LogFAQs > #954862505

Zeus posted...

So I guess with the caveat "if you invest everything you feasibly can," the million would be enough to retire on assuming that a person's debts don't vastly exceed the national average. When I heard "retire on a million," this wasn't where my mind was going. Colloquially, when people say that, they mean just living on that money and maybe whatever assets they already have, which would be difficult for younger people.

I don't think anyone with a modicum of financial sense means "I'm just going to take all the money I have now and hope it lasts me until I die" when they talking about retiring. It's a given that any retirement plan involves investment so you have actual income to keep you going and your savings can do more than just sit there uselessly until you reach the bottom of the barrel. That's not to say that nobody tries to retire like that, but it's very clearly not a good idea, and most people at least understand that the concept of investing exists.

Zeus posted...

So subtract [...] $90k to get out of debt.

That's not necessarily a prerequisite for planning retirement (or whatever) around receiving a large lump sum. If the interest you're paying on that debt is lower than your RoI, you may actually be better off investing the money and making minimum payments on the debt. Other factors can come into play, like improving your debt:income ratio to get better terms on a mortgage, or simply the peace of mind that comes from being debt-free, but defaulting to "I must pay down my debt before anything else" isn't always the optimal course of action.

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