This is a general topic that's become reasonably top of mind for my wife and I, with a lot of the same dynamics. We also have no kids or family that we plan to leave the pile to (that's how I refer to it
). We're getting better at spending money on ourselves but not THAT good.
Our primary plan is to focus on giving as much of it away as we can while we're alive. There will be charity(s) there at the end, but we think it'll be more fun and rewarding to give away smaller amounts constantly, than 2 or 3 huge gifts to charities that know they are coming when we shuffle off.
One of the problems we're encountering is that with one exception, there isn't anybody in the collection of people that we knew before I retired that we can talk about this stuff with. I've heard the advice 'get new friends' and that certainly makes sense to me. Heck I want to expand my network anyway now that work isn't providing me with a supply of people with similar interests. Leading to the question - where do we find each other?
I read through some of the reviews of that book linked by
@heltok . It appears to be a polarizing book, with many reading somebody that comes across as privileged and so out of touch with reality that it's hard to find the words. First world problems indeed, and I'm totally cognizant and appreciative that these are indeed first world problems. I like first world problems and I wish them on everybody.
Your questions:
So the question is really, how much did life prepare you for this success?
- Not much preparation really, beyond working in high tech and being paid a very good salary. So having enough to have an emergency fund, debt free, and basically whatever we want without having really expensive hobbies - that's been part of our adult life from pretty much the beginning. Our earlier lives were not so well off financially, so its something we're making up as we go along.
What is it that prepared you?
How are you handling this success?
- One first world problem that we're starting to tackle is being willing to spend money on our selves. We're new enough to this (like you - the last year or 2 changed a comfortable retirement into 2 or 3 comfortable retirements, with all indicators that the comfortable requirements will continue accumulating much faster than we can spend them.
- It can be difficult to start spending the retirement money. And both of us know people - coworkers and family - that achieve retirement and don't spend their money on themselves; we don't want to be them.
Do you keep quiet about it or share?
- quiet with 2 exceptions (strangers on this forum, and 1 person from my work network where we've been talking options for most of a year). I still am not specific about how big the pile is, but we've also talked enough that he can guess and its obvious that it's not small.
Do you share wealth with others and how?
- We're just getting started this year with a more robust giving plan than we've ever had. My guess is this year will be modest relative to what we want to get to --- part of that spending money thing and needing to feel like we're not going to accidentally run out. The year after will be more, and in 3-5 years we'll have a system in place for figuring out how much we can give away.
- And in 3-5 years we might even have a more systematic way for deciding where to give it away to
.
- There aren't any individuals we plan to share with.
Have you left your old social scene and moved up in the world formally, ie changed neighborhoods?
- we're looking at houses that we wouldn't have previously considered. We plan to move but we're not in a rush.
What is going on in your life and mind as it relates to this success?
- We keep having days where we look at each other and its like "I don't know what to do with that". Like a day where the portfolio changes more in value in a day than a year of salary back when I was still working. Nothing actually changes for us in the moment - it's not like "ooh - now we can get that <x> we've been wanting, that we couldn't get before.
- It boggles our minds, regularly. I think this is where knowing some people with similar first world problems would be good. If nothing else, my personal experience in life is that people that are especially successful financially (I met these folks almost exclusively through my job) are also some of the best and nicest people I've met. It's not exactly onerous in my mind to join these new-to-me communities.
Anyone join Tiger21?
- Not I. But I have no idea what it is either.
