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In my case, there was little in the way of cap gains; I'm a buy & hold guy. I rarely sell, and when I do, it is for tax loss harvesting.
I retired and didn’t want the encumbrance of managing a building any longer. Real estate runs in cycles and it looks like I got out of commercial real estate at the right time. Sometimes buy and hold doesn’t always fit one’s situation well.
In regard to tax loss harvesting, the benefit is derived from being able to balance the losses against gains so the gains end up being tax free. Otherwise the losses just carry forward and you can only use $3000 against earned income.
it kicks the tax can further down the road really just delaying taxes not avoiding taxes .
whatever you buy after selling has the cost basis pointer set at todays cost so any future gains are all taxable .
the old investment that was at a loss has to regain back to first owe taxes .
if the old investment which was down moves up 10% you may not owe tax .
if you sold the old investment and bought a new one and it moves 10% you owe tax
so the best deal going is when one has room in the zero capital gains bracket and can actually avoid taxes. tax gain harvesting is a gift from the tax gods when one can use it.
we delayed selling and kicked the tax can down the road . for the size of the gain the rate jumped from 15 to 23.80% so delaying hurt us
it kicks the tax can further down the road really just delaying taxes not avoiding taxes .
whatever you buy after selling has the cost basis pointer set at todays cost so any future gains are all taxable .
the old investment that was at a loss has to regain back to first owe taxes .
if the old investment which was down moves up 10% you may not owe tax .
if you sold the old investment and bought a new one and it moves 10% you owe tax
so the best deal going is when one has room in the zero capital gains bracket and can actually avoid taxes. tax gain harvesting is a gift from the tax gods when one can use it
I have no idea what you folks are talking about, or how it may relate to this topic (ie, annual expenditures). I earned my retirement by practicing my difficult profession, I gave it my all, and now want to comfortably sail into the sunset. I can't imagine dealing with tax gain harvesting (whatever that is) and similar preoccupations even at this active stage of early-ish retirement (age 64), let alone when I get old for real :-).
At the moment, am drinking an interesting variant of green tea while making notes on two books (I always read two different things in parallel), The Mammoth Book of Explorers and one of four semi-popular/semi-professional books on particle physics from our local Cambridge MA Nobel laureate Frank Wilczek. This activity fascinates me, costs nearly nothing (ok, the tea did cost me something at a specialty tea store on Christopher St in NYC, but it couldn't have been much), and both books are free from the library. To each his/her own :-).
Our highest unexpected/emergent expense by far has to be purchasing an additional 10ac parcel of undeveloped land next to our current property. The owner had gone into Assisted Living in January, and needed the funds. Knowing the situation, we paid his asking price and kicked in all closing costs. We didn't want to finance it, so it took about 80% of our emergency cash fund away. It will increase our tax load a bit, but as it is adjacent to our existing land and undeveloped, we are able to apply homestead exemptions, so we should be good.
Groceries, Car Gas, Recreation, Entertainment, Clothing, Gifts, Miscellaneous*: $14,400
Medicare/Med Supplements, Dental and Co-Pays: $10,800
Utilities, including phone and internet: $6,240
Property Taxes: $4,440
Major Expenses**: $2,000
House Insurance $1,500
Car Insurance: $1,080 TOTAL: $41,060
*Everything that we don't have an automatic deduction or receive a bill
**These are irregular expenses of more than $300, such as getting a new major appliance, but I would say these average a total of about $2,000 per year. If it is less than $200, it is included with the first 'miscellaneous' category.
We have only been retired for about 3 1/2 years, and so far, the only unexpected expense was some major dental work that cost about $2,500 out of pocket (total).
Boy I don’t know if I should be scared or not? Lol. Some of these spending budgets are close to what I spend a year. And I’m still working and in a hcol area. I thought retirement was supposed to be a little cheaper!?
Boy I don’t know if I should be scared or not? Lol. Some of these spending budgets are close to what I spend a year. And I’m still working and in a hcol area. I thought retirement was supposed to be a little cheaper!?
Reality check. The downsized house is more expensive and so is everything else.
Boy I don’t know if I should be scared or not? Lol. Some of these spending budgets are close to what I spend a year. And I’m still working and in a hcol area. I thought retirement was supposed to be a little cheaper!?
Fallacy. You’ll likely spend more in retirement with more time on your hands, more healthcare issues as you age and the biggie: the realization that if you don’t spend it, someone else will.
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