GolfHos

... the security/stability/etc of your family/income/house/etc  in the next 2-3 years?

I'm stuck between C and D.  With my job, I have the stability, but I did feel a really good pinch with gas, food, and everything else prices climbing.

We're pretty much paycheck to paycheck right now.  Although the gas decrease of 50 percent plus has given us some breathing room.

My wage hasn't increased, and could easily see being behind in 2 years enough to not make it month to month.

I'm with you on this. I fear in 6 months though things could be worse. It all depends on a lot of things.

Well my job is secure and I may be getting a new job with my company which would make me happier at work.  My wife will only be increasing her monthly income as her clientel increases.  But with hospital bills eating into our savings we are still paycheck to paycheck.  So I'm just a little worried because we are one more major medical problem away from being really broke.  No way we can afford for me to go to law school in the next year or so.  But I am fairly optimistic about our future.  Especially if I get the new job.  

Things overall are pretty scary, but I'm feeling pretty good right now about my chances. If I have to work healthcare is a pretty safe spot all around. Sadly, people always get sick as attested to in Walfredo's post.

I'm not terribly concerned about our current situation, nor am I terribly concerned about it getting any worse on a household level. My retirement portfolio has taken a pretty significant hit, but I'm generally optimistic about it getting better.

C.

Susan's job is pretty secure relatively speaking (works for the gubmint  [sm_shock]). The benefits of past sound fiscal decisions, i.e., savings, are nice to have in the back pocket these days.

Our retirement portfolio has been hit for sure but we are still doing o.k. I'm optimistic but realize things could change rapidly.

There's a large gap between options C and D.

We aren't paycheck-to-paycheck, our house is still worth well more than mortgage balance, and we aren't laboring under ponderous debt ... but we're facing some upcoming medical bills and we don't have a 2- to 3-year slush fund, either.  I'm NOT in health care, so my job could go poof if things tighten up enough.  (My old law firm has already had a round of layoffs.)  With big companies in trouble, the impact on patent law is two-fold: their own law departments are always targets for cost-cutting, and they send fewer cases to law firms to write/file.

And of course, I'm always just one patch of wet leaves away from a motorcycle accident.  Short-term disability, long-term disability, and life insurance FTW/L!

Well Clive, I know it was an overly generalized set of categories, but hell I could have made 30 options, all sorts of subdividing it.  Just tried to make it into the broadest, realistic (for most people) group of 5 that I could.

I myself am in group D.
 8)

i may be employed but the bill collectors still call every day.  :sad3:

 :sad3: 

I answered C (cus I don't own my house), but not because I'm a little bit worried.  My job and place of employment are pretty secure, and my extra spending could be reduced significantly, and rather instantly, if things did happen (give up the club membership, cut back/eliminate my many vacations, etc.).  I didn't buy much house given my income level, so I could still make it on half my current pay should it come to that.

single guys FTW  :D

Plus he's a hobbit so he probably doesn't spend much on food.   :)

The line in hobbit's post that struck me was "I didn't buy much house given my income level, so I could still make it on half my current pay should it come to that". 

What scares me is that Susan and I could be sitting on a mortgage 2-3x what we currently have based on what we, ahem, qualified for according to lenders. I'm thankful today that we put as much down as possible and only used one income for planning purposes.

Exactly!

My lender qualified me for a lot more than I wanted to spend (this was 1998), but I stuck to my planning - not his.  His exact words... "You never know when you're going to find your dream house."   My instant response.... "What makes you think I can afford my dream house?  I dream big!"

meh!

I'm almost 52 years old, and I've watched my investments decline by almost half over the last 14 months (down around 400k).  I have one child in private grade school and another in an Archdiocesan high school. The one in HS is 21 months from going to college.  November has been the worst month my company has had in the 7 years I've been there.  I have this impending sense of doom almost daily (unless I drink). I've never been so scared.

Yet I realize my debt on my home is less than 35k, my wife has a job that provides half our income (and there's very little chance that her job is at risk).  Unless my company goes belly up (which is a definite possibility), I have a job.  I still have almost $500k in 401(k)'s and mutual funds.

So, I'm between C and D.  On one hand I know we'd get through it, on the other hand I'm watching my retirement disappear and I have the feeling that if I lose my job, I may never get another.  I've never had the feeling of anxiety that I have right now.

I know I'm over-reacting, I have trouble sleeping, but I can't seem to get past it.

Try Ambian. It works great.

C for me.  I've been straight commission for 11 or 12 of the last 15 years.  Some good months; some not as good.  Some good years; some not as good.  My industry is typically cyclical where we run into 12-18 months of downturn every 5-6 years.  We budget based on the worst months and years, and put the rest away. 

Still carrying 2 house payments, though we've had the other house rented for the last 6-7 months - to the person with whom we have a contingency contract to buy the house.  Hopefully, hers will sell at some point; otherwise, we keep it as a rental.  It wouldn't be the end of the world, though I'd rather have it gone.

That is brutal. Am I right to assume that you were 100% invested in equities in your retirement account (rather than a mix of stocks, bonds, and cash)? Also, does that amount represent losses on just your retirement account or the combined losses on both your and your wife's retirement account?

I've been too afraid to look at my retirement account balance, although I've been in a large cash position for quite some time now and know that it can only go so low. Where my wife and I lost most of our net worth is probably in our home value. Based on average declines here in Nor Cal, we've probably lost the equivalent of our remaining principal balance in equity. IOW, had we sold the house a year and a half ago, moved to Kansas or Greenland or Nunavut, moved back today, and bought an equivalent house, we'd own it outright.

We had a small amount in bonds (a balanced fund), but the number is combined losses for both of our accounts.  I figured I was 10-15 years from retirement, it wasn't yet the time to start moving to more conservative investments.  Now I have no choice but to stay invested in stocks.  If they go back up, I'll be okay.  If they go back down, it makes little difference.

There's time for the investments to come back.  My company may survive and I'm obsessing about nothing.  It's just difficult to not obsess over it.