Walk away from $1 million a year?

[Anonymous]

Well what do you spend in a year?

If you’ve been making 7 figures for years now, I’m going to assume you have fancy tastes.

Can you actually live on 200k? When was the last time you tried?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The choice is yours. I'd want to leave my grandkids with fully paid for college/graduate school college funds and maybe gift each kid enough for a nice house.

So you'd want to spend years of your life working in a job that you "absolutely hated" just so you could pay for your GRANDkids' college and buy all your kids a house? Wow. My kids would never, ever want me to do that!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:On a scale of 1-10, how much do you hate the job?

10

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here. I should add that all the kids are out of college and married. We have a mortgage of about 2k a month and no other debt.

What’s your current net worth?

$5.8 million as of today

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here. I should add that all the kids are out of college and married. We have a mortgage of about 2k a month and no other debt.

What’s your current net worth?

$5.8 million as of today

Live on $100k for the next 6 months. If it's easy; quit. If it's a struggle: make changes so you can quit.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:OP here. I should add that all the kids are out of college and married. We have a mortgage of about 2k a month and no other debt.

I mean, I'd probably pay off the house. I know its not necessary but just a mental thing before quitting work. But obviously you can easily do what you are proposing.

I'd work one more year, pay off the house, get everything in order, then walk away.

Another miserable year, another million dollars that's taxed to death and ends up being a lot less. Then you pay off the house and have no mortgage but your overall net worth doesn't change. You just have more of it invested in your house and not generating any income. So your portfolio generates less money but you have no mortgage.

Isn't that six of one, half dozen of the other, except you've lost another year?

You do not understand net worth, my friend.

Sure I do. It's gross assets minus liabilities. If you have, say, $5 million in stocks/bonds and a house worth $1 million but with a $500k mortgage, then your net worth is $5.5 million. If you take $500k from the stocks/bonds and pay off the mortgage you now have $4.5 million in stocks/bonds and $1 million in your house -- $5.5 million again. No difference.

No, because he's working another year and paying off the house with that money. You said "six of one, half a dozen of the other, except you've lost another year" which indicates that you do not realize that working another year and making another million dollars, whether it goes into stocks or to pay off debt, will in fact improve OP's net worth. There is a difference.

NP here. PP was quite clear, work another year, then pay off the house, but your net worth does not change. Yes, that's correct, it won't change (other factors not withstanding) whether you pay off your house after that extra year or not. If you compare it to a year ago, yes, of course it will change, you will have worked another year and you will have likely received other non wage income but PP (who totally understands net worth and you're all just being dicks about it) wasn't talking about that he/she was talking about whether to then pay off house.

No, you're reading incorrectly. PP was saying that working the extra year wouldn't change OP's net worth -- that's why he said "Isn't that six of one, half dozen of the other, except you've lost another year?" The implication is that OP's net worth would be the same either way, and the only difference is the lost time. That's incorrect, and demonstrates that PP does not understand net worth.

also
OP here -- I wrote that forgetting to ID myself, sorry. Of course I know working another year and paying off the mortgage would also marginally increase my net worth. It wouldn't be a life changing increase, though, and I'd be in hell another year . . .

I really, honestly, truly understand the concept of net worth, and I really, honestly, truly understand that every year spent being miserable and earning another million increases my net worth!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Well what do you spend in a year?

If you’ve been making 7 figures for years now, I’m going to assume you have fancy tastes.

Can you actually live on 200k? When was the last time you tried?

I haven't been making 7 figures for "years now." I've been making in the mid to high six figures for the last dozen years or so, and have just now hit the seven figure mark. I guess I have the portfolio I have because our tastes aren't particularly fancy.

Last year we spent $250k, but that included paying for a nice wedding for our youngest. So far this year we've spent $125k, but we still have three and a half months to go.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I would totally quit.

Signed, a non-partner in biglaw who can't stand it and wishes I was in the financial position to quit. It sounds like you know what you're doing financially. And wow, what a low mortgage payment you have (jealous). Enjoy your retirement.

Thank you, my brother/sister.

[Anonymous]

It's just money. It serves you, not the other way around.

[Anonymous]

Life is too short to do something you hate. If there's a short term goal, that's one thing, but a decade? No way.

If you got hit by a bus at year 9, you'd wish you had spent less time working.

[Anonymous]

If I were you I'd leave the practice of law but I'd look for something else interesting to do. With my kids out of the house I have plenty of time to continue to work (and at least in my case I want to continue making money - I wouldn't be comfortable in my mid 50s starting to draw on my assets). I know plenty of lawyers who have gone on to do other interesting things - it's not a life sentence. Surely you have some other interests and skills that you might be able to transfer to another short term career, even if it's not as highly paid? Business, government, teaching, non profits, becoming a chef, consulting, leadership coaching (all things I know former lawyers have done).

[Anonymous]

I know someone who happily worked for a long time in a federal agency and was brought in as a partner at a big firm. She's made $1M+ over the past few years, dresses a lot better, bought a really nice house, paid for her kids to go to college, and built up a good nest egg. But, she works 60+ hours a week, feels she's protecting bad actors rather than doing good and she is pretty unhappy. She'd be psyched to downsize the house, go back to shopping Macy's sales and tell her kids to finance law school on their own for an academic job or a judgeship (after 2020).

[Anonymous]

In a heartbeat. I could easily live on less than $200K a year, and I'd want to enjoy retirement while my spouse and I still had our health. There are no guarantees. You likely can't spend a million a year for the rest of your life, anyway, so it's sitting in the bank while you are miserable.

[Anonymous]

But what about the poster who says she'd keep working until she paid for all her grandkids college and grad school and bought all her kids a house? Am I a bad person for thinking that that's overkill? My kids certainly don't expect or want that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:But what about the poster who says she'd keep working until she paid for all her grandkids college and grad school and bought all her kids a house? Am I a bad person for thinking that that's overkill? My kids certainly don't expect or want that.

First of all, (s)he's crazy. Nobody has to keep working at a job they hate just to pay for grandkids' education and children's homes. You're in your 50s, you've amassed a lot of money, and if you want to call it quits that's a perfectly fine choice.

Also, to be totally clear, if you've got a $5.8M NW and you're in your 50s and you'll start drawing on your nest egg at $200k/year, then in all likelihood you will die with a large amount of wealth to pass on to your kids/grandkids when the time comes. But nobody should count on that of course.