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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]You can probably refinance but I really think you are on shaky ground for retirement long term.  You've got very limited savings and income.  I would seriously downsize and pay off most of the loans with your home equity.  Even a $1 million house would give you a lot more finanical security.

The maintenance on 2 houses alone must eat up a lot of your income? [/quote]

We are open to downsizing and will most likely do so in the next five years. What I would like clarification is why you think we are on shaky ground for retirement with our current savings. We dip into savings less than the earnings. If one looks at our savings over the last five years since retirement, our savings in absolute terms has increased without considering inflation ..... and even allowing for inflation, the impact has been modest.

The second home is fully paid and our only expense is the condo fees.

Quite honestly, if we downsized, our lifestyle would not change ........ we'd probably just give more money to our kids and grandkids.

Having said this, I do accept that the level of indebtedness on our house is not typical of retirees.[/quote]

Because you've got to plan for 20-30 years of living on your income (my grandmother died at 99, others in my family and my DHs family seemed to make it to their 90s), you've got relatively little equity in your home and a modest savings acount (I recognize that $1.2 million may not seem modest to some, but for someone with 2 houses, one of which is worth $1.6 million, you are presumably living at the somewhat higher end of the scale).

Your mortgages take $78,000 of your income, untilities and maintenance of two homes must cost another $20-25k (I have 2 houses and that's conservative for ours), so that leaves you with very little for anything else.  As I understand it you are also drawing down your principal at $42,000 a year.

What happens when one of you needs to go into a nursing home, or needs other long term care?  That cost an arm and a leg for my in-laws and grandparents and ate away at principal mighty fast.

I assume you have a good financial advisor so I'd sit down with him/her and go over the refi options and what makes the most sense.  As a comparison, I am 50, we have at least $2.5 million saved for retirement,  and refied both mortgages to 15 years so that we have them fully paid off a few years before age 65.  Our total mortgages are $600k against home value of about $2 million (so value probably not too different from yours).  And I am nervous about having enough for retirement and am ramping up our savings substantially.[/quote]

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