Being tax-free for 20 years was a great help for us. Living frugal and investing 'hard' helped to build our portfolio. I knew that having the pension was going to be a huge help later on [and it certainly is, an E6 pension allows me to be retired], but I had no idea that the greatest benefit from retiring from the military was going to be the healthcare package.
Our investing while on Active Duty allowed us to buy a farm with no mortgage, so that worked out well for us. It is important to have low housing expenses in retirement.
$1490/month is not a lot. But by living in a low cost-of-living region with a long-term extremely depressed economy, it puts us just below the average household income. My Dw working [in a grocery store] puts us head-shoulders above the average household income in this area. Who would have ever guessed that would be the case? In the high COL areas we have lived in previously, we would be severely scraping now.
Tricare Standard is the greatest benefit we have. It's value far exceeds the pension. I would have never expected this. Healthcare costs today have gone up so much that my entire pension is not enough to pay for cheapest health insurance policy [and the deductible would be entirely beyond our ability, ignoring all other living expenses like housing, food, clothing, etc].
While the pension is great and wonderful; Tricare is of far greater value, to us retirees.
Keep this in mind when your portfolio planning, and stay tax-free in all of your financial dealings
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