Need advice: how would you allocate between cash and investment

[sweatybrain]

Hi everyone,

New member here on the midwest coast. Kinda of a late bloomer when it comes to money and saving and investment. When I finished college, I  followed my dream, got a PhD, worked for a bit, then went to medical school and just FINALLY finished residency. At 40 I'm at last no longer living pay check to pay check. Just last year I moved out of my beloved NYC to save more...now my school loan is paid off, and I'm making a decent salary. I am still renting, and would like to eventually buy a house. (However, I'm not yet sure whether I will stay at my current job longer than the next 3 years.)

Here's my question as someone who's very new to investing and personal finance. How would you allocate between saving for a down payment, emergency fund, and investing. right now I am doing the following:
1) maxing out my 403 b at 18k. My employer will match another 12k. Thinking about doing defer compensation (457), but not sure yet.
2) Roth IRA at 5500 a year
3) I probably have about 14k left to invest each month. I'm putting around 8k a month into betterment. I was stashing 6-7k a month into my emergency fund/house down payment fund (currently around 85k).

I would appreciate any advice on whether I should do anything differently. My goal is to be financially independent and in a position to retire in another 15-20 years, but I love my work and will probably continue working 2-3 days a week. I have a significant other who still lives in NYC, but we are not married. No kids. One car, though I might have to get a beater since I'm driving to work more than I thought I would.

Thank you in advance for your time and advice.

[FLBiker]

Personally, I would absolutely do the 457.
And I'm not a fan of Betterment.  I'd just go w/ Vanguard directly.

I don't know what your COL is, but with that income you could be retired quick!

[ysette9]

Can you give us some more info on your expenses and what you expect them to be in the future? Do you expect to move back to NY at some point and if so, how expensive would that be?

I'd advise you to be thoughtful about the decision to buy a house. Many people (including us when we got married!) buy a house because it is "what you do", not taking the time to really crunch the numbers and figure out if it is the right decision. With a SO on the other coast and not being sure if you'll be in this job past 3 years from now, I think your goal of buying a house deserves some scrutiny. This is a good calculator that can help on the numbers side. Only you can say whether it is the right move for your personal life. http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/upshot/buy-rent-calculator.html?_r=0

[sweatybrain]

Thank you for your replies.

Right now, my rent is about 1700, with insurance, parking, gas, car lease payment (I know), gym, and utilities, the fix expense I calculated to be about 32-3500. I personally spend around 1k max on living/food, but given an SO on other coast, most of my expense lies in plane tickets. let's call that 2500 so I'm guesstimating a monthly expense of around 6k. I know that number is not very mustachian, though as a percentage of my income, I like to think it's pretty good. My take home is right now around 21k a month, but with my side hustle, I hope to add another 3-6k in cash flow (1099 income)

In term of the future, I don't anticipate a move back to NYC. My SO works in fashion so there're only a few places where she can work. NYC, LA, maybe dallas or seattle. Job-wise, I think florida or texas seems more reasonable and with no state income tax.  For this reason, I'm basically planning to save up to 20% of downpayment. I don't know the market in those area, but I think something like 450-500k seems very reasonable.