I often imagine where my wife and I will be five years from now. Will we be fully retired, working, traveling, living at the beach or in the mountains? These are just a few of the thoughts I have when I think about that question. To see where we may be five years from now I need to look at where I am right now with life. To do this I have to put together a list of the things most important to my wife and I and then add to that list with details about our current status. We then can look at determining where we want to be in five years and how we will plan to get there. We have been in this process for awhile now and it takes time to decide what you want to be doing in the future.

Our girls are grown and living their lives and doing quite well at it. We are at the phase where we have supported and raised them through college and into their mid twenties so now we will look to do what we want to do in the next five years so we can spend the balance of our lives doing what we want to do. My wife likes the beach more than the mountains and I like the mountains more than the beach. I think either would be great but if we cannot find a way to have both then one will have to give. One of our goals is to have a place at either or both. To accomplish our five years from now goals we had to look at our financial, spiritual, family, work and activity goals.

1- Financial: We want to be financially debt free. In five years we plan to owe zero to no one. Not one red cent to any bank, credit card, mortgage company or anyone. We will likely accomplish this goal long before that because we have a plan in place already. As soon as we sell our current home we can get completely debt free as that is the main debt we carry. Plans are to payoff debt, save and invest for a bright opportunity five years from now.

2- Family: Our girls are grown but we spend lots of time with them not only hanging out but working with them in a family type business situation. We want to be close to them, but also want to travel and find our happy spot for retirement. There is a balance we need ti figure out with that so we have some decisions to make and work on solving that dilemma.

3- Activity: We love to travel around even if it is just a short weekend trip. This allows us to go and see new places, find new things to do and spend time traveling and chilling out. Do we get a new place, buy an RV, rent or pay cash in a central location. Once again we have questions and things to work out. We love the mountains, beach and lakes so is one of those our final living destination as home base. From there we go be active and live our best lives.

As you can see my wife and I have questions to ask and answer in the coming years as we plan to see where we will be five years from now. I do know it will require not working, traveling, enjoying life and spending time with our family and friends. How we accomplish that is TBD and something we will be actively figuring out soon.

Coach B!