Happy New Year, Cohort!
2019 was very good for us financially. My wife worked a full time job plus a couple of contracts, which allowed us to push our savings rate up to 59% of net income, a record for us. Our spending has been stable for the last 3 years, and the market returned even more than we contributed in savings. We're at 74% FI, with 18.5 years expenses saved vs. our target of 25. Feels close, but still far away!
I've been hesitant to invest new money into stocks at these prices for a year now. I've allowed our cash (vmfxx) to grow to 5% of our portfolio (~1 year's expenses right now). We are still 75% in stocks, so we're not missing out on market gains, just waiting for better buying opportunities. The gold I bought last year gave a healthy return, but it's still high, so I'm not buying more gold either. And the combination of high stocks and high gold is a pretty strong end-of-cycle signal for me.
I haven't figured out how large I'll let our cash allocation grow before I bite the bullet and buy stocks at record prices. If it gets to 2.5X our annual expenses, I'll be able to pay off our mortgage, which would reduce our income needs quite a bit, to help with taxes and maybe health care subsidies in retirement.
Work got much better for me last year, with a transfer to a very interesting project that is in a fun phase right now (we're not late or in deep technical trouble yet). I left a program with a toxic leadership team last year, and while I feel fully recovered, I have some dread that in another year or two, my current program will turn into the same mess. It helps to have some light at the end of the tunnel in case it goes badly. On the other hand, if things go well, it will be hard to leave next year. We will be in the thick of some historic developments, and if it's still fun, I'll probably stick around for OMY.
My wife didn't renew her additional contract gigs this year, so she is already enjoying a return to a normal workload. She cancelled a big hiking trip last year because she didn't have time and mental energy to plan it, which was a first for us and very disappointing - not the lifestyle we want to have. She's not too keen on retiring next year, so we have some conversations ahead of us about what it would look like if I stopped working before her.
We finished a satisfying house project, adding an office in our garage (my wife works from home full time and the kitchen table wasn't cutting it). I learned a few more DIY skills without it taking so long I hated it. I look forward to building more skills and tackling bigger projects in retirement!
Our fitness efforts last year fell apart, so we decided to buy a Peloton. My wife had wanted one for a while, and some friends sold us on it. I've been listening to a lot of podcasts on health and healthspan, and as a 42 year old with a 4 year old daughter, I want to be as physically and mentally healthy as possible for as long as I can. We decided health is an area worth spending more than the minimum. Pro tip: search classifieds for misspellings, I found a "peleton" for half price :) It's been great, we totally love it and we even have to negotiate who rides it first 3 days a week. We're also expanding the workout space for dumbbell and body-weight exercises.
I feel very lucky to be in this position, with so many options and choices ahead of us!
