Who is Retiring, or Retired?

[tsptalk]

How many of you are either retired or within a couple of years of retiring? With our good friend Spaf and others retiring, we need to come up with new features here on TSP Talk as your allocation strategies will certainly be changing.

Please post any ideas you may have for the site that would be geared toward our retired members and short timers.

Thanks.
Tom

[Spaf]

The retirement strategy




The question is: How do we help each other?


I'm kind of new to the FERS short time position. Haven't been here before!

July 31st is my retirement date. And, I feel like I've been treated like a "mushroom" concerning my retirement strategy.

If any members would like to chime in, please do! Maybe, just maybe we can make the road a bit smoother for those that follow.

Thanks Tom!

Regards, and lets be careful! :) Spaf

[Dave M]

Strategy? The strategic goal is accomplished once one retires -- to work no more. After that the goal is to find ways to fill the hours. For me that means chess, wargaming, bicycling, getting out on the water.

Dave

[Birchtree]

I know I thing for sure - life actually begins at 60 - and a little extra jingle in the pocket sure makes it delightful. Power account, baby, power account.

Dennis - give me Dow 17,000 and S&P 1700 and I buy the lake place and entertain the eventual grand kids.We'll talk more - got lots of ideas to save taxes.

[Master]

Tom,
You might want to re-poll using 5-year brackets. Just as recommended allocation. People with many more years to retirement will probably have higher tolerance for risk... like going back on the market at its peak.
I have 25 yrs to retirement (67).
M

[yakers]

I became retirement eligible a few months ago. I like my job a lot under my last boss. I would not have considered retiring. New boss, looks OK. But a few years back I had a real jerk, I would have left if I could but family & compensation & retirement made me put up with him.

Now being retirement eligible, having the house paid off, no debt and a nice dollop of funds in IRAs & other places and I have "jerk proofed" my work life. I don't feel desperate to leave, my attitude toward work has improved and my effectiveness (if not my efficiency) have improved. I am happy, I sing happy songs to myself and maybe a few are somewhat audible around the office. People wonder who the happy guy is.

I don't know about retirement but Financial Independence is "priceless".

[tsptalk]

Sounds good yakers!

[ocean]

Echo with Birchtree, power account .. power account .. I have 5 more years to take the DSR (Discontinued Service Retirement). My Army Base will be closed in 5 years (estimated) then I will take the early retirement. I am taking the next 5 years to build my power account. Give me the C, give me the S, and give me the I ... Yeah baby ..

Ocean

[yakers]

As the original poster asked, how has your progress to or in retirement changed your asset allocation or other financial plans? I am 55 and expect to retire in the next two years. Over the last two years I have increased my G Fund and put my new contributions in the L 2020 Fund. For 15+ years I was 100% in the C Fund.
My inclination is that when I retire I will shift everything into an L Fund and just have them send me 4% or 5% of the balance each year until I hit RMD age. Another possibility is to transfer some of the TSP into a traditional IRA and then roll that over into a Roth IRA. I'll have to do more tax estimating to figure out if that is a good move.

[ayla]

I"m 59 and retired. Retired a bit earlier than normal because of some health problems. Would be nice to have some pertinent links about IRA's, why rolling over the TSP might be good, etc.

Relevant to what info I would like to see about trading strategies, my pension which is CSRS is pretty generous and stable so I feel free to take a fair amount of risk with my TSP. My main desire is to know what strategy makes sense but always believed the saying "no guts no glory" so don't assume all us "gray-hairs" want to avoid risk.

[tsptalk]

Thanks for the feedback.

When you say trading strategies, did you mean within your TSP or IRA?

I have been wanting to be more active with the IRA information but I haven't been sure if this site is the best place for it. Maybe a separate website project. :D

Tom

[EW_ret]

I retired last year under CSRS. My monthly CSRS pension has been sufficient to pay the bills and enjoy life. I am still putting aside about 10% of my net pension income into my taxable investment accounts at Vanguard. I have not worked any other jobs, and I have no desire to work at this time,

I was very conservative in my TSP accounts until recently. I did not need to be aggressive because I do not need to withdraw the money until RMD when I turn 70. I asked myself should I remain conservative and stay in G Fund, or be aggressive with 60% or more in CSI? What strategy should a young retiree use if they do not need the money from their investments?

