One of the big issues with this is sequence of returns risk. If you retire and rely on your portfolio but the market dives for a year or two right after you leave the workforce, your total portfolio value is screwed because you were selling at a low point.

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rwmj an hour ago | parent [-]

Which is why you keep 3-5 years of spending money in cash (or a bond ladder if you want to be fancy).

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duzer65657 an hour ago | parent | next [-]

most don't even have 3-5 years "spending money" (whatever that is) in total savings; if you're keeping that in cash you're getting 2-3% annually while the market has doubled.

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MattGrommes 39 minutes ago | parent | next [-]

When you're headed into retirement, one possibility is to shift to saving more in cash-like options instead of a 401k (or whatever). It's should just be part of your retirement plan to account for possibilities like this.

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rwmj an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Sure, but we're not talking about people who have no savings. FIRE people have huge investment portfolios while being frugal with their spending, and understand the risk of keeping 5-10% of their total net worth in cash equivalents (not dissimilar to having insurance).

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hdgvhicv an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

People return with less than 4 years expenses in retirement funds

Surely you need about 20 years?

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bell-cot 30 minutes ago | parent | prev [-]

Look back at the grandparent comment. If someone doesn't have 3-5 years in total savings, then they had better not try to retire.

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staticman2 27 minutes ago | parent | prev [-]

3 to 5 years of cash or a bond ladder won't help in a 1970s stagflation scenario.