My Financial Situation ( Need Advice)

Does your wife work? How much does she pull in?

I agree with what others have said but wanted to explain why you should not pay early on the house note.

2% is about the rate of inflation. Because of this alone, your note effectively costs you nothing. So don't pay more than the minimum each month.

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Household Income: 54,000 take home

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So you get checks in your name for $4500 a month or you make $4500 a month before taxes?

your set expenses sound too low given the price of your house. Something doesn't sound right to me.

Are you sure this is all of your set monthly expenses? This includes groceries, auto insurance, electricity, gas, sewer, water, etc.?

Quit worrying about the life insurance. If your spouse works now, she will work after you’re dead. Think of building your retirement savings as self-insuring your own life: as those funds aren’t subject to probate, retirement funds pass directly to the named beneficiary upon your death. So find some spare change each month, set up a retirement account, and add to it regularly. Make sure your wife is named as the beneficiary, with your children as contingent.

Make sure you are actually discussing all of these things with your wife. Do not hide any financial issues from her, and make sure you are listening to her views, priorities, interests, etc. (For example, you do not mention saving for kids’ education: she might consider this more important than you do....figure this stuff out with calm conversation.)

—Don’t pay off the house. Just keep paying over time. You’re beating inflation, and you’re not sticking your cash in a non-liquid asset.
—Pay off the personal loan, stat.
—Rebuild your savings as quickly as possible.
—Open a retirement account and direct the funds to very low cost mutual funds. (Vanguard or similar). Pick a target date fund for now. No need to think any more about it, you’re still young. Just let it quietly pile up.

Obsessing over details and inaccurately understanding risk are your Achilles heel—so don’t give into temptation to fiddle in the markets. A direct deduction each month from your bank account into your retirement account means you do not have to look at the details; it will just happen, and you can go obsess about something with much smaller potential downside (like music).

Good luck to you.....

Hi RM,

Build up your emergency fund until you have over six months of reserves and then focus on other areas. If you put money into loans and retirement it is not liquid and you cannot get at it in an emergency. Also, don't count on selling your home or getting an equity line of credit to cover cash outflow in case of emergencies. Credit and housing markets are not liquid, or not in a way that benefits you, if you need cash during an economic downturn.


Good Luck!

I'm not s financial advisor but I can talk with you about the bipolar illness and how you can protect yourself long term.

It would help you tremendously if you had someone that you trusted to bounce your ideas off of before you jump in with both feet. Bipolar can be a sneaky illness in that it can make you so sure that you are right in the way that you understand situations differently than others. Could your wife do this for you?

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"What should i focus on first?"

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Two words... Blockchaining

OP should see if employer offers disability, most big companies do and it’s cheap. It’s really gap insurance to cover the difference between what Social Security pays and what your pay was. It’s usually guaranteed acceptance into the employer risk pool.