$45K/ yr from youtube = net ~$2,500/mo ... well that helps! 👍

As an international investor, I'm about 60-65% in the US, which is probably a little overweight. I think that it's more about having a diversified portfolio, as some commenters have noted, lots of companies trade globally, so with the large cap stocks most viewers would be investing in, there is an element of geographical diversification. The weightings you chose should be based on the factors that fit your risk tolerance and world view.

Alafasdfasv

Financial advisors number 1 job is to protect their butt. They will put you in super safe no yield investments.(It didn't go down)

Tom from Dallas. A clarification: your spouse does not get 50% of your SS amount when you begin drawing (69). She gets 50% of what your SS benefit as of your FRA. The 8% annual growth after your FRA does not affect her spousal benefit.

I am 52 years old and am in no way ready financially for retirement, but I am looking forward to it all the same.

I agree taxes is the biggest issue. I have always handled my own finances and have done well, but I started Roth Conversions and have studied income brackets, and I am a bit stressed. I may go for help with that. I chuckled about your downsizing comment. Houses in Indiana are relative inexpensive. If I move to the state where my daughter lives, I would have to spend more on a condo.

Thank you for making this. I'm 40 and what you listed is great topics to consider and discuss with my partner

Love your content Joe! I’m considering taking SS at 62 even though my wife is 10 years younger. While it’s ordinarily a no-brainer to delay in this situation, my youngest child will only be 13 when I turn 62 qualifying her for SS for 4 years.

I torture myself over this every so often but still 100% VTI. Recently considered adding small cap value and Intl after listening to Paul Merriman's presentations, but also listened to some opposing views from Rick Ferri that i tend to align with and sleep better about, so sticking with my all US allocation for now. Age 41 for time horizon reference.

the longevity equation tends to be skewed for over 65 to live longer. However 1 out of 5 will live to 90. That means 4 out of 5 will not.

Joe, I am sorry to hear about your mom. That is an emotionally difficult thing to go through for the family. I am glad to hear that your mom is improving. We went through this with my wife's parents. They both ended up in nursing homes. They were divorced so their situations were very different. My wife's mother went onto Medicaid almost immediately. She had a shared room the entire time. She had Alzheimers and was in with another Alzheimers patient. Toward the end it was very hard to visit her and I only went to support my wife. My wife's father was retired from the merchant marine and had excellent insurance from his union that covered a private room except for about $1K a month, which he could easily afford. He also had Alzheimers and again it became very depressing and emotionally hard to visit him near the end. In both cases, my wife who was an attorney (now retired) handled all the legalities and actually became the legal guardian for both parents. I think that dealing with the legalities helped her to deal with the emotional impact of her parents decline. We are fortunate to have traditional Medicare with F supplements. That will give each of us 100 days in a rehab facility at no out of pocket cost should that ever become necessary. As far as long term care beyond a rehab situation, goes we will make every effort to avoid that. Locally we have a very good visiting healthcare infrastructure that should allow us to stay at home even if we have significant issues. That is much cheaper than going into a nursing home. Should a nursing home become necessary, we can manage it financially.

The quicker I can get SS away from the government the better. Last person I trust is bureaucrats in Washington.

I need to more thoroughly review 5/ out of 18- AI list plus yours plus a couple from other comments. I've touched on all but those 5 need more thought.

I’m buying 150 dollars of scratch offs every Friday at the gas station. Thats my retirement plan.

Thank You.

Oh definitely check out Rhode Island

I believe that I hear a big expense in the background.

My own planning involves putting me in a position where "guaranteed" sources of income like social security and pension can cover all my basic expenses--food, clothing, shelter, transportation, and utilities (including phone and Internet). Then my savings and investments can cover the discretionary items like travel and hobbies. As long as I have enough money to cover my basic expenses, I should do OK.

I scored well on all of the points. I REALLY like playing with AI. My favorite is Perplexity as you get web links for it's answers and it's database seems more up to date. Also, and more importantly to me, Perplexity seems to be politically agnostic while Open AI seems like a Harvard graduate student in political science. I prefer the former.

Nice video Joe. I don't know everything about Social Security, but Spousal Benefit does not increase after your Full Retirement Age. You were born after 1960 so that is 67. You waiting to claim SS benefits at 69 would not increase your wife's SB. I'm pretty sure about that. So you waiting till 69 is because you want your SS benefit to be higher while you are among the living :)

Always great content.

SSA benefit increases vary with time. It’s only 5-6.6% annually before FRA, then 8% after FRA. The big increases are the after FRA timeframe, making it the most valuable time to delay.

Joe, I better congratulate you on this well done video since I complained to you about one of your other ones. Over all you put out very good information.

A huge reason to wait on SS is survivors benefits. Your spouse gets 100% of your amount at her FRA. My wife is 12 years younger and this is huge for us.

