Say if you retire early with 500k in saving but you lose all your income, do you count as low income and can get some sort of financial assistance e.g. food stamps or having that 500k disqualifies you for any assistance?
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You'd need to look into the specific eligibility criteria for each program you're interested in and for the specific state you're in. If you want to receive food stamps in the state of Idaho, for example, you're generally limited to 5,000 in assets in addition to a car. Other states and other programs will have different limitations.
That being said, it is pretty unlikely that someone with half a million in assets would receive meaningful amounts of cash welfare assistance in any state if they were able to work and just wanted to retire early. It is also reasonably likely that if you have a $500,000 portfolio that you're using for retirement that you'd be producing a reasonable amount of income in the form of dividends, interest, capital gains distributions from mutual funds, etc. It would generally be unwise to be retired and have your entire nest egg in early stage growth companies that don't pay dividends.
Justin Cave
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Yes, by engineering your lifestyle and by being honest with your social worker, you can get food stamps with a net worth of $500k in many states [PDF].
- Engineer for yourself an income near $0 by investing 80% of your money in non-dividend payers such as Berkshire Hathaway. The other 20% is cash savings for you to spend down. Don't realize any capital gains. Don't take on any interesting consulting work or part-time gigs
- Sign a statement requested by your social worker, to prove that, by spending down your savings, you are paying your monthly bills despite having little income
- Prepare to be underwhelmed by the food stamp allowance for a single individual with no kids
Here's a relevant forum post from early-retirement.org
Orange Coast- reinstate Monica
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