Comments on: Our Early Retirement Plan: Where We Are Now (Part 1)

By: Tim

Tim — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 22:59:41 +0000

if you already own a car and have car insurance, zipcar makes no sense is expensive. it’s cheaper to rent a car. why not get a scooter for SF? but you say your wife gets a bus pass

By: Erica Douglass

Erica Douglass — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 18:47:52 +0000

Hi Lazy Man,

I feel your pain on both the ZipCar and on owning a house… I live in San Jose, so no ZipCars here too, although my friends in SF swear by them.

Also, I will definitely agree that owning a house is more expensive than renting — although many from outside California have a hard time understanding this! :) (Happy renter here.)

-Erica

By: Lazy Man

Lazy Man — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 18:08:43 +0000

We do plan to buy a house, but we aren’t sure if it’s going to be in SF or in Boston. It doesn’t make much sense to buy in San Francisco now, the rents are proportionally much cheaper than the mortgages.

By: Miss M

Miss M — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 16:55:32 +0000

Do you plan to buy a house in SF in the future, if prices come down? Just curious if your retirement planning figures in owning a home or renting for life. Also I think working a limited amount can still be called retirement, there are a lot of experts out there pushing semi-retirement as a way to live the life you want without the worry of saving a huge nest egg.

By: Lazy Man

Lazy Man — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 19:18:20 +0000

No problem, they were very valid questions. They may still be valid when the series is done. I should have probably outlined all the parts in the Introduction so that people know how I attacked it.

Early retirement (by any definition) is hard to plan, and the organization of how I present that information could have been better on my part.

By: Mr. ToughMoneyLove

Mr. ToughMoneyLove — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 18:50:57 +0000

Lazy Man – Sorry for jumping ahead on you. I’m looking forward to reading the next installments.

By: Lazy Man

Lazy Man — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 18:18:36 +0000

Mr. ToughMoneyLove:

Shhh, you are giving away the good stuff :-). I had written about a definition of “retirement”, before, but I’m saving that for tomorrow where I talk about my retirement plan in detail.

The series is going to be both of our retirement plans. As for the timing, I cover that in part 3 to some degree. My wife has 11 years before she’s eligible to retire from the military with 50% of her base pay for life. So that timing is specific to the day.

For me, the timing is going to be fluid. Maybe I just end up outsourcing more stuff and winding down my responsibilities. In some way, I’ve tested that this week by writing this whole series in a few hours on Friday and Saturday. That matches my definition of retirement quite well.

While I’m taking each of us separately in parts 2 and 3, it’s mostly for ease of explaining it. It also gives the reader insight into two ways one could “retire” early (again depending on definition). I don’t want to give the impression that this isn’t a team effort.

By: Lazy Man

Lazy Man — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 18:00:37 +0000

We are in the peninsula (middle of Silicon Valley), but it’s easier to just say San Francisco for those who aren’t familiar with the area.

We have thought about going down to 1 car. As you mentioned a Zipcar doesn’t really work well in suburbia. The biggest issue is that about once or twice a week, we really need two cars or would have to spend about 3-4 hours trying to plan our trips around the car. That 3-4 hours a week is definitely worth the cost of maintenance and insurance.

It feels like there should be a solution, but I can’t come up with one. Maybe I can use this to convince my wife that I need a Segway ;-) – nah that won’t work.

By: Mr. ToughMoneyLove

Mr. ToughMoneyLove — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 17:54:38 +0000

I would have thought that part one in this series would be your definition of “retirement.” Some people would consider working on websites from home and an unspecified “start up business” to be retirement. The other part of this is who is planning on retiring – you, your wife, or both? If both, since you have separate finances, who goes first? Do you get to retire on her assets? Vice-versa? Or is it every spouse for himself/herself? Looks like you have some unanswered questions and missing planning steps, right out of the gate. It would be interesting to read how you work these issues out.

By: Erica Douglass

Erica Douglass — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 17:37:10 +0000

Hi Lazy Man,

Since you live in SF, have you considered going down to 0 or 1 cars and using ZipCar? I’m guessing since your rent is only $2075 that you don’t live in SF proper, so this may not be an option, but it sounds like the two of you don’t really need 2 cars.

-Erica