You look healthy and young for 60, Likely a life of treating your body right, Good for you

It's so sad that old age in this country,( unless you are wealthy), comes with such life altering sacrifice. Due mostly to the almighty dollar of course. Our overall healthcare system has become a patchwork at best, as the head of several insurance companies recently admitted. And there needs to be a massive reset and uniform standards in place nationwide to fix it!

I recall that some people took issue with the cash balance in Schwab's robo advisor, but I've come to appreciate large cash balances. My asset allocation target (!) is now 12.5% in I bonds (minus Social Security in the next 10 years), 12.5% in money market/stable value (plus future Roth conversion taxes), and the rest in stock.

If you use a software like Boldin and use the 2 bucket method you should be in pretty good shape for a DIY. One more item to consider is changes to the plan when one spouse dies

I got side tracked, but here is your coffee.😃

Also, wanted to add an additional mistake people may make in retirement: 17. Communication and Documentation: It is paramount that we, retirees, communicate our retirement plans and finances with our spouses and adult children and have clear accessible documentation for everyone to access when you have lost the cognitive ability to manage things and/or when you pass. There is nothing worse than trying to do forensic accounting when a loved one is impaired or has passed. Additionally, with your children, they get to learn from your experiences in retirement and that will help them to plan their own and eliminate much guess work they may have had. 👍

Surprisingly accurate for ChatGPT. I'm accustomed to about a 50% accuracy hit rate -- even on simple things. Definitely distrust-and-verify.

Great video! Two things I thought of for DIYers. Cognitive decline, I've watched smart people do foolish things as they age. Second thing is spouse being completely disinterested in the plan and something happens to me.

About social security, I'll have to monitor it as I get closer, but right now it looks like I'm better taking it earlier, which lowers my monthly income, which allows me to avoid IRMAA. Most of my assets are in taxable, generating dividends/interest. Combined with social security, that would put me into IRMAA.

I’m a 22 year old cloud Engineer from India who probably has nothing in common with you. But let me say this, the world needs more of such content. Social media nowadays is full of peer-group standards. Getting to know how someone senior thinks about life is increasingly more relevant and important.

Love this video. ❤ Keep ‘em coming Joe. 👍 Wanted to add my family’s experience and strategies to the points in this video. Very long response so stop now and skip if you don’t want to sit through my ramblings… 😜 1. Longevity: We know we cannot accurately know when we will pass. So we pick 100 for the software, but we plan for infinity with a diversified total global market equity portfolio and hedge to our unknowable horizon with guaranteed lifetime income. (Maximized Social Security, pension and SPIA). 2. Inflation: This one on average is manageable, but will hit hard periodically and could destroy a plan. I use maximized Social Security and Equities for income that will likely meet or exceed inflation. Also, I use a variable spending plan with guardrails to preserve my equity portfolio. And finally, if my pension and annuity income ever fall below my needs, I will “rebalance” with additional small SPIAs to bring the guaranteed lifetime income back to restore spending power. 3. Withdrawal Rate Calculations: We use a guardrail approach. Google Guyton - Klinger guardrail withdrawal strategy to understand. Our spending is variable within the guardrails. 4. Taxes: We use a tax professional to help plan and file our taxes. And we also see our tax planning in Boldin as well. 5. Healthcare Cost: We are using our subsidized retiree medical plan from my previous company until we transition to Medicare. We are investigation our options for long term care but haven’t chosen quite yet. So, we are effectively self funded at the moment, but may switch to dedicated insurance or a hybrid annuity product in the near future. 6. Sequence of Returns Risk: Maximized Social Security, pension and SPIA income are all outside the market and unaffected by market volatility. And our variable spending within our guardrail withdrawal strategy from our equities all combine to address sequence of returns risk. 7. Diversification: Our equity portfolio is 25% each in VTI/VXUS/DFSV/DISV. This gives us between 12,000-13,000 stocks across all public global markets. With 50/50 US/EXUS and 50/50 large blend/small cap value allocations. Dead simple and low cost with wide diversification across all equities, countries, markets and the academically identified Fama-French equity asset factors. 8. Rebalancing: We rebalance when and of our four equity funds drift more than 5% out of allocation. And we drip rebalance by reinvesting dividends along the way into which ever funds are falling behind the others. We also monitor how inflation is degrading our pension and SPIA income. We will “rebalance” with additional SPIAs if spending needs fall too low in the future. We don’t use bonds because our lifetime income sources are better suited as our “fixed income”; so, we don’t use them. So, stock/bond rebalancing is not applicable for us. 9. Lifestyle Changes: We plan for a retirement spending “smile” with highest spending at the beginning of retirement for the “go-go” years. Then comes lower spending during the “slow-go” years. And finally spending rises again during the “no-go” years for healthcare expenses. 10. Social Security: Maximizing this was priority #1 for our retirement plan. No where else can we obtain an inflation adjusted, tax advantaged guaranteed lifetime income source. We have a disabled adult child; so, SS is a resource for not only my wife Nd myself, but for our child as well. We used a free web tool called the “Open Social Security” calculator by Mike Piper for identifying the best claiming strategy. Boldin does not account SS disability benefits or for family members beyond spouses. So, we could not use it for SS. 11. Estate Planning: We have used (and continue to use) lawyers to create and execute our estate planning. (will, trusts, powers of attorney, guardianship of person for our disabled adult child, etc…) These all are critical to have done correctly by the law. Can’t afford to make mistakes and certainly can’t “do-it-yourself” our way through estate planning. 12. Investment Knowledge: We have spent years educating ourselves and collaboration with a CFP to ensure that our investment portfolio is allocated with academically researched, evidence based principals and that we ourselves behave as rational investors and stay true to our plan. 13. Contingency Plan: All of our “fixed income” is outside the market in guaranteed lifetime income sources. SS/pension/SPIA. They more than cover all our spending and we only pull from the market portfolio for discretionary “fun” spending. If the market crashes, we lose some “fun” money, but nothing critical. Also, we do not carry any debt. (No mortgage, car payments, credit card balances or loans of any kind). So, that reduces our critical expenses. 14. Emotional Decision Making: We have professionals and a plan we stick to. Also, we automate everything we can. We want the right actions to be automated or the easiest decisions (i.e. planned and documented clearly) We use researched information and professional advice to guide our decisions. We ignore the noise and stick to our plan. 15. Reviewing and Adjusting Plans: We view it a different way. We don’t adjust our plan. Instead we plan for adjustments. i.e. Our plan has adjustments built in. For instance, we use variable spending from our market portfolio with guardrails that adjust them with the changing portfolio value. We have a detailed budget that changes per our needs and life events. Just 2 of many examples. 16. Budget: We have a detailed budget. We keep it both in Excel for day-to-day use and in Boldin which folds it into our planning. Hope this adds some additional data points for folks to use. 👍

