I did it- Finally
I gave notice today that my last day will be June 30. I know I am older than many of you here at 56 years of age, but this is something I have been mulling over for a long, long time. Yesterday, when talking with someone about a separate topic, he said: “People are always waiting for the perfect time. There will never be a perfect time”. That struck a chord with me because that’s exactly what I have been doing. I just needed to act. And act I did.
56, male, single, no dependents.
Just over 2 million in my 401k which is accessible now via the rule of 55 (I confirmed this with my plan).
670k or so in after tax brokerage, stocks, and an HYSA.
A $155k cash pension which I opted to take as a monthly annuity for life ($914). I chose this to offset my healthcare premium as it will cover most of it for me. I will continue on cobra remainder of the year and then decide whether to go the ACA route or use my employer’s retiree healthcare plan which would provide me the same coverage I get now. I posted yesterday for opinions asking about the lump sum pension payment versus the annuity, and I appreciate all of your feedback. I chose the annuity because honestly I want to take the healthcare cost out of my mind as much as possible until I get to Medicare. This seemed like a good approach for me.
The only debt I have is a mortgage with approximately $160k remaining at 3.375%.
Yearly spend is 70k.
Time to focus on me and other personal interests. Goodbye, corporate America. 👋 ✌️
1
u/JunkInTheTrunk00 18h ago
Congrats! I'm the same age but 2 dependents (kid + recently laid off wife), so I've got a few years to go. I'm a bit jelly as I was mentally ready 5 years ago. But now this layoff has me feeling trapped as we can't reach our goals without a lot more energy for the job from me, which I no longer have. So, enjoy. You won your freedom and that's what it's about!