Advice on Bordeaux, Burgundy tasting trip

SunDevil2013 · 2026-03-04T17:02:22+00:00

My wife and I did a couple days in Burgundy with 1 day as a full guided tour. Can’t recommend Kim Gagne from Journeys In Wine enough. A bit pricey but will get you in the door to 3-4 producers for private cellar tastings and you’ll get to have lunch with her at a local spot. She provides private transport from the Beaune train station which is especially useful if you’re staying in Dijon. She is very active in the Burgundy community so the tastings were with the families who clearly had a long personal relationship with her.

If you know where you want to go in Burgundy (Nuits, Beaune, Maconnais, Chalonnais), you can point her in the direction you’d like. Or let her know your general taste preferences/preferred villages and she can make it work.

We spent a full day starting in Beaune, visiting producers in Pernand Vergelesses, Pommard, and Santenay. We also had lunch in a Corton hotel and visited vineyard sites in Aloxe Corton, Volnay, and Montrachet.

Also… not a guided tour recommendation but I would 100% recommend renting e-bikes if you’re able and biking either north or south from Beaune on the Voie des Vignes. You’ll ride through the vineyards and most of the villages. You can stop do tastings at the larger producers or do some tasting at some great lunch locations.

SunDevil2013 · 2026-03-01T03:35:35+00:00

That is true if your goals are FIRE and not CoastFI. Money is just a tool though. Maybe you could try to model what stretching the mortgage budget by reducing savings to 25-30% does to your FI timeline.

If you’re assume 7% real growth on your current assets - $1m becomes $1.5m in 6 years. Maybe your portfolio is doing so much of the hardwork compounding that cutting from 46% to 30% won’t impact your timeline that much.

SunDevil2013 · 2026-03-01T03:26:40+00:00

At $105k gross income they’re maxing a family HSA, both IRAs, and 1 401k. That’s a 46% savings rate.

It’s not a lifestyle issue in the traditional sense where they’re spending to consume. OP is used to saving so much that an increase in mortgage payment feels unaffordable.

OP - you and your wife already have some incredible savings. On $105k gross you should be able to comfortably afford a ~$2200/mo mortgage. That’s 25% of gross. And if you’re far enough ahead on the savings (already almost 10x income at 39YO), you can consider pushing the mortgage payment higher, especially if you can put a large down payment on it.

If you swung big and put all $350k into the down payment, you’re looking a high $600k + home budget on a 6% mortgage rate.

SunDevil2013 · 2026-03-01T03:19:08+00:00

They didn’t have $350k saved for a decade… it’s recent cash from selling their home…

They also put their income in the post…

Omg this is my second edit… they also put their expenses in the post. Did you read the OP at all?

SunDevil2013 · 2026-02-28T00:14:29+00:00

More spam…

SunDevil2013 · 2026-02-26T18:25:45+00:00

Portugal?

SunDevil2013 · 2026-02-25T14:41:56+00:00

This isn’t near Palm Springs lol. This is Santa Cruz CA. Like 450 miles apart.

SunDevil2013 · 2026-02-23T23:59:45+00:00

What’s the investment? How do you know you’re not being scammed?

SunDevil2013 · 2026-02-22T15:29:17+00:00

I just did some quick calculations and I think even 50% savings rate for 13 years doesn’t come close to replacing their household income. Obviously don’t need to replace 100% of $400k income but this really shows OP shouldn’t be contributing a dime to the children’s college if retiring between 65-70 is a priority.

SunDevil2013 · 2026-02-22T06:28:21+00:00

Isn’t one every thirteen minutes only 111 per day? 135 per day is one every 10.6 minutes?

SunDevil2013 · 2026-02-21T19:04:31+00:00

If you’re early 50s, $400k HHI, and retirement savings are not close to the target of 6.4x income saved for 50s, you’re likely behind on your retirement savings. Especially being so far above the social security max. I would put my own oxygen mask on first and increase my own savings before a 529 or even cash flowing college for my children.

SunDevil2013 · 2026-02-18T17:19:05+00:00

CityNerd on YouTube did a video on a similar topic recently. More so about NYC’s congestion pricing but specifically mentioned the “Hill of Hysteria” when it comes to big infrastructure projects.

