Your taxes will be what your taxes will be. If you and your husband have steady, predictable income (rather than having it vary wildly due to bonuses or commissions), and you haven't had huge increases in pay, then your taxes next year will be roughly what they were this year. The question you need to ask is: Are we having a monthly amount withheld that at the end of the year will total about what our taxes were last year? What you should strive for is to be just a little over or a little under. Right now you say you're having an extra $5280 in income from reducing withholding. How much was your refund last year? If it's less than this, you need to make some adjustments to get these two numbers into rough alignment. While it's ok to under-withhold and owe money, it becomes a problem if you are too aggressive, because it can trigger penalties, additional forms, and mandatory quarterly payments the following tax year if you don't have at least 90% of estimated taxes withheld, as I recall. If the math is too much for you, have your financial planner figure out how much should be withheld. You can specify this amount on the W-4, rather than simply changing the exemptions. Right now it sounds like you're guessing at some of this, and you should really try to get it right.

"Luck" is very often another word for "opportunity". Sometimes you are able to take advantage of it, and sometimes you aren't. It wasn't hard to make money - we're in our late 50's, double-income no kids Boomers, and own a paid-for home, two cars and little debt. But we've made very specific choices in life, some of which paid off (DH's defined benefit pension and retiree health benefits) and some of which didn't. Our overhead is still high - I cringed the last time I totaled up what we spend monthly on various insurance policies - but as I've often said, I was taught to view insurance as risk mitigation, so it's a necessity in our overall estate planning. We've done a lot better on our investments since I really started paying attention to investing and made an effort to learn about it. But when I look back, we left the portfolio unattended until almost too late in life. Fortunately, I picked up the interest in learning about investing before the dot-com bust. So when the bust happened, I didn't change a thing about the portfolio, because I'd learned that panic moves are what kill your ROI. Sure enough, the portfolio got back to even in 18 months and then took off from there. That taught me the value of dollar-cost averaging, too. stinkygdnr, I don't know what OJ would say about your home, but our home was underwater for almost 10 years. It was pretty painful, but we consoled ourselves that heck, we had to live somewhere no matter what. In the end values went higher, although of course they've dropped again this past year. But in the long run, a home usually gives you some appreciation. Plus you get a lot of incalculable enjoyment from living in a place you can remodel and change to your heart's content. We liked our home, didn't love it, until we finished all the landscaping. Then we fell in love with it, finding it a real joy to just sit in the garden in a recliner, reading a book and drinking homemade lemonade. Like I said on a different discussion forum, very often it's the simplest pleasures in life that are the best!

Bob, This is part of "The Energy Policy act of 2005". Attched is a link to the policy and it explains the credits suchas High efficiency furnaces $150, High Efficiency Central A/C units $300, High Efficiency fans for heating/cooling $50,... Split systems must have a Seasonal Energy Efficiency Rating of 15 AND and Energy Efficiency Rating of 12.5. Total credit max is $500 and the deadline is December 31, 2007. As the credits are listed separatly, I would assume you can get the $300 credit for the Condensing unit & Evaporator coil (Less furnace), but heres the catch. You have to buy an ARI certified set of coil and matching condensing unit. The sites below will help you. Also contact a local A/C installer and get a second opinion. Remember this is a "Tax Credit" so if you can google the tax credit form, it should definately explain what is and is not covered. Thanks Dan Martyn http://www.epa.gov/oust/fedlaws/publ_109-058.pdf http://www.energy.gov/taxbreaks.htm http://www.cee1.org/resid/rs-ac/res-ac_specs.pdf http://www.cee1.org/resid/rs-ac/rs-ac-tax-credits.php3 http://www.ceehvacdirectory.org/ Here is a link that might be useful: Energy Policy Act of 2005

HOA fees can be fairly predictable, they usually don't take huge jumps. We have an HOA on the lot we bought and there is a limit to the increase. It should be published somewhere. I think it is a consideration but I wouldn't think it is a vast swing one way or the other. Full disclosure - I am not retired, but I believe that most people go through several phases of homes - The starter home, the family home, and the retirement home and each of those phases are a departure from the things we wanted/needed before. It really all depends on what you want. My mind always goes to the financial perspective when thinking about these things. If you find a community that you like, there is nothing wrong with doing things for non financial reasons. There is no point in having a little more money if you are not going to use it to be happy. From a financial perspective there is no real difference. Rarely have interest rates been good enough to see a spread once you are retired and have a low risk appetite, but they are now. I personally prefer a small single family house, my grandmother turned 94 in a small "shotgun" house. There are some good Christmas memories as we packed a lot of people into that tiny house. I have lived in condos and townhomes, they don't seem the same to me. But that is just me.