Wow… the story about the couple (and son) was a sad one. It’s hard to live on low income, but even harder w/o a savings safety net.
Thank you for the information about Specific Lot ID. I think I can do that by looking at statements and selecting chunks (low tech). I’ll contact Vanguard to find out.
About the Yahoo article, I absolutely think that choices play a part. Most of us are where we are because of choices and decisions we made years ago. And where we’ll be years from now will spring from decisions we make today. So, it’s never too late to learn new things and make a course correction. I, for one, have been glad that people here have been helpful.
But circumstances can and do conspire to make a poor situation worse. I hope that someone reaches out to this couple as a result of their opening up their financial lives for public scrutiny. I imagine that the purpose of the article was actually to highlight how they have tried to make the best of their challenging situation.
I do not think we will be able to live on about 35%. Maybe it is because our “final income” (before retirement) will not be that large to begin with, or we are unable to be frugal enough.
We are in the “power saving” mode now (like 40% of current income go into the retirement nest egg.) . But so little time left.
Sometimes we wish we could be older (so that we could have Medicare sooner) or we will have a fewer number of retirement years (i.e., a shorter life span.) Are we the only people here who are so pessimistic?
@mcat2 hang in with your high income year that you are in the power saving mode. You have to find outside things to stimulate yourself to stay ‘happy’ because it seems the work world is pulling you down emotionally - that is why you want Medicare sooner. If your health is poor, do what you can to improve your health.
I had to give H an ‘attitude adjustment’ - he is healthy, has a career job where he is highly respected. He is working on his hobby today because we are ‘iced in’ and he will have to work Saturday to make up for no work today. I pointed out that on these high income years, it is also not drawing down our retirement nest egg. I show how our retirement money is growing nicely. H has longevity in his family - paternal really long (6 great aunts living to 103-107, grandpa to 96 and would have been longer if could have avoided the hernia surgery that took too much out of his system, other two siblings lived into late 70’s with one dying of heart disease and a priest dying of prostrate cancer), and maternal fairly long (grandparents into 80’s, and parents currently in 80’s and still living in own home).
I plan to outlive H and enjoy the good cash flow and healthy lifestyle. One has to decide to focus on the important things and divest of the unimportant or less important.
^ Until the day that the machines rise up against us, and traffic accidents kill 90% of us in one day. 
DH and I both have stressful jobs at places with regular layoff cycles. But while we still have the option to stay, we are hanging in there for the extra years of income/savings, the retirement benefits… and allow 401Ks to grow more, untapped.
To make it more palatable, we’ve decided that splurging on fun / travel in the meantime is OK. The last college bill is PAID, so we may even do some house renovations too
@colorado_mom
I was just about to say “balance” is a good way to go. But you said it best. Sometimes a stressful job exacts too high a price. But a leisurely retirement spent worrying about outliving one’s funds can’t be too enjoyable either.
Here’s another Forbes article about retirement expenses. It is notable for its mention of the CPI-E (for Elderly) index. I had no idea there is a “Centrum Silver” version of the CPI:
Love your terminology, and yes, I didn’t know such a thing existed either.
This seems extremely high, especially if you’ve paid off your mortgage.
Where the heck was this person eating lunch, that they saved $10 per lunch every day by brown-bagging it? I buy my lunch every day and spend $6-7. If I brought a lunch it would cost several dollars, so the net savings would be like $3/day.
Lunch w/tax and tip can easily be $13 - savings of $10 a day by bringing lunch.
Perhaps someone can show me how to make a proper “inset” quote box…But, the article does say that:
“older Americans spend relatively more on shelter, and during the last 29 years shelter costs have modestly outpaced overall inflation.”
I interpret this to mean that housing costs for the post-62 population account for 46.9% of their (relatively-reduced) retirement budget. YMMV, of course.
The way I look at it, a fully-paid but large and pricey house carries huge opportunity costs that aren’t even factored into out-of-pocket costs. I happen to like where we live, but the house is too big and will be too empty once D heads off to college.
Edited to add @Dadof3
Thanks, it sounds better than “Elderly.”
Using ( in place of [, and ) in place of ]
(Quote=“someone”)Blah blah blah(/quote)
The =“someone” is optional. The Blah section is usually copied and pasted.