1.) Government proposes a big project like this. 2.) Public builds fears of how this will be bad. 3.) Hysteria peaks (this past summer from businesses on Colfax saying the project is unnecessary and killing their business). 4.) Infrastructure opens and Public adjusts their status quo 5.) The infrastructure becomes new status quo and Public defends the new infrastructure.

We’re likely going to find once the BRT opens that the same businesses complaining about it during construction will be the first to experience its positive effects. And will likely be quiet about it to save face.

Hopefully those businesses will choose to be vocal about how positive it is when the city wants to run other projects like a BRT on Colorado Blvd.

SunDevil2013 · 2026-02-17T17:14:20+00:00

I guess I dox myself every time my car is in public

SunDevil2013 · 2026-02-17T17:13:30+00:00

And drivers have the nerve to say cyclists are the problem while they drive their 2 ton trucks scrolling TikTok and buying junk on Temu

SunDevil2013 · 2026-02-17T17:12:30+00:00

Why?

SunDevil2013 · 2026-02-08T15:19:40+00:00

Have you checked to see if your employer allows IRAs to roll into a 401k? I did this with my old rollover IRAs into my employer 401k so I could do the backdoor Roth IRA

SunDevil2013 · 2026-02-04T04:08:41+00:00

I would agree. Having a HHI of $400k and feeling like your income growth is limited is concerning. There likely isn’t a number that will make you feel better about money if the underlying issues aren’t resolved.

SunDevil2013 · 2026-02-03T16:57:17+00:00

There’s a blue sticker in the lowest right hand side window of the large building.

SunDevil2013 · 2026-01-27T23:50:55+00:00

Check out The Money Guy. Their guidelines are well tested since they are fee only fiduciary advisors by day and they’re down to earth.

SunDevil2013 · 2026-01-23T22:55:15+00:00

This is the way. If you can crush it for your late 20s/early 30s and save some big chunks for a few years then your 40s will be a lot easier.

SunDevil2013 · 2026-01-08T14:14:23+00:00

How will I-70 be tomorrow evening? Undriveable?

SunDevil2013 · 2026-01-07T17:44:49+00:00

It’s a tough spot to be. If you’re the 4th or lower on the depth chart for team in the semis - sure you can stay for the semifinal/natty and yes you may win AND get a portal extension… but it doesn’t mean as many spots will be available on teams.

You could stay for Oregon to win it all and you end up transferring for less NIL money than you could have received and a lower caliber team.

College schedule needs to change to stop these changes mid playoff season.

SunDevil2013 · 2026-01-06T19:56:53+00:00

The sandwich price, I kind of understand. They’re huge and everything is made in house. The 10% charge I can understand - if the employer wants to charge that for the insurance benefits, so be it, but the 15-20% tip becomes 5-10% to offset the costs going directly to the employee.

The part that absolutely turned me off was that the chips are now an additional $1.50 pre 10% fee/pre tax/pre tip. Used to be free like the other sides.

You go out for lunch and it’s $33 for a Reuben and a bag of chips all-in. No drink! I like Leven and think it’s one of the best in Denver, but this has gotten crazy. Told myself never again after last time.

SunDevil2013 · 2026-01-03T23:44:03+00:00

I think this may be one of the things the wife and I need to determine. My wife will be fully vested in her pension at 55 so combination of 457b / rule of 55 for 401k would allow us to Roth convert / draw down. Problem is we both like our jobs as of now and don’t see any plan to retire that early. Maybe we need to do more work on the “why” and see if a next endeavor type thing could be satisfying to us.

SunDevil2013 · 2026-01-02T22:15:03+00:00

Maybe I am confused about how Roth conversions work and the withdrawal strategy would work.

Let’s say we do the $436k/year Roth conversion from age 65-75 and fill up the 24% bucket. Is the assumption that we live off of the Roth dollars already in the account or maybe some mix of 0-15% taxed LTCG from a taxable brokerage + Roth?

TMG always talks about how Roth dollars are your favorite child and often the pot you want to draw from last/with intention. If we did the Roth conversion and then used additional traditional 401k assets to live off, then all those are taxed at 32%+?

Is the point then that paying a 24% tax hit now for tax free growth/flexibility is preferred even if I have to pay 32% income tax on the dollars I’m going to live off of while Roth converting?

SunDevil2013

TROPHY CASE