Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would start taking better vacations.

This would be my approach as well. I think my family sounds a lot like OP’s. I’m a Fed, and was the primary earner for maybe 3 of the last 20 years while DH pursued entrepreneurial opportunities. After that, DH has earned from 3 to 10x my salary, which has given us enormous financial freedom. I have sadly ended up with around $2 million inheritance over the years, and never thought about keeping it separate.

Once our retirement and 529s were in good shape, we paid off our mortgage and then contemplated things for a couple of years. We are in the stage now where we are comfortable paying up to $500 a night for a great hotel or resort when we travel, and it’s kind of amazing how many more fun things that brings you than the Motel 6 experiences of our youth. We could add more luxury and sometimes do, but even these baby steps are lovely. The biggest thing we’ll do is both retire by 60, which is obviously much easier if you are a Fed with health insurance options.

$500 a night for a hotel room sounds completely out of reach. We have always been quite frugal. It’s hard to imagine switching from a mindset of savings to loosening up. We really don’t like one of our cars (2010 CR-V) so maybe our first move should be to replace it. I think we would get more enjoyment out of that than a vacation anyway.

Anonymous wrote:1. Spend some money on therapy, because you are obviously having trouble coming to grips with the fact that you are extraordinarily wealthy and can afford almost anything you want to do or buy.

2. For god's sake, get a financial adviser instead of relying on advice from anonymous DCUM randos.

3. Find a good cause to support!

Anonymous wrote:1. Spend some money on therapy, because you are obviously having trouble coming to grips with the fact that you are extraordinarily wealthy and can afford almost anything you want to do or buy.

2. For god's sake, get a financial adviser instead of relying on advice from anonymous DCUM randos.

3. Find a good cause to support!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We discussed keeping the inheritance separate but spouse was adamant that we commingle it. We have a strong marriage and I think there is gratitude that I have been the primary wage earner for our entire marriage. That’s a good idea to pump up the 529 since our daughter has been talking about graduate school. She hasn’t decided but it would be good to begin funding that. We could always transfer it to a grandchild if necessary. If we were to take nicer vacations I would have to reduce savings. That would be hard for me but I guess our kid will only be with us a few more years so it’s probably worth it.

I appreciate the reassurance that early retirement is not the answer here. I didn’t think so. And I don’t really want to retire yet.

Have you discussed this with an estate attorney? This isn't just about your strong marriage. What happens if your spouse passes before you, and you remarry someone with kids? If you don't comingle, the funds can be put into a trust that you can access for as long as you live and then transfer to your kids. If you don't, you'll have to figure this out in a pre-nup or in your will. Much easier to figure this out now by not comingling.

I commingled a smaller but six-figure inheritance some years ago without any hesitation. I don't really care what happens to the money if I'm dead; I didn't do a thing to earn it, my parents didn't earn it (it came from my grandparents), and my spouse knew and loved them, too, so why should I be the only person who gets any of it? If my grandparents wanted to make sure any and every dollar they left me went to my children and only my children, they'd have left it to my children in trust. They didn't. I understand there are logical reasons not to commingle assets like this, but people on here act like it's absolutely insane to even consider doing it. I really strongly disagree.

I agree with you to an extent. I would comingle, and similarly, I'm not overly concerned about "my" assets after my death, even the ones I earned myself. Still, I told my husband that if I die early and he re-marries, he needs to get a prenup figured out to ensure our kid ends up with whats left of "my half" of our marital assets in the end, instead of a new wife and step kids. He's a really good person, and loves our kid, I trust him to honor that (and vice versa). I don't expect him to marry a gold digger, but money can do weird things to people. We talked through ways to do this via a trust & will, and it just is much simpler to trust the surviving spouse to act ethically. Not ironclad, but good enough for me.

That was dumb. You could have put it in a revocable trust that turns into an irrevocable trust at your death, with your husband the beneficiary and your children the remaindermen at his death.

Anonymous wrote:Spouse needs to get a post-nup. It's his money, not yours.

Anonymous wrote:My spouse recently inherited $3 million, increasing our net worth from just over $2 million to now north of $5 million. Our household income is about $210,000 a year and our suburban townhouse is paid off. Our budget is well defined and I am not sure whether we should change anything. Investments are all with Vanguard in diversified index funds. We are ages 49/50 and our only child‘s college fund has enough for her undergraduate education which will begin in two years. There will be no more inheritances. I have always managed the finances in our family but I am unsure whether to make any revisions to our budget. We are saving 1 401K, and two back door Roth IRAs plus a family HSA.

The only place money could come from in our budget is if we reduced savings. Would you do this? My spouse works part time and high don’t have any plans to retire until I am closer to 60. I don’t think we have enough money yet to handle the cost of early retirement health insurance and we both come from long-lived families.

Anonymous wrote:Thank you for the very solid comments here. I also did a double take at “income producing prostitutes.” Hilarious. I do like the idea of taking some set amount of money and deciding to spend it each year. We are financially conservative, although not for any particular reason. Like many, we have saved regularly and our investments have done well over the past two decades. We were unable to have additional children so that kept our expenses low. That said, we don’t deny ourselves anything. It would take some thought to spend an extra $50,000 a year. I think I’d like to put us on a waiting list for a new car. There are a few new electric cars coming out that interest us.

I know there are some software programs that model how much you can spend, I like to do my own research rather than hire help. My experience with hired financial advisors has not been great. Our estate documents will funnel this money to our child so that has been done. Spouse is already basically retired, working one or two days a week for pure pleasure.