Has the extra spending made you happier? Do you feel like you're getting enough happiness serotonin or dopamine (or whatever those good brain chemicals are) for your extra spent dollars? I do NOT mean this as a loaded question. It's what I struggle with and I think is the essence of all spending discussions...are you getting enough good brain chemicals for your dollar?I came around to this same line of thinking two years ago as we were beginning our 9th year of retirement. We began retirement (ages 53 and 51) using a 3.25% WD rate. Even with a very conservative asset allocation, through a combination of good equity market returns, nice yields on fixed income (in the last several years) and more often than not spending less than our budget (despite trying to), our assets grow and our WD rate fell well below 3%.
Because you only took 3% to begin with, you "re-retire" (adjust your 3$ draw to the new portfolio balances from here forward). And if things had gone badly, you can continue on your original path because you only took 3% to begin with. And if 3 years after you "re-retire", you either re-retire again or stay the course with your latest re-retirement!
I'm not sure if 3 years, 4 years or 5 years is the right number for this. But you are onto something. You never have to suffer a cutback but can still look forward to possible future spending increases…
For 2025 we reset our WD to 3.25% of our year end 2024 asset balance. For 2026 we increased that at the rate of inflation (which has us below what we would draw if we reset again). We will revisit resetting again at the end of this year or the end of next year.
Definitely felt we were leaving too many experiences on the table with our original plan. While we still are grossly underspending what we can afford to spend, we would have to invest a lot of effort to come up with travel and entertainment ideas to spend a lot more than we already are (discretionary spend is well over 1/2 of our current year budget). While we are planning to leave a nice legacy for our daughters, we are also helping them now with home purchases and renovations.
Statistics: Posted by Leesbro63 — Sun Jan 25, 2026 11:44 am — Replies 166 — Views 41755