Thank you for all you’ve done for me and my family. We are eternally grateful for all of the advice and counsel you’ve given us over the years. Our thoughts and prayers are with you and your family. Godspeed
Thanks for sharing. I can relate to the car-frugality. I still drive the 2000 Tundra I purchased 6/1999. I’m sometimes ribbed by my friends, but knowing I “could” buy that Tesla or Jag, but choose not to, is comforting. Many of the choices I/we’ve made “not to” put us in the fortunate financial position we’re in today. We now have choices we otherwise might not have had. Transitioning to the spending phase and giving ourselves permission to spend on things beyond the necessary has been harder than I thought. I guess that’s normal for lifetime savers/investors. We too have also dialed down the allocations of our accounts, currently 45/55 equity/fixed, a significant downshift from our working and savings years. After recovering from ‘87, ‘00, ‘08-‘09, the Pandemic sell-off, and everything in between, I realized we’d won the game and decided to follow my own advice for once and “not take more risk than necessary to achieve the objective”. Hopefully the angst of spending will start to dissipate with the realization that we’ll never be younger or healthier than we are at this moment. Thanks for all of your musings and advice over the years. And thanks to all the contributors to Humble Dollar.
Regarding the question of whether or not to pay off your mortgage, I’ve entertained hundreds of conversations on the matter. In the early days I would consider the mortgage rate, tax bracket, appreciation rate of the property, investment alternatives, etc., all in an effort to provide the “right” answer…simply to find out in the end that the they “just didn’t want to owe anybody”. I soon learned that it was much better to talk about how they “felt” about paying off the mortgage before running the numbers. Further, I found it made less sense to pay if off early if you were still working and had the cash flow to satisfy the debt service. But once you retire, it’s all about cash flow. If you lack a pension or any other “guaranteed” income stream, and you rely primarily on your tax deferred savings for your income it doesn’t make much sense to withdrawal money and pay tax at 20% to service a 3% mortgage payment. Bottom line, I encouraged everyone to pay the mortgage off by the time the retired. And not once has anyone ever come back to me and said they regretted doing so.
Comments
Thank you for all you’ve done for me and my family. We are eternally grateful for all of the advice and counsel you’ve given us over the years. Our thoughts and prayers are with you and your family. Godspeed
Post: Jonathan and website update
Link to comment from September 21, 2025
Thanks for sharing. I can relate to the car-frugality. I still drive the 2000 Tundra I purchased 6/1999. I’m sometimes ribbed by my friends, but knowing I “could” buy that Tesla or Jag, but choose not to, is comforting. Many of the choices I/we’ve made “not to” put us in the fortunate financial position we’re in today. We now have choices we otherwise might not have had. Transitioning to the spending phase and giving ourselves permission to spend on things beyond the necessary has been harder than I thought. I guess that’s normal for lifetime savers/investors. We too have also dialed down the allocations of our accounts, currently 45/55 equity/fixed, a significant downshift from our working and savings years. After recovering from ‘87, ‘00, ‘08-‘09, the Pandemic sell-off, and everything in between, I realized we’d won the game and decided to follow my own advice for once and “not take more risk than necessary to achieve the objective”. Hopefully the angst of spending will start to dissipate with the realization that we’ll never be younger or healthier than we are at this moment. Thanks for all of your musings and advice over the years. And thanks to all the contributors to Humble Dollar.
Post: A Time to Spend
Link to comment from January 13, 2024
Insurance. All of it. Auto, Home, Boat, Liability Umbrella, Earthquake, Medical, Dental, Long Term Care. The largest single expense in the budget.
Post: What costs are you most loath to pay?
Link to comment from December 16, 2023
Regarding the question of whether or not to pay off your mortgage, I’ve entertained hundreds of conversations on the matter. In the early days I would consider the mortgage rate, tax bracket, appreciation rate of the property, investment alternatives, etc., all in an effort to provide the “right” answer…simply to find out in the end that the they “just didn’t want to owe anybody”. I soon learned that it was much better to talk about how they “felt” about paying off the mortgage before running the numbers. Further, I found it made less sense to pay if off early if you were still working and had the cash flow to satisfy the debt service. But once you retire, it’s all about cash flow. If you lack a pension or any other “guaranteed” income stream, and you rely primarily on your tax deferred savings for your income it doesn’t make much sense to withdrawal money and pay tax at 20% to service a 3% mortgage payment. Bottom line, I encouraged everyone to pay the mortgage off by the time the retired. And not once has anyone ever come back to me and said they regretted doing so.
Post: Four Debates
Link to comment from February 18, 2022