No doubt, but I will politely suggest that it looks to me like you and your family have also made a lot of wise decisions along the way!
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That is fortunate, makes the retire decision fairly easy. (Though I do know one state worker who wants to keep working to up his percentage, much lower than that…. but also to have slightly increased salary in last years.) Your point about inflation is important too - good you are keeping an eye on that and have other resources too.
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DH and I just reviewed our retirement accounts. OUCH!
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It’s painful right now (and probably will be for some time, unfortunately).
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I just don’t look. What goes down, comes up and vice-versa. Easy to say because all my $ is in Vanguard index funds, managed by my personal adviser.
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We’re in it for the long haul and look at our portfolio only twice a year (no idea what it’s doing today, don’t care) as we don’t plan to make any changes, certainly not in times of volatility. Crashes and corrections are to be expected and must be baked into your projections. Accounting for pullbacks is a basic part of retirement planning and is where FA modeling is helpful. In figuring out how large a nest egg we needed, our annual (re)modeling accounted for a 20% pull-back every eight years, unlikely but provides the comfort factor we require to provide a measure of calm during guaranteed future market volatility. The best bet is to do nothing and wait it out. Certainly don’t add to uncertainty with any ill-timed or knee-jerk reactions. The market always recovers,* so you never win by pulling out (not that anyone here would do that). If you can’t sustain a long recovery time horizon, you may need to consider where/if you invest. You can always put your money under the mattress, but that strategy has drawbacks, too.
Cheer up. This is temporary. Pour a martini and ignore the nonsense. 
*Should the U.S. market fail, we’re all doomed, so we don’t bother worrying about that one.
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Oh, we’ve been retired long enough to have been through this before, and we trust our FA. It’s just tough to see the market going down, with no true end in sight (yet).
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Don’t look. 
ETA: Was just commenting on the jist of your post, @kelsmom, not you specifically. For someone just thinking about retiring, building pullback resilience into the plan is as important as trying to determine how much and when.
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Indeed, the comforting (?) thought re many issues of the day.
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Just look at a long term chart of the market, especially if you can remember the earlier corrections/crashes and what sentiment was like at the time …
Of course, in retirement part of the portfolio is what I heard called the “sleep at night” part (bonds). I’ve watched the market up and down in the decade + we’ve been here in the US and our sleep at night portion never moves much. So it doesn’t give us growth, but it’s there as insurance in case the market crashes at the wrong time.
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These are uncertain times for sure, but the market is resilient. It’s seen the crash of ’29, the Great Depression, two world wars, Korea, Vietnam, the Cold War, The Bay of Pigs/Cuban Missile Crisis, civil unrest, riots, Watergate, the crash of ’89, the dot-com bubble burst, the 2008 recession, Influenza, SARs, MERs, and COVID. And through it all, the market recovers and continues to hit new highs.
Here’s a good article from Morningstar with a table listing the largest real declines in U.S. stock market history. The bottom line:
Still, even if you are looking down the barrel of the next Great Depression, history shows us that the market eventually recovers.
But since the path to recovery is so uncertain, the best way to be prepared is by owning a well-diversified portfolio that fits your time horizon and risk tolerance. Investors who stay invested in the market in the long run will reap rewards that make the turmoil worthwhile.
Again: Turn off the noise, enjoy an ice-cold adult beverage, read some good books, and feed the chipmunks.
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Can I suggest we do everything but NOT feed wildlife. Some of them carry diseases that are pretty bad (bubonic plague, rabies, & other nasties). We can enjoy watching them. Agree to ignoring the noise and staying the course and things will work out.
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My husband looks at things quarterly. I give him the info from my accounts and shut my ears. We had enough to live on for a very long time when we retired in 2018, and as long as it stays above that, we’ll be okay.
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We are about a decade off from retirement, but decided to put some funds into a HYSA a few months ago to diversify and to have some assets in the “Sleep well at night” category.
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H calls this a buying opportunity! Everything is on sale!
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When my husband and I decided to retire was at a different time and with different reasons.
