom had to suffer like that. That sucks. Paying $10K-$15K/month for in-patient Hospice care seems crazy and sad to me. By definition, the care people are getting in a Hospice facility is "unskilled," which means any able-bodied person could provide it. It's sad that the norm in our society, now, is that most people are so busy working at jobs to earn money to pay mortgages and other bills that they can't afford to take time off to care for family members who need it. One of the nice things about FIRE is that we are now available to move anywhere in the world to help any family members or close friends who may need it.
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My sister lived a hour away and was retired. She would stay for the weekend and go home. I was still working and lived 2k miles away.
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I googled and there are some hospices that are now providing service if you live alone.
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Car Jack, do you even realize that most people can't afford 65k/year for private tuition and do not live in your world? The median salary for a family of 4 in the US is around 50k last time I checked.
Your point is valid, however, here are some better numbers. Median household income, regardless of household composition and size for 2015 was $56k.
Male head of household: $56k
Female head of household: $38k
Couple household: $82k
Single Male: $41k
Single Female: $29k
I think this really helps demonstrate why the upper 10% think they are middle class. Couples with families live in neighborhoods with other couples with families, and they average 2 times the income of 3 of the 4 other household types. They think this is normal, and it is for them.
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My 83 yr old father’s assisted living home cost $72,000 per year. In he Midwest
My wife and I retired at 50 a little over 10 yrs ago. We spend $100k to 120k a year. Health insurance runs $18,000. We live in SW Florida.
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My 83 yr old father’s assisted living home cost $72,000 per year. In he Midwest
My wife and I retired at 50 a little over 10 yrs ago. We spend $100k to 120k a year. Health insurance runs $18,000. We live in SW Florida.
So if I understand correctly, your health insurance is about $1,500 per month. Your other spending is in the range of $7k to $8k+ per month.
Would you mind identifying the most significant drivers of the other spending amount?
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My husband and I live on the West Coast of Florida, one bedroom condo, paid off, share one car, paid off, no debt. Our base annual expenses are about $14,400 (maintenance, power, internet, cell phone, health insurance, gas, food, car insurance, real estate taxes, homeowners insurance), plus our personal allowances bring it up to a little over $20K. We estimate we spend about $1,000- $2,000 extra per year on misc. (dental, eye appointments, RX, over the counter meds, grandkid expenses, etc). I basically feel like I'm on vacation all the time so I don't need to travel, but we do go to Germany every other year to see friends, and we did a lot of traveling before retiring. Well, I retired from my career 4 years ago and now I work 16 hours a week, so *almost* retired.
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Just before my grandfather died at 92, he spent about 6 months in an assisted living facility and HATED it. He, literally, tried to escape on foot, with his walker, two or three times that we know of. Once they caught him a few blocks away at a McDonalds eating a Big Mac. The other time, staff from the assisted living place caught him at a convenience store as he was about to buy some illicit snacks. Apparently, my grandfather's doctor had him on a strict low-fat diet, which he hated, and he wasn't allowed to eat nuts, because the staff were afraid he might choke. It's seems bizarre to me to worry about a 92 year old man choking on some peanuts or dying from a heart attack because he ate too much fatty food. WTF is the point of living if you can't do the things you enjoy? It just makes no sense...
Guess we kinda hijacked the thread..... When my mom was lying in the hospital very near death from kidney and liver failure (78 yo diabetic), staff came in to wheel her away for her annual mammogram! Fortunately my dad was there to stop them. He was enraged!
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I would start with the major expenses in your life. Housing, Transportation, Utilities/Internet, Food, Health Insurance, Recreation/Other and see where these take you to start with. You’ll get a baseline of your needs somewhere in the ballpark. It’s hard to quote a number because it will be different for everyone. Housing and Transportation tend to be largest so if you can keep these low, that’s a big help. The difference between HCOLA and LCOLA can be huge.
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My husband and I live on the West Coast of Florida, one bedroom condo, paid off, share one car, paid off, no debt. Our base annual expenses are about $14,400 (maintenance, power, internet, cell phone, health insurance, gas, food, car insurance, real estate taxes, homeowners insurance), plus our personal allowances bring it up to a little over $20K. We estimate we spend about $1,000- $2,000 extra per year on misc.
~$20k/yr is pretty amazing. When I see figures like this it makes me want to take a closer look at our nut to see if we can make it any smaller. We're closer to $50k in a MCOL area, not including health insurance premiums (though we have a family of 5 right now). Nice work!
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Just before my grandfather died at 92, he spent about 6 months in an assisted living facility and HATED it. He, literally, tried to escape on foot, with his walker, two or three times that we know of. Once they caught him a few blocks away at a McDonalds eating a Big Mac. The other time, staff from the assisted living place caught him at a convenience store as he was about to buy some illicit snacks. Apparently, my grandfather's doctor had him on a strict low-fat diet, which he hated, and he wasn't allowed to eat nuts, because the staff were afraid he might choke. It's seems bizarre to me to worry about a 92 year old man choking on some peanuts or dying from a heart attack because he ate too much fatty food. WTF is the point of living if you can't do the things you enjoy? It just makes no sense...
Guess we kinda hijacked the thread..... When my mom was lying in the hospital very near death from kidney and liver failure (78 yo diabetic), staff came in to wheel her away for her annual mammogram! Fortunately my dad was there to stop them. He was enraged!
Common milking of the Medicare teet. I saw a program one time that said 85% of all Medicare expenses come from "end of life care," which consisted largely of unnecessary tests and procedures for very old people on death's door.