I got all 16. But then again, my last job was at Schwab and they have great resources on how to set up a plan. I gotta agree with you that first and foremost is budget. Before you can decide what is enough you gotta know how much you want to spend. The royal family probably spends more than you would ever dream of. Also, some "unplanned" expenses can and should be planned for. If you own your home you will need to replace the hot water heater, the refrigerator, the roof, the furnace etc. Unless you die first. Build it into the budget.

If I can hold off until 70 to collect SS, my income from SS alone will fund my life.

I have a detailed retiree monthly budget, plus a great number of one-time expenses that I have accounted for. I reduced those one-time expenses into monthly costs to get an idea what I would need (monthly) in income over my social security benefit. I then got an annuity to cover that gap. Of course, repeated tweaking of my anticipated retiree budget has added some expenses that I’ll have to cover from my brokerage portfolio. (E.g. a golf membership plus season tickets (with booster fees) for Gators sporting events, et al.)

great points about inflation and having a detailed budget, Joe. having a generic monthly budget estimate isn't effective for the inevitable sudden random expenses.

How does retiring early affect social security payments later on when you start taking? You have 40 quarters and were paying in the max when you decide to retire in mid 50's.

Joe, have you run a scenario in Boldin where Social Security benefits a reduced to, say, 70% in 2033? What were the results? What levers did you adjust to get your plan back to a 80-85% success rate?

When your the best at something, and enjoy making boat loads of cash while doing it part-time, it's a no brainer !

For taxes as a retiree - now you have to pay quarterly estimated tax. Plan on that change, too.

How much saving in % of total net worth do I have to keep untouched ?

Wow, I aced the DIY test. Perhaps the only part I haven't done complete anal-retentive work on is the medical expenses (I'm 60), though I have an inflation-indexed IRMAA section of my spreadsheets as part of my tax plan & have a sizeable amt put aside just for medical and to "self-insure" for long-term care as you've also alluded to in a recent video. I also have a plan to be able to maximize ACA subsidies for a couple of years if it comes to that, but I haven't put the specific numbers in. All the other ones on the list have all been accounted for. Unlike you, I've got $1000 a month "cushion" rather than $500. So far it's only been used once. The plan even has inflation-indexed tax brackets lol. Good stuff, good to know we've got it covered.

#17 might be your plan for when you are mentally/physically unable to DIY anymore.

9 years out from retirement. I own 0 international. 14 years is a long time to wait for a positive return 🤔 Could have doubled my money more than twice in the S&P 500.

A coworker died this year and after 20 years not one coworker went to his memorial. There was a speech about him, a moment of silence for him and then we all moved on. Sad…no one cares. All they really want from you is you to work so they can make money off your back and loss of health.

Wow great information . I live in Canada and what your going through my family is just on the edge of having to do.