My husband’s job was very demanding with often insufficient supporting crew. He had to work in all kinds of weather condition as long as his work place opened for operation (it rarely closed). His health got worse while stress continued to increase. Then, his elderly mom and one of his brothers suffered serious health issues at about the same time. At 58, my husband asked me if I would be OK if he quit his high paying job. I said yes. He submitted his resignation the next day. He said quitting that job saved his life.
He took care of his mother and brother full-time for two years before he felt he could work again. He has only worked part-time with a job he enjoys and feels like he has found a happy medium of semi-retirement and working on a job that stimulates his brain.
I was a state worker and have a pension. My salary was low but we are never big spenders. I worked until early this year when I maximized my pension benefits (80% of 36 consecutive months of highest salary). I retired at 65. The last 3-4 years were barely tolerable due to a ruthless boss who wanted everyone to kowtow to the boss. Promotions went to those who kissed up, even though they did not have enough knowledge or experience to do the job. I could not wait to get out.
We have had an independent financial advisor since we got married 30 years ago. We both were busy and we had no time (or interest) to manage our financial investments. We have been fortunate that both of our financial advisors have been trust worthy.
Our current financial advisor showed us the numbers. He said we are more than fine financially.
My husband does not regret leaving his high paying job. He had time to care of his mother (and his brother) until she passed away two yeas ago. His other siblings were grateful for his sacrifice. He is healthy and happy now.
I really enjoy my retirement. The unfortunate part is that I have developed a health issue after being super healthy all these years. It has limited my ability to do things I enjoy including gardening.
Many people could retire when they wanted to while many more had to retire when their situations were not ideal.
Whenever you and your husband plan to retire, I wish you the best.
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I think I am an anomaly compared to many women on this forum.
I worked full-time until ds was two years old when my husband took an expat assignment in the UK for two years. I stayed home with our ds when we lived overseas. I only worked part-time when we returned stateside and then only for two years. I then homeschooled our ds for 6.5 years. That was certainly working, but it didn’t pay much - lol. I, “retired,” from that when he entered high school and never returned to working. I was 47. Re-entering the work force was really not feasible for me at that point.
Dh had a high-stress corporate job. They, “retired,” him at age 55. He did plan to retire, but a headhunter found him, and he started working again. When we returned to Arkansas from Florida he intended to retire then. Alas, somebody else found him, and he immediately started working yet again. So, he has tried to retire twice to no avail. He plans to retire in two more years when he is 65. Hopefully, the third time will be the charm. I will say that these last two jobs have been less stressful and very fulfilling to him.
I feel like we are unusual compared to many CC-ers in that I really was primarily a SAHM from the age of 35 on. As such, there is great disparity in our lifetime earnings for SS purposes.
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same thing here.
Did not homeschool but worked part time, my main job was being a mom.
My husband switched jobs and relocated when our children went to college. It was the depths of the Great Recession, it was difficult to find a job in a small town. I’ve basically been retired since then. Not by choice but by circumstance
My husband was “retired” at 60. He was unceremoniously dumped. It was pretty traumatic at the time because the company he was loyal to wasn’t at all interested in what he was doing.
In the end it was ok. We are still in our small rural area, my husband has no intentions in working. We can be retired and be fine.
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I was a SAHM for 19.5 years. I returned to full time work for 11 years before retiring, and I earned a laughable salary when I returned (less than I had made almost 30 years earlier). While I worked my way up in my 2nd act, I was in a relatively low paying field. My SS is correspondingly lower than it would have been had I not stopped working when my kids were born. However, continuing to work another 5 years wouldn’t have made a lot of difference in the SS amount. It is >half my H’s SS, though.
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I was a SAHM for about 7 years, between when we moved to the US and when C26 started high school, when I went back to work. For reasons, during that time I used my savings /income on investments as though it was my salary (shared joint expenses with hubby and paid for all my own stuff) so I actually have a pretty good idea of what my spending was like with no salary income, though of course stage of life was different to what it will be when I actually retire. We will definitely downsize our house to an apartment (tbd where we will actually end up) and that alone will reduce some significant monthly/annual expenses.
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