So it’s been a rather turmoil month on the stock market with Apple really taking it on the nose. Then we have the invasion of Ukraine by madman Putin, the lockdown of Shanghai and Beijing due to COVID as well as cases rising everywhere. Suffice it to say, for someone who’s nearing retirement in 5 months, it has me uneasy.
I have a lot of anxiety about retirement and the future. To list them all, in no particular order:
- Nuclear war
- Running out of money in retirement
- Running out of time on Earth
- Health and inability to do the things I want to do
- Walking away from an awesome job, at an awesome company and all the comp and benefits that go with it
- The fear that I am so blinded by desiring a change in my life, that I’ve discredited the life I have and what I’m walking away from, only to find what awaits me isn’t all that great…or worse, it sucks.
There’s probably a plethora of other fears but those are what come to mind this Saturday morning. However, I had an epiphany in the shower on Friday on the money and job fears. I had read years ago a number of articles on a study on happiness which basically suggested that after about $75K/year, happiness generally declines. Now, I’m not saying that’s my number, because clearly the ability to retire at 54 on a brand new Catamaran took considerably more money than that. But, it does remind me that I really don’t need to maintain my current standard of living to be happy. Sherine and I have been through many financial phases in life and while we’ve been so fortunate to have never lost our home, we did go through a phase where we had to put cash in a drawer at the beginning of each month and when it was gone, it was gone. No more spending.
So, I’m confident we can get back to that, if need.
My father passed away in February. I will miss him. However, this did open up an opportunity for us with his home. So, after talking it over with my sister, she’s going to allow us to buy her out from his home and we can then make it our primary residence. The home is modest. It’s about 1/3 the size of what I live in now. But, it’s comfortable and I think we can make out home…at least until we figure out our next “forever home”. It also will enable us to change domicile from California to Florida. While I’m not super happy with the political climate of that state, I do see that as an opportunity to vote against what I disagree with in that state.
Anyways, I don’t want to talk politics other than: Can’t well all start talking and respecting people with differing opinions again?
This modest house is going to allow us to significantly cut our expenses and weather this financial storm and bring us closer to our boat and a most excellent cruising stomping ground.
Further, since we’re planning on selling our primary residence here, the stock market decline is an opportunity for us to reinvest the net proceeds from our sale.
I have to remind myself sometimes, perspective is everything. We don’t know the future. We can’t predict it so I should stop worrying about it.