General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: If you are between 30-50 .. how do you feel about your nest egg? [View all]politicat
(9,808 posts)DH and I both came out of school debt-free (in the SL sense) but I'm his second marriage. His ex ended up with much student loan debt, which meant that they ended up with living expenses debt that he assumed (along with the marital assets) when they divorced. We've spent the last 12 years paying it off. (As well as our house. It's complicated, but really, truly, their split was fair and amicable and reasonable.)
We will be entirely debt free in 6 months, including no mortgage. We have been putting aside rainy day funds, but when interest on debt is 5-12% or higher, and interest on an IRA or other savings is in the 1-2% range, it is stupid to save more than 6 months' expenses.
We will be putting most of our salaries for the next few years into savings of some sort. Most of our "savings" right now is in our house's equity, and we're lucky enough to live in a place that only got Great Recession brushed, and to have skills and educations that make us semi-recession proof. We're sort of planning on selling this house and downsizing early, but that's vague.
We won't be living on a cruise ship, but we have a plan.