Net Wealth and Cash Flow

Sure, why not.
If you got plenty of funds available, it's just a big game, not like work or anything.
Got to do something.

 

We retired 6 years ago (1st September is our anniversary date) when we sold our business.

We were going to invest these funds into real estate but our accountant and our financial planner independently told us that we had enough IPs. So we didn't.

For CGT reasons, we put most of the funds into our SMSF. With the balance, we knocked down our PPOR and built a new one. That was 5 years ago and was a lifestyle decision. So much for listening to our accountant and financial planner.

Until this year, we had stopped investing and watched our net worth increase due to capital growth and our cashflow increase due to our SMSF balance and our rental increases (property portfolio was cashflow positive).

We are living the good life. We are both 60 and, while we are reasonably healthy, travel is our big thing. In the last 3 months, we spent 2 weeks in Melbourne, 2 weeks at Bargara and 5 weeks in Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos. Over the 2 months, we will be spending another 3 weeks in Melbourne and 2 weeks in Bargara. We don't have time for investing.

Having said that, we made our BIGGEST ever property purchase in February this year. In the short-term, it is an IP but it is really a lifestyle investment. We plan to down size into it in the next 2 to 5 years.

And it was a big purchase for us. It was 5 to 6 times the current value of any of our individual IPs and twice the value of our unit complex. We drew equity out of our PPOR for the 20% deposit, borrowed the other 80% against the new purchase, turned our positive cashflow portfolio to negative and need to use some of self-funded pension to hold the property, especially if it is vacant for too long (although we had a tenant before we signed the sale contract).

So, the morale of the story, one should never say never.

 

I don't think we'll ever stop renovating/building and moving - but only as our ppor-of-the-moment rather than rentals

 

My goal, and I'm sure I'm not alone in this, is to keep working and buy/pay down IP's with some shares on the side, until I can replace my wage and own our PPOR outright. Then transition into life as a full time investor on my own terms. The goal is 10 more years at which point I'll be 55.

 

I decided to skip the last 10 yrs, might go back to it but happy to take a break and see if life could be just as good enjoying what we have today. Depends on your requirements though.

 

Over the last 5 years:

Running (and expanding) a business; we are shareholders rather than full owners so are buying more shares whenever the opportunity presents itself (not that often so far). It's a big part of our (current) cash flow.

Invested in a property which will (longer term) be a great income earner. Currently not receiving any income from it (all going back to pay off the loan) so we will be out of pocket for a few years yet. We'll be very happy to get to the point where it starts to pay us, and that will be a big part of our future cash flow.

Otherwise, trying to read/learn about developments, as I see opportunities all around us! But don't know enough yet. One day......

Also see lots of opportunities in the stock market, and will move into the SMSF space at some point in the next few years (once cash flow starts to actually flow to us rather than to loans!).

Would love to be able to call ourselves "retired" within 10 years. Very unlikely that we will ever stop investing, though - just the mix might change.