ETA: Or [quot=“someone”]blah blah blah[/quot] with quote spelled correctly. I don’t know why I didn’t do that in the first place 
I suddenly recalled having read this article in the NYT some time ago. Luckily it was easy to find:
“I Want to Be a Millennial When I Retire”
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/05/booming/i-want-to-be-a-millennial-when-i-retire.html?_r=0
Here’s a particularly lovely reader comment to that article:
An American stood on the pier in a small coastal Mexican village, where a boat with a single fisherman docked. The American praised the Mexican on his catch and asked how long he had worked for it.
“Only a few hours,” the Mexican replied.
“Why don’t you go out longer and get more fish?” the American asked.
“This is enough fish to support my family.”
“Then what do you with your free time?”
“I sleep in, play with my kids, take siestas, stroll into the village in the evenings, sip wine with my wife, and strum my guitar with my friends.”
“This is crazy,” replied the American, “With my help, you could catch more fish, buy more boats, sell more fish, open your own company, move to the United States, and eventually run a massive business operation.”
“How long would that take?” the Mexican asked.
“About 20 years,” the American said. “And when you’re ready, you could sell your company for millions of dollars.”
“Millions of dollars? And after that?”
“After that,” the American said, “you could retire. Move to a small fishing village in Mexico, sleep in, catch some fish, play with your grandkids, take siestas, stroll into the village nightly, sip wine with your wife, strum your guitar with your friends…”
Thanks, @IxnayBob. Though it doesn’t make sense to me. 
Quote boxes work like this. You put this in your reply:
[quote]
Put the quoted text here.
[/quote]
And when you post it, it turns into the following:
“How did you get the quote tags to show up without actually quoting?” I hear you ask.
Easy, I used the “code” tag.
“Ask a silly question…”
@notrichenough, I learn (or remember) something every day :). Thanks.
The code tag is really handy for tables, because it uses a fixed-width font and preserves white space.
2015 Tax Brackets (for taxes due April 15, 2016)
Tax rate Single filers Married filing jointly Married filing Head of household
or qualifying separately
widow/widower
10% Up to $9,225 Up to $18,450 Up to $9,225 Up to $13,150
15% $9,226 to $37,450 $18,451 to $74,900 $9,226 to $37,450 $13,151 to $50,200
25% $37,451 to $90,750 $74,901 to $151,200 $37,451 to $75,600 $50,201 to $129,600
28% $90,751 to $189,300 $151,201 to $230,450 $75,601 to $115,225 $129,601 to $209,850
33% $189,301 to $411,500 $230,451 to $411,500 $115,226 to $205,750 $209,851 to $411,500
35% $411,501 to $413,200 $411,501 to $464,850 $205,751 to $232,425 $411,501 to $439,000
39.6% $413,201 or more $464,851 or more $232,426 or more $439,001 or more
@notrichenough, where be this here “code tag”? Much obliged.
Code tags work just like quote tags, except instead of “quote” you use “code”.
We used to have a “noparse” tag for this, but it went away during the Big Change.
There’s other tags like for bolding text:
Make me **BOLD!**
Make me BOLD!
Italics:
Make me *italic!*
Make me italic!
Color:
Make me **BOLD and red!**
Make me BOLD and red!
Links can show just the URL:
<a href="http://www.bbcode.org/reference.php%5B/url%5D%5B/code%5D">http://www.bbcode.org/reference.php
http://www.bbcode.org/reference.php
or some descriptive text instead:
[List of tags for your posts](<a href="http://www.bbcode.org/reference.php">http://www.bbcode.org/reference.php</a>)
[List of tags for your posts](http://www.bbcode.org/reference.php)
That link actually contains a list, but not all of them work here.
Go nuts! 
I think being smart on housing is important. When you no longer want to maintain a home. Also down-sizing when you are able - got to let go of the ‘stuff’ once the kids have set up their own homes.
If you can time selling property when it is ‘hot’, and pull the best cash value.
There are a lot of people who have not saved enough, like the discussion we had on the article with the people moving and then taking out debt on their paid for house because they couldn’t handle some medical costs and costly insurance (based on their modest budget).
We all want to be ‘smart’ based on our own situation. Want to have our money ‘outlive’ us. Live as active and healthy as possible.
I agree with @colorado_mom to do what is enjoyable to get those high income years in, despite the work stresses. Little daily stress relievers too - be it imagery, breathing exercises, meditating, etc.