Our wedding is coming up on July 1st. Since this is just a couple of weeks away, it’s going to mean a tremendous change in our finances aside from just shelling out a whole ton of money for the reception. So, we’ve put some thought into our medium term (3 to 5 year) goals after our nuptials. Some goals we’ve definitely decided on, some we are still batting around.
The one thing we have definitely decided on is maxing out Miel’s retirement. Now that we are done saving for the wedding, Miel can shift the funds she has been reserving for our home and then wedding savings, to our retirement. The means having the ability to increase her contribution from $300 a month to soon putting at least $700 directly into her 403(b) TIAA and CREF account. This makes a lot of sense from a financial standpoint. First it will lower our taxable income, second it will give a market rate (less fees) on the money she’s investing in her retirement and third, we’ll both feel a bit more secure knowing that Miel has something more put away.
We are batting around three other ideas.
1) Saving for another investment property. Personally, I really like the idea of owning real estate and think it makes a lot of sense in the long run.
2) Setting up a ROTH IRA with an eye to hand it on to our children. The big idea here is that one can give one’s ROTH to one’s children without tax liability. Since we don’t have any children yet, any funds in the account would have plenty of time to grow. Ideally, we might present the account to the child as part of their inheritance, or we might give it earlier, with some strings attached.
3) Miel and I have been discussing going traveling around the world for the longest time. While our homes in
We might get some cash wedding gifts, so we anticipate actually being able to get started on funding one or more of these goals.
As always we’ll keep you updated!
Best,
James
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