To ask if any of you feel financially secure, and if so, what does it look like...?

[Sugarbeach]

Is it even possible? Is it a realistic hope/goal?

[DontmindifIdo]

I am the only one who wants to know what festered does for a living/has done in the past to get to a high wage? [nosy]

[Want2bSupermum]

We keep our cash here in the US because cash limits for FDIC coverage are much higher. Our joint account is covered up to $500k.

Word I hear you on not wanting to end up with spoilt children. DD is two and DH came home saying we should 'do' FAO Schwartz. I put my foot down and said no. Nothing good comes from that. When DD is older she can earn special trips into town. I also think about other things which have an effect on their upbringing such as the cars we drive and our housing. We could have new cars every 5 years and live in a large house. Instead, I refuse to trade in my 8 year old car and expect I will be driving it for another 8 years. A car built today should last at least 150k miles. Housing wise we are looking at living in a house that can be converted into a multifamily once they move out.

Upthread someone was talking about divorce. I have a pre-nup in place and I take an active role in our finances for that very reason. My mother was the dainty housewife who didn't want to be part of the discussion. It cost her dearly. She got a great settlement from my father but still to this day she has no idea about household finances.

[VivaLeThrustBadger]

I kind of feel financially secure but I'm aware that we're only a redundancy away from not been.

We only have about 30k on the mortgage left, we own our cars outright, we have furniture, etc, no loans and we have probably a years worth of wages in savings.

But dh has quite a specialist job and if he got made redundant he might struggle to get employed, certainly at such a level again. He's in his 50s which doesn't help.

I think I'll only feel truly secure once I've retired!

[morethanpotatoprints]

We are financially secure and it feels good.
We don't have a lot of money but are asset rich and some savings.
Pension is in a property rather than a fund, as I didn't trust these .
Everything is paid for, but not necessarily bought new.

[pencilsharpener]

I feel pretty financially secure. I'm about 15 years off an early retirement and have the equivalent of 15 years' net income in savings/investments. And a house with no mortgage. So I could quit my job any time I liked and not worry about the consequences

I'm not at all interested in possessions, so saving has always been easy for me. My car is a 12 year old rust-bucket!

[ItIsKnown]

DH and I are carers to two disabled DC. We have a bit in savings from more economically productive times (not nearly enough to not qualify for help before anyone says anything) but I feel financially secure these days when I've put money on the gas and electric meters and the fridge is full.

I hate being at the mercy of this the government but it won't be forever. We're both graduates and DH is extremely resourceful.

[holidaybug]

Early 40s, largish house, mortgage nearly paid off, no other debts, save over 50% of what we earn.

Do I feel secure? No way! We couldn't afford to live comfortably without working - we'd be fine for a while but not indefinitely.

[itwillgetbettersoon]

I work in the public sector. I don't feel financially secure at all as I could lose my job anytime. 2015/16 is going to be a terrible year for local government so I will be surprised if I survive the next cull. I am late 40s, part time pension and soon to be divorced. I use to feel financially secure when I was married.

[Comfortable]

I feel fairly secure. Joint net worth of roughly 2 million of which roughly a third is my paid-for home, a third is my savings/investments, the last third is spouse savings/investments. On top of that basic state pension entitlements we have accrued so far are worth about 150K each.

This is not how we are invested, but to illustrate, 1.4 million in Vanguard European tracker ETF would mean owning assets with (I estimate) an underlying smoothed earnings yield north of 6% and a dividend yield north of 3% last time I checked, so I reckon you could spend the dividends (call it 40K) and you would only be spending half the underlying returns. (I see risk differently from people up-thread and would cope with two thirds drop in balance. In fact I did, back in 2008/2009.)

Given house paid for, if no-one were working we wouldn't need our (paid-for but worthless) car and core/unavoidable expenses would come to 12K, so no danger of not being able to pay them.

Main risk for me is divorce, as spouse might get half the home. That seems particularly unfair given that I paid 80% of bills during the marriage and am retired, while spouse now earns as much as I used to and intends to work forever.

Next biggest risk is the home itself - a lot of money tied up in one place.

Since people may wonder, the source of 2 million funds is:-

1. my income earned since 1998 funded my savings and paid for the home
2. spouse income earned since roughly 2005 funded spouse savings
3. 400K from home value tripling since 1998.

[alanapartridge]

angelintercepter


I can sympathise. I´m in a similar, if not far worse, position than you - had it all - big house (with big mortgage of course), nice cars, etc.....worked our asses off for 20+ years, OH expanded business then things went soooo wrong.....got so stressed I had a nervous breakdown, and the only way out (because we were tied to many commercial leases) was to sell our house, pay the bank off and virtually give the business away. We literally ended up with nothing, just the clothes on our backs.
Have never had kids (which now seems a blessing !) and now live abroad where we both work freelance and earn very little,(but probably more than we could in UK) rent an apartment, live hand to mouth (so under even more stress every month), haven´t a single shred of security, no possessions, no money for clothes, make-up, hairdos etc.,and because we rent, I can´t even have a dog (which would keep me sane). I´m 58 this month. Don´t stand to inherit a bean. Sometimes life doesn´t seem worth living, but guess you´ve just got to get on with it.
For those of you who didn´t feel very secure before reading this, I bet your bottom dollar you do now ! LOL

[wink1970]

I'm not sure you ever feel completely secure (unless you are a millionaire).

I tick all those except the pension - though we do have a couple of rental houses to sell when needed.

However, it will never be enough. yes I am greedy.