Meet Wendy.
Wendy’s main concerns, in her own words: If we were to stay in the Midwest in our current jobs, I wouldn’t be worried about our financial future at all. However, my husband, who is active duty military, is going to separate soon and we plan to move back to southern CA where both of our families live. We’ve both been applying to jobs for the past year. He is currently on the short list for two positions & seems confident that he will get at least one of them; I’m still applying and interviewing.
We aren’t going to move until at least one of us has a job, so I think our worst case scenario is that we move when (if) he gets one of these jobs, which we estimate will pay him $130,000/yr. Here are some of my biggest concerns with that scenario:
SoCal costs of living are not what we’re accustom to. If we scale back on our retirement savings and continue living frugally, we can make it on that salary, but it would require that we scale back on our retirement/investment savings, which is very scary for me.
I’ve been researching housing options, and I think buying a house might be the cheapest option for us. We have access to the VA loan up to a home worth $625,000. We would like to buy a house for less than that amount both so that we don’t have to take on two mortgages and because a house worth more will require a higher monthly payment than I’m comfortable with. The VA loan doesn’t require a down payment, but we plan on putting down 10% to reduce the funding fee.
I’m hoping to land a job not too long after we get there, but I really have no idea how long this job search will last for me. To that end, I am lining up contract/freelance work for when we move, but I’m not factoring that into my projections because I have no idea how much that will bring in or how consistent it will be.
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Nicole is the Digital Marketing Assistant at Pete the Planner®. She produces the radio show, podcast, and TV show. Additionally, she runs all email campaigns, webinars, and client programming. Nicole can be found drinking a Kombucha wherever there is an outdoor music festival.