I was very conservative with my TSP until last week when I went 65% into the equity funds C, S, and I. By COB today I will have an 85% allocation in the equity funds. Is this being too aggressive? Even with this allocation in my TSP, my overall equity position will stand at 57% in stocks and 43% cash and bonds.

[Dave M]

Congratulations EWG. I'm with you; when I retire I don't want to work any more, either.

What you might consider is the date when you plan to make withdrawls, and go with the L-fund closest to it. If you turn 70 in 2012, say, then maybe the L2010 is for you. Or, examine the mix of that L-fund and create a mix of your own that mirrors it but is more to your liking. I think of the L-funds as expert advice which comes to us for free.

What I have in mind is a fixed dollar figure for my TSP when I go in 2010. Back-calculating from that I can estimate how much I need to have in the market to reach my goal. It works out close to the L2040 even though I am going in 2010. Thus I am being more aggressive than my 'advisor' suggests (L2010).

Dave

[eukrate]

Hi Tom

I'll be retired in about one month (end of april). You may remember I re-allocate frequently, based on my risk calculations. Have been heavy into C and I, some G. For retirement though, I ran the numbers through Financial Engines' site (www.financialengines.com) and came up with
L-2010 40% , G 50%, S 5% , I 5%
L-2010 allocates as G 43% F 7% C 27% S 8% I 15%
thus G 67.2% F 2.8% C 10.8% S8.2% I 11%

( I know one is supposed to dump 100% into an L, but the variance on my allocation is lower than 100%L with the same 7% return)

If I can find a cyber-cafe in southern Europe, I'll let you know how it's working out. Hi to wheels, if he's still around...

[tsptalk]

Nice to hear from you again eukrate! Congratulations on your retirement. Keep us posted.

Tom

[Wheels]

Hi to wheels, if he's still around...

Hey man, good to see you. I miss your input. You are responsible for getting me curious on the dynamics of the I fund and I've done a ton of studying on it and I have a pretty good grip now. Thanks for that.

Later,

Dave
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[yakers]

Hi Tom

L-2010 40% , G 50%, S 5% , I 5%
L-2010 allocates as G 43% F 7% C 27% S 8% I 15%
thus G 67.2% F 2.8% C 10.8% S8.2% I 11%

.
I understnad your AA choice. I am 55 and expect to retire in the next year or two. My current TSP AA is 85% L 2020, 5% S & 10% I. The idea is to reduce the holding in F as well as increase international & small cap. G is a nice fund but I figure a CSRS pension makes up for a lot of bonds. When I retire I may just move everything into L2020. Simple is good too.

[grasshopper]

Retirement sure sounds good but at 55 I see myself working for another 5-7 years as long as my health holds out. Retired military and now work for the government for the last 15 years. Have alway contributed max to TSP but missed out on some good gains while hiding in the G fund. Hoping that with the help of others on this site I can do better... Of course buying this new house did not help matters any..... Still unsure about the correct mix but learn a little more each day. Thanks for all the help.
Bob.

[eukrate]

Hi Tom
I see you're still running this great board! I'm temporarily back in the states,
been doin some travel overseas.. CSRS retirement is great even at half-salary!

Still allocating L-2010 40% , G 50%, S 5% , I 5% . Been good for me lately but missed out on International in 2006 -gotta watch I-fund more closely.

Where's wheels? I see "member deleted" or some such. He is / was a thoughtful contributor.

A warning for those nearing retirement - your agency must notify TSP when you retire, else you have no access to those funds. For 6 months after I retired, TSP insisted I was still 'active employee' and would not release
money, and would not accept my verbal or written statement that I was in fact retired. After extensive fussing with my old agency, they finally filed the required 'TSP-5' form with TSP telling them I really had retired.
A word to the wise..

I'll be around, Tom. Keep up the good work.

[tsptalk]

Hi eukrate. Good to hear from you. We miss your input.

The I fund has been relentless. I should have listened to Buffett when he said the dollar would keep moving lower.

Wheels got his hand slapped by a moderator and decided to quit over it.

Good info on having your agency notify TSP when you retire. I hope a lot of people see that post.