No. of Recommendations: 8
I saved too much. Probably.
Or retired too late, but I'm in my mid-50s now so still think I caught an extra 10-20 years that many will not.
Spend rate on the port for 2025 was a mere 1.4% of the gross. I'm shooting for a whopping 2-3% this year but probably won't hit that unless I buy an expensive classic muscle car, which is highly unlikely as my wife hasn't assessed the utility at the same level as I.
Seems a pretty good SWR, especially considering the market appreciation for the year was about 4x what we spent. Also, 2025 was the most expensive year we've had even accounting for inflation, since I started tracking all expenditures by year. I started this to get a real sense of when we had enough accrued, which I've been tracking for about 6-7 years.
Some people look at monthly expenses but I find expenses are much more lumpy and some months were as much as 3x others in 2025, but most years are about the same as others. We did a low 5 figure sum of home renovations, and some white shoe legal estate work, and a few other elective and pricier outlays we hadn't done in prior years, which is why the spend rate was higher.
Still spending down the taxable account a-ok and it will last easily until I decide to take SS and my 2nd pension kicks in, in about 9 years. All sales so far are of Apple, which I mostly bought when Jobs was still alive fortunately. I'm about to roll the first year of the 5 year CD/bond/annuity ladder into a five year somethingorother.
What did 2025 tell me? All this retirement planning stuff works, and so far, swimmingly.
Don't wait too long to retire (but also these clowns that say you can retire on like, $250k with no pension or such are high).
