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How do you define when someone or you can safely retire. 3% rule based on liquid portfolio plus 1-2 years of cash living expenses?
Maybe thats extreme as most push 3.5-4% liquid portfolio as pretty safe.
Beyond a modest liquid/cash emergency fund, I think that the 1-2 years of cash living expenses you mention ought to be rolled into the overall asset allocation for their portfolio. The idea being that if the equity market declines for a while, you'd be selling bonds (not stocks) to fund your withdrawals anyway, as part of planned rebalancing.
In general I think people should just pick an overall asset allocation and stick with it. When people say they're 100% stocks but then also say they're holding cash on the side for a future buy-the-dip scenario, they're not actually 100% stocks.
I think aspects that are often overlooked in these calculations are that (1) it's usually possible for wealthier retirees to adjust their spending in response to market events, and (2) retirees typically spend much less in their later years than their earlier years.
3% is rather pessimistic/conservative unless your retirement budget is dominated by fixed/non-discretionary spending. That's often true for lower income retirees, whose retirement budget is dominated by housing food and healthcare, but it's probably NOT true for people like us.
A retiree with a $200,000 yr budget might want a portfolio of $X million to yield that $200K post tax at a SWR of Y% ... but there's a world of difference between a retiree whose $200K budget has $180K of fixed expenses, vs one whose $200K budget is $120K of fixed expenses plus $60K of travel. The former should probably choose a lower SWR and therefore set his portfolio goal higher, while the latter should be safe with a higher SWR and therefore a smaller portfolio.
The ability to spend an extended period of time withdrawing less money, and especially not selling equity holdings during a downturn, is very important.