re: How much of an emergency fund do I really need?

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What if you need to make a big purchase? Wouldn't it be better to have the ability to liquidate assets held in a brokerage account for a good down payment rather than having all that money tied up in a 401k?

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Sure, but you can do that on your roth if need be. What is nice about the 401k is its a lot more painful to raid than your roth. So you have a disincentive from raiding it.

If you know you are going to buy a house or a car soon, then yeah, a brokerage account might be a better bet.