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The week's question
In December 2024, in the thread "Re: BRK: Why Not XOM?", BreckHutHigh asked the members: "What about the long road trips with kids?" This week it is put to everyone again. The button below opens the small thread re-asking it - read what others have said so far, then give your own answer as an ordinary reply.
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Personal Finance / Retirement Investing
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Author: FlyingCircus   😊 😞
Number: of 1282 
Subject: Re: First Withdrawal
Date: 05/01/26 10:00 PM
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you will qualify for very substantial health insurance subsidies, even after the enhanced subsidies went away this year.

Yup, been all over those calculations for months, and no. 2 problems that just don't show up in the media. 1.) Unless we downsize to a (non-existent) smaller, lower cost house, we need 60K just to cover mandatory expenses - mortgage, prop taxes, Medicare + part D for DW, 1 car payment, groceries, utilities including now $5+ a gallon oil for heat. Then "discretionary" of $2K-$3K a month - without extravagant travel - brings us right up to that $84K subsidy cap. That's BEFORE the $800/month med & dental insurance for me, with a 7500 deductible, for the cheapest bronze HDHP I can get.

Pension (moderate) and Social Security are taxable income that count against the cap.

2.) No taxable funds left. Don't have enough millions$ for Roth IRA conversions like some here. I spent down our taxable brokerage account to help pay for dear daughter's college and then graduate school, and then covering some withdrawals last year while unemployed and funding an HSA with the remnants. 95% of our retirement money is in traditional IRAs. And of course those withdrawals are taxable income that count against the cap.

So, no, we don't qualify for subsidies. Part of the reason I went back to w*rk for a year-ish.

FC
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This community has written 1,215 posts about Retirement Investing. The article-length ones it recommended most:
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