But if you work longer than you needed to, you still busted your retirement. Only you busted it at the beginning instead of the end.

This is something that I have started to ponder recently. I am approaching age 50 and become eligible to make “catch up contributions” into my 401k. But if it looks like I will have more than enough to fund my retirement needs, is it in my best interest to try to avoid the tax man or to accelerate my retirement date? It seems foolish to wait until you’re 59.5 to open the floodgates and start spending significantly more. But it’s not like $7500/yr is all that significant so I’m probably over analyzing the situation.

There is the option of Substantially Equal Payments between age 55-59.5 should the need arise to access retirement accounts, but being locked in for five years could be frustrating. It would not be the ideal way to access retirement funds but if you ran out of taxable assets it’s at least an option.

I think it just comes down to looking at all after tax spendable income you are generating yearly (both working and investment). We have rarely drawn any cash out of our taxable accounts to fund any spending in our yearly lifestyle needs so it’s hard to think in that manner, as funny as it may sound. I never thought I would have difficulty shifting from an accumulation to a drawdown mindset with all of the spreadsheets I’ve maintained over the years but I probably need to prepare for it more intentionally in the next few years.